Content distribution defined: The process of publishing and promoting content across different channels to help it reach the intended audience (beyond waiting for SEO).
Let me be quite frank… If you’re looking for a magical place to distribute your content and hit pay dirt, you’re never going to find it.
It simply doesn’t exist.
That isn’t to say you can’t drive traffic to your site and your articles independently (though I’d argue that really shouldn’t be your goal – conversions should).
What I am saying is that there’s no single place that will automatically drive traffic. Yet, you’ll find a log of BS advice on this:
- Add images with alt tags as keywords
- Create slideshows and share them on social and Slideshare
- Bookmark them across aggregator sites
- Repurpose them into webinars, ebooks, social posts, videos, podcasts…
- Add the posts to your email signature and social media bios
Honestly, the list can go on and on. I know because I’ve written a content promotion strategies guide, and it was over 8,000 words. I shared a lot of great places to distribute and repurpose your blog posts in that piece, but out of all that, there are really only a few methods I consistently use.
Why?
Because I’m just one person, and I don’t have a lot of time. Oh, and because they’re extremely simple and effective.
So what are my go-to methods and how did I figure them out? Here’s a look at a content distribution strategy in action, the results, and the advice I have for you (well, the cliff notes version, anyway).
Why content distribution is important (an example of what it did for one brand)
Content distribution isn’t really a service many offer, but Kaleigh Moore, DTC writer and freelancer influencer, wanted to put it to the test for her articles.
Here’s the content distribution case study if you’re curious about the full story.
In less than a month (really more like 2 weeks accounting for the setup and analysis period), I’d earned her:
- 4,000 more pageviews
- 1,200 new users
- 2,000 Twitter followers
- Facebook referrals increase by 1457%
- 48% jump in views of her coaching pages
- An 18% boost in newsletter views
I put in around 5-8 hours per week for this effort. It took about 2 weeks just to reassess to see what was working best and double down on those efforts.
That was a pretty good boost for her brand in such a short period, especially considering this was content previously published and not particularly optimized.
There really isn’t much need to explain why it’s significant and important to get these results… but I’ll point out that her coaching pages and newsletter are part of her revenue stream.
Any kind of boost to that is significant.
Add good calls to action in the posts I’d boosted, and well… you get the picture.
I can’t say everyone will get the same kind of results from the same tactics – or any content distribution tactics, really.
But I can tell you that your content pretty much dies when you hit publish and then do nothing else with it.
You might have the initial boost… and heck, if it’s well-optimized for search, it’ll continue bringing in traffic for years… but not as much as it could (and that’s the kicker).
Why continue creating tons of new content and not give it wings? It’s a waste of effort, time, and money.
How I gained more traffic to her articles from simple content distribution tactics
At first, I was really just testing theories of what could work.
It was a bit different than how I would have approached distribution; normally, I’d build a distribution plan before publishing content. Instead, I was testing things I’d only put into practice for myself… but it was still tailored.
I didn’t just throw a bunch of tactics at the wall to see what would stick.
I didn’t even jump at all the content distribution channels at our disposal.
She’d already had a huge following built up on Twitter, and there were tons of active and relevant Facebook groups, so we started there.
Let me walk you through the process in a nutshell.
1. Content library creation and analysis
I first made a content library for all of her articles/blog posts and analyzed each. I knew it would be impossible to promote all of her articles, so I put them into a spreadsheet with all the details like the name, link, publishing date…
Next, I ran an analysis on her site to see which articles were already bringing in traffic, and what the main keywords were for these articles.
I then added a tab for the keywords to focus on, because the main tactic I wanted to employ was social listening. She had so much advice, and they were regular topics of discussion across social media platforms, so I knew this was a great opportunity to join the conversations.
2. Created Bitly links organized by keyword category
I created Bitly links for each of the articles in each keyword category (a lot of the keywords could be lumped together around certain topics, so I organized the content this way).
3. Joined relevant conversations on Twitter
On Hootsuite, I created streams to follow those keywords on Twitter and find relevant conversations.
Every time a relevant conversation popped up, I joined in. Sometimes I just mentioned Kaleigh’s name, other times I added a link.
4. Shared articles in relevant Facebook groups
On Facebook, there were several groups I was already a part of since I am technically also a member of Kaleigh’s target audience — so I was already engaged with these members.
This makes it easier to be seen less as spam and more as a member of the community, which is absolutely vital to the success of this kind of promotion.
Funnily enough, I didn’t really do too much else. Yet, you saw the results of just 2 weeks of real effort on this.
Additional content distribution strategy options
Now, if I had been working with her long-term instead of us conducting this little experiment, I would have:
- Optimized a ton of her articles
- Repurposed a lot of her articles for social
- Created content upgrades that correlated
- Added more calls to action to the articles we promoted (she didn’t add any, it was just readership)
- Created conversion goals in Google Analytics to more properly measure the results of promoting the articles themselves
Are these the tactics I would use for all clients or that I’d recommend to you?
NO.
Not a chance.
In fact, I’d say this probably wouldn’t work for a lot of brands. Why? Because too many will make their social listening like spam rather than spending 8 hours a week engaging in the community they’re selling to.
So what can you do? Well…
How to build a content distribution strategy for your brand
If you’re looking for a quick route to a content distribution strategy, think again. My tactic is to build it directly into your overall content strategy.
This means thinking ahead about distribution.
Here are two approaches I recommend.
1. The Justin Simon way
Create one piece of content (such as a video or podcast) and use it to create all of your other content for the rest of the month. For example, record your podcast and add it to Youtube, break it into clips for social and ads, transcribe it for an article, and turn it into 5-10 social media posts.
2. The ultra-specific way
If you do audience research well enough, you know where your audience hangs out and gets their information. Promote only in those places for specific topics (as I did for Kaleigh). If you’re writing about content distribution, you might find newsletters, influencers, or podcasts your audience pays attention to that often talk about the topic.
Create relationships you can leverage that help make the spread of your content easier. Which, really, you should do anyway.
Where can you learn more about my content distribution techniques?
Frankly, there’s a lot more to all of this. It’s a challenge to explain it all in so little time and without some demonstration.
That’s why I’m constantly talking about it on Linkedin and my blog, and why I’m creating a course and resources on my site for you to follow and use.
I just hate seeing good content go to waste without at least some kind of targeted distribution. A proper content distribution strategy makes sure all your effort is worth it.
You can also hear more from Sarah about content distribution on Episode 1 of the All Things Freelance Writing podcast!
Have questions? Drop them below.