Researchers are not 100% sure where the origins of spring cleaning came from, some trace it back to the Iranian Nowruz, the Persian new year, which falls on the first day of spring where everything throughout the house is cleaned. But others have suggested it dates backs to the ancient Jewish practice of cleansing the home thoroughly in anticipation of the springtime festival of Passover. Another thought is it's associated with the Catholic church because on Maundy Thursday, the day before Good Friday the church cleans everything related to the altar.
Whatever the true origins even Microsoft Dynamics content marketers, spring cleaning has similar parallels. It’s a great time to stock of your content strategy with a fresh set of eyes, clean up old files, create new content and look to see what material can be reused.
Within a content strategy there are three types of content:
Original
Repurposed
Syndicated/Curated
Let’s dig deeper into how this might look in more details.
Syndicated/Curated Content
We look at approx. 20% on average in this area.
An are we can all agree on is that writing original content is time-consuming.
Pro’s and Con’s Syndicated/Curated Content are:
· Pro
It’s Easy
Typically there is a lot of it out there
t’s accessible
· Con
It’s syndicated/curated which means others are also using the content and usually you are sending your customer to other websites instead of yours
Depending on you use the content you run the risk of being penalized by Google for posting duplicate content.
Now there are few ways you look to avoid being penalized.
Don't post the entire article. Instead, write your introductory paragraph and link to the original article, giving full credit to the source.
Post the entire article, but change several elements, minimally the title, and the paragraph order. Ideally, change more of the wording, editing as you go along.
If you're looking for content one site you could look at is the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Community as there is a ton there.
Repurposed/Refreshed Content
Again we put this done to being approx. 20% of your content
It is like hitting the lottery that many will ignore. If you have been tracking your open and click rates of your blogs/articles over the last year for example and then go back to look at which ones were your best performers. OK now, which ones are still relevant? Which ones performed well but the content is outdated? These are you winning numbers so go and look at repurposing the content and posting new blogs/articles. Don’t update the originals, create new ones.
Sshh I’m going to tell you a little secret. This article was written back in 2017 for a magazine, so all I am doing is merely refreshing and repurposing the content to make it relevant for 2019 and Microsoft Dynamics 365 Partner.
Pro’s and Con’s Repurposed/Refreshed Content are:
· Pro
Save Time
Allow you to capitalize on great content
You know your readers engaged with original content
· Con
Typically, the con’s are very low here
Original Content
The other 60% of your content on average should be made up of original material.
When blogging remember blogs don’t have to be thousands of words long. The average blog post length for 2019 is approx. One thousand fifty words (Source: Orbit Media) but 18% of companies typical write approx. Seven hundred fifty words (Source: Curata). But longer, in-depth blog posts typically generate 9x more leads than shorter ones (Source: Curata), so if you have the time try to go with the slightly longer blogs.
But always be relevant, catchy and make sure include the appropriate keywords.
To get more engagement out of every blog make sure you are posting them appropriately across your social networks and not just once because people are not always online at the time you post.
A tip I like I to share is making sure you have a content calendar to keep you on track.
One area we like encourage our customers to do is to get their consultants involved by writing blogs as well. You might even consider an incentive, such as: “The first person on the technical team to send me five blogs will win a $100 gift card.” Make sure they know that the blog doesn’t have to be polished as you will make it customer facing.
Still struggling for content ideas then look to for example LinkedIn Groups to see what people are discussing. Pose a question and see how people answer. Look to the pre-sales cycle and what are the most common things addressed. There are lots of places you can be looking for ideas.
Client testimonials or case studies also can make excellent blog posts, too.
Pro’s and Con’s Original Content Content are:
· Pro
It’s yours
Will improve your SEO
Customer will trust you more
· Con
It’s time-consuming.
Summary in brief
Use syndicated content very judiciously. Use repurposed content to your advantage. Use original content most often but cut yourself a break by following some of the tips outlined above.
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