The third degree: How to use third-party content to boost your content strategy

An effective content marketing strategy is largely built on creating original content that projects your organization’s expertise and experience in ways that resonate with your target audiences. The foundation for such a program is typically laid brick by brick through regular blog posts. And as the contractor, you can build your blogging strategy as you see fit, showcasing the various parts of your business that highlight your knowledge and skill in your line of business. As long as you refrain from being too salesy, you can go a long way toward building your reputation and market position on the back of blogging.

But we get it, developing content can be laborious and time-consuming (not to mention require a bit of writing talent), and if your goal is to post frequently, that’s a lot of time and effort dedicated to this strategy, irrespective of its effectiveness. We typically suggest that companies share the pain when it comes to blogging, that everyone should shoulder their part of the burden. Life on the blogging commune means that you’re not relying on a handful of folks, but on a much bigger community where many on the wider team need to blog perhaps only once or twice monthly.

But blog writing is only one part of an effective content strategy. Too often overlooked is a strategy that regularly incorporates a range of third-party content. Here are some ideas on how to add third-party content in ways that can save time, showcase your expertise and fold in additional color and perspective.

Curated content

Share articles that relate to your business or profession. I’m not talking about pieces about your company per se (although that’s always a good idea), but stories that discuss industry-related news. The articles may come from trade publications, which is a way of validating the fact that you are keeping up with the latest news in your profession, or they could be more general in nature.

And just don’t post the article. Add context to it, two or three short sentences about why the news is important or exciting or upsetting. Perhaps the author missed an important point or you think got something wrong. Use it as an opportunity to show expertise. Pro tip: here’s a quick guide to curating content on Twitter.

Videos

The popularity of video content is growing dramatically on social platforms, and statistics tell us that including a video in your content stream will increase engagement. One study found that marketers who use video content get 66% more qualified leads year over year. Reshare video content to your organization’s social channels with commentary on why the content is important to know.

Data

Posting the results of research or surveys – again, with your own context – is an easy way to project expertise and demonstrate that you stay on top of trends and stay up to date on the latest news in your industry. Have you seen our Monday Minute on Instagram? It’s a moving compendium of sorts on some of the most recent statistics and data related to marketing. Turning data into a weekly Instagram story is one way we are increasing engagement with one of our target audiences.

Third-party content is an excellent way to add some color and context to your content strategy. Start broadening your horizons, and you’ll likely broaden your reach and enhance your engagement as well.

Josh Dare

Josh’s career in communications spans more than four decades. In addition to providing strategic counsel and crisis communications direction to clients, he is the resident Writer-In-Chief, regularly writing op-eds and bylines on behalf of clients that have been published in The Washington Post, The Richmond Times-Dispatch, The Philadelphia Inquirer and Huffington Post, among others.

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