How to Repurpose Long-Form Content into Social Media Posts

Repurposing long content into social media posts is a great way to expand your reach, save time, and boost engagement. Long-form content, like blogs, white papers, and eBooks, is often full of valuable insights. They can be turned into bite-sized pieces for social media.

This blog post will show you how to turn a great long piece into engaging social media content that resonates with your audience. By the end, you’ll know how to use your content to boost your brand’s visibility on social media.

Why Repurpose Long-Form Content?

Repurposing long content saves time and has many benefits for your business.

1. Wider Reach: By breaking down your long-form content into different formats, you can reach audiences on various social media platforms.

2. Improved SEO: Repurposing content helps improve your brand’s visibility across different channels, reinforcing your SEO efforts.

3. Increased Engagement: Short-form content like quotes, infographics, and visuals derived from long-form posts are more digestible and often lead to higher engagement rates.

4. Content Longevity: When you repurpose a blog or eBook into smaller posts, you extend its life cycle, making your content continuously valuable.

5. Consistency: Repurposing content ensures your brand message remains consistent across all platforms while allowing for creative iterations.

Now, let’s dive into how you can efficiently repurpose long-form content for social media platforms.

Step 1: Identify Key Sections of Your Long-Form Content

The first step in repurposing long-form content is to identify the key sections or main points that can be broken down into smaller pieces. Look for the most valuable and insightful information in your content that can stand alone as social media updates. These may include:

• Important takeaways

• Key statistics or data points

• Interesting quotes or highlights

• Actionable tips or recommendations

• FAQs or commonly asked questions

For instance, if you have a blog post on “10 Effective SEO Strategies,” each of the 10 strategies can be a separate social media post. Break your content into its core elements to make it easier to repurpose.

Step 2: Choose the Right Social Media Platforms

Different social media platforms cater to different content types. So, decide which platform is best for each piece of repurposed content. Here’s a quick breakdown of how to tailor your content to fit the most popular platforms:

1. Instagram

• Best for: Visual content, quotes, tips, and behind-the-scenes.

• Content Ideas: You can turn key quotes or actionable insights into eye-catching graphics using design tools like Canva. Also, create carousel posts summarizing main points, tips, or strategies from your long-form content. Instagram Stories and Reels are perfect for short videos summarizing a blog or whitepaper.

2. Twitter

• Best for: Quick, concise updates, quotes, data points, or thoughts.

• Content Ideas: Extract data points or quotes from your content and share them as tweets. Include relevant hashtags to increase the reach. You can also run a thread breaking down the key sections of a blog post, where each tweet in the thread addresses one aspect.

3. Facebook

• Best for: Engaging and community-building content.

• Content Ideas: Share tips, key takeaways, or questions from your long-form content to spark conversations. You can also create polls or ask questions related to your content to drive engagement. Facebook is also a great platform for sharing blog post links with engaging summaries.

4. LinkedIn

• Best for: Professional insights, articles, and industry news.

• Content Ideas: Share case studies, statistics, or long-form posts as LinkedIn articles. For business-related content, you can share professional advice or key findings from your blog or white paper. Create a LinkedIn carousel or slide deck summarizing key takeaways.

5. Pinterest

• Best for: Visual and how-to content.

• Content Ideas: If your long-form content contains actionable tips, you can create “how-to” infographics or step-by-step visuals to share on Pinterest. You can also make pinboards that link back to your blog posts or eBooks for additional exposure.

6. YouTube/Instagram Reels/TikTok

• Best for: Video content.

• Content Ideas: Repurpose your long-form content into short video snippets. For example, summarize a blog post or give a behind-the-scenes look at the creation of your content. These platforms thrive on short, engaging video content that entertains or informs.

Step 3: Create Multiple Content Formats

After finding key sections of your long content and choosing the right platforms, it’s time to create different formats. Here are a few ways you can repurpose your content creatively:

1. Quotes and Graphics

• Extract compelling quotes from your content and pair them with stunning visuals. These work well on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn, where quotes are widely shared and engaged with.

2. Infographics

• Condense the main points of your long-form content into a single, visually appealing infographic. This works especially well for statistics, data points, or how-to guides. Infographics are great for Pinterest, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

3. Video Summaries

• Record short videos summarizing your long-form content. Videos grab attention quickly, and platforms like Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts are ideal for short, engaging video clips.

4. Carousel Posts

• Create a series of images or slides that walk through the main ideas or takeaways from your content. Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook allow you to create carousel posts, which provide more information in a swipeable format.

5. Blog Post Links with Summaries

• Share your original blog post or long-form content link on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, along with an engaging summary or teaser. Use this as an opportunity to drive traffic to your website.

6. Threaded Posts (Twitter)

• For platforms like Twitter, where posts have a character limit, break a long piece into a series of themed tweets. Use a Twitter thread to share tips, strategies, or case studies from the content.

Step 4: Include Visuals to Boost Engagement

Visuals play a key role in making your repurposed content more engaging and shareable on social media. Well-designed visuals, like quote graphics, infographics, and short videos, capture attention and boost engagement. Use tools like Canva, Adobe Spark, or Visme to easily create professional-looking visuals that align with your brand’s style and message.

Step 5: Use Hashtags and Keywords

Hashtags are critical for social media content discovery. To increase the reach of your repurposed content, use relevant, trending hashtags on Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Incorporate industry-specific keywords in your posts to attract a larger, targeted audience.

For example, if your long-form content is about “SEO Best Practices for 2024,” you might use hashtags like:

• #SEO2024

• #DigitalMarketing

• #SearchEngineOptimization

• #ContentMarketing

Make sure to tailor hashtags for each platform and the audience you’re trying to reach. Instagram allows for more hashtags, while platforms like LinkedIn and Twitter prefer a limited number of well-chosen tags.

Step 6: Engage and Respond

Once your repurposed content is live on social media, engage with your audience by responding to comments, likes, and shares. Social media is not just a broadcast channel but a two-way communication platform. If someone asks a question about your content or shares their thoughts, reply to them. This helps you build stronger relationships with your followers. It also boosts your social media presence.

Step 7: Analyze and Adjust

Lastly, track the performance of your repurposed social media content. Use platform-specific analytics tools to monitor engagement, reach, and conversion metrics. You can then adjust your repurposing strategy based on what types of posts generate the most engagement.

For example:

• If quote graphics get more likes and shares on Instagram, consider focusing more on visual quote posts.

• If video summaries work well on LinkedIn, produce more short video content to share your insights.

Analyze your social media performance. It can help you improve your content repurposing strategy for better results.

Conclusion

Repurposing long content into social media posts is a smart way to maximize its value. It saves time and helps you reach a wider audience. To keep your social media content fresh and engaging, break down key points. Tailor content for each platform. Create multiple formats. Your long-form content, like a blog post or eBook, holds valuable insights. They can fuel your social media strategy for weeks or months.

By repurposing content, you keep your messaging consistent. You also build a stronger, scalable content marketing strategy that supports business growth.