Episode Summary
The fear of self-promotion is a big hurdle for many marketers today. And one of the biggest reasons they’re afraid to promote their content too much is that they’re afraid of boring, annoying, or losing their followers.
But as long as you create valuable content, your options for repurposing are endless, and your audience won’t be able to get enough of you.
In this episode of the Recorded Content podcast, host Justin Brown welcomes Ross Simmonds, the CEO of Foundation. They talk about the importance of repurposing content, why you need to promote your content as much as possible, and how to effectively collaborate with influencers in your niche.
Podcast Expert
- Name: Ross Simmonds
- What he does: He's the CEO of Foundation.
- Company: Foundation
- Noteworthy: Foundation is a content marketing agency that combines data and creativity to develop and serve ambitious B2B brands. Foundation provides content marketing services to organizations worldwide, ranging from some of the fastest-growing startups and consumer products to the Fortune 500.
Key Insights
- Content promotion helps you get your content in front of the right people. Despite what some people think, content promotion is nothing to be afraid of. You won't lose your followers, and you will certainly not embarrass yourself. Remember that the biggest reason you need to promote your content is to help your audience solve their problems. Ross explains, "They're going to continue to struggle for weeks, months, even years, maybe for the rest of their lives, because you didn't promote that piece of content. So you need to start with that — understanding that you're actually doing a service to your audience if you truly believe that your content is worth sharing. And then, while you listen to this, you should be thinking, 'Okay, I need to go promote that thing that I developed, right here, right now, this second.'"
- Give value to your community. Every successful content creator knows that value is everything. You need to give back to your community by creating valuable content and promoting it on various channels. Ross says, "When you do it, you always want to lean heavily into the idea that you're adding value to the community. You're not trying to extract it. So what I always advise people to do when you go into these communities is to come in very much thanking the community for what they did for you in terms of the content they've produced. Maybe you advise in a subreddit that you've been a longtime lurker and that you are sharing this podcast because you want to give back to the community that has given so much to you."
- If you create valuable content, your opportunities for repurposing are endless. When you make a valuable and powerful piece of content, the most important thing to do is to repurpose it. And luckily for you, there are many different options for repurposing content in today's day and age. Ross explains, "What you want to do is think about how you can chop up your content, whether it's turning a video into an audiogram, an audiogram into a Twitter thread, or a Twitter thread into a video that you're talking into the camera for. You want to realize that if you can create a piece of content, one that is valuable, you can distribute it forever. You can repurpose it forever. You can find ways to repackage that thing forever as long as the content at its core was valuable."
“Create once and distribute forever.”
Ross Simmonds
CEO
Foundation
Episode Highlights
Ideal promotion frequency differs from platform to platform.
“The frequency volume on Twitter is significantly higher than the frequency volume that is ideal on LinkedIn. And it’s directly related to the way in which those platforms are treating content when they serve them up to your followers and your connections.”
Give your influencers creative freedom.
“The key is to give the influencers the understanding and the ability to be great at what they do. I think a lot of brands make the mistake of jumping in and trying to create a very tight creative brief, trying to create a very tight window of opportunity and saying, ‘You have to do it exactly like this. You have to refer to us this way.’ And as such, they’re met with some watered-down content. Your influencers know their space. They know what’s going to engage with their audience. They know what’s going to drive results, so you have to give them some wiggle room.”
Embrace video content.
“The vast majority of the world wants video content. Our primary media consumption channel is video. But for years, I’ve been creating the written word. Blog posts and writing have been the things that built my career. And when I realized this, I clued into a simple fact, which is that if I took a lot of my written content and turned it into video, it would probably have a longer shelf life. So I started to make that move and shift to video-driven content because the humans have spoken, and the humans want video content. So let’s embrace video content.”
