Using Content Roundups to Build Your Digital Brand

Using content roundups to build brand image

Content roundups can be a quick way to build your digital brand, especially if you don’t have time to write all new content.

However, there are a few rules you should follow for optimum growth. Keep reading the find out more.

Using Content Roundups to Build Your Digital Brand

Before you write your own roundup, you should know what comprises a good roundup.

What Makes a Good Roundup?

In order for your roundup to be good and efficient, there are a few things that it will need to do.

Your roundup should meet this checklist’s criteria:

  • Keep blog traffic and subscribers coming
  • Feeds your loyal users with relevant content
  • Triggers the interset of your mentioned sources
  • Creates community and builds connections
  • Gives a nudge to all sources, including those that are newly interviewed or cited from older posts.

If you can check off each of these bullets, then you know that your roundup is doing exactly what you want it to.

SEE ALSO: 3 Quick Tips to Achieve Content Marketing ROI

Types of Roundups

There are two basic kinds of roundups.

#1 Curated Old Blog Content

Before you create a roundup, you need to know exactly what you want from it. There are different ways to use a roundup, so without a clear picture of what you want it will be easy for it to become ineffective.

A great example of using older content for a roundup is to use some of your best materials for it. These are your ‘evergreen’ materials. What posts have you created that are just as relevant now as they were when you wrote them? These are the posts you’ll want to use.

When you use your best materials, you can use the headings of ‘best of’ or ‘top ten’ and then add your still relevant posts.

Another way to use old content is to spark new conversations with your email subscribers by updating an old post with current information.

To do this, you would create an email roundup that would cover the updates and why the old posts were created in the first place.

You can’t just use any old post for this kind of roundup and expect it to be successful. You need to make sure that you are using content that is interesting for your readers.

This means that you need to check your analytics to see which of your posts get more or less traffic.

Then you need to decide if you want to re-introduce posts that only got a little traffic to give them more life, or if you want to boost your most popular posts.

SEE ALSO: Content Planning Tips To Compete with Big Brands

#2 Expert Roundups

Expert Roundups bring real advice and expertise to your readers from authoritative and reliable sources.

There are two main ways to do this.

#1 Compile a post where you link to expert articles and interviews from the internet with a personal comment for each resource.

#2 Have a roundtable with experts and ask them questions about the main points in your specific niche

This can be done live, or you can record a video and share it on your post.

The main thing to remember here is that you roundups cannot be generic. Don’t call in an expert to talk to your readers about any possible topic.

Pick a specific topic, or angle within your topic and then ask an expert’s advice on it.

Your readers are looking for specific advice to solve a problem, not a general chat on some marginal topic.

Your roundups should represent your most valuable content. You want them to be link and citation-worthy for months to come. So don’t get lazy here.

Here are a few tips when working on your roundups:

1. Focus, focus, focus

Gathering a list of eclectic links to interesting articles on random topics will not be a valuable resource to your readers.

Focus on a single subject area or keyword per roundup to help your readers and search engines get the most out of your roundup posts.

2. Reach out

If you’ve included other bloggers and writers in your roundup, then reach out to thank them for their thoughtful piece.

Let them know that you’ve featured them in your work to build feelings of goodwill between you.

Often the people you included in your roundups are willing to share your roundup post on their social media too.

Here’s an email example of how to let people know you used their work:

Hey (name of writer),

I wanted to reach out to let you know we included your name on our recent post on (subject). (Include a sentence about your post)

You can see it here: (link to your post)

If you like it, I would appreciate it if you considered sharing it in some way. Thanks for reading and for the great content!

Regards,

(Your Name)

3. Remember to be Evergreen

Give your roundups as long of a shelf life as possible. Title your roundups with something that describes the type of content without dating it as ‘old.’

This means no ‘best of the week of October 9th, 2017’. Keep it simple and stick with describing the content so that readers can find your curated post.

SEE ALSO: Brainstorming Tactics for Content Creation

How to Boost Traffic with Roundups

Boosting your traffic with roundups can be easy if you do it correctly.

First, you’ll want to get in touch with influencers. When your roundups contain authoritative resources and expert insight, people will be more willing to share your content.

Second, you can link to your new roundup from other posts you’ve created. These can be new posts, but any older relevant posts from your archives can also be used.

Third, when using emails, you can share your roundup over again at regular intervals. This is especially helpful if you see new subscribers joining.

Fourth, invite more experts to follow up on your roundup. You can do this using social media or email outreach. The purpose of this is to let experts add their considerations to your roundup. This can even lay the foundation for a follow-up post!

Fifth, share your article on sites like Inbound or GrowthHackers to generate relevant traffic.

Additional content roundup strategies

1. Follow the source on Twitter a week before their roundup mention goes live (and if they don’t have an avid, active Twitter audience, likely pass on them as a source). The influencer might follow you back.

2. Send the influencer a direct message on Twitter, a day before the roundup post goes live, alerting them to the upcoming post featuring them and mentioning that you’ll tweet the link in the morning.

3. Make sure to include the influencer’s handle at the end of the tweet (example: Blog Post Title + shortened URL + 1-2 relevant hashtags + @InfluencersHandle

Tweet regularly about this post, targeting a variety of hashtags, but don’t include the influencer’s handle in every tweet about that post (mention their handle 2-3x/month to have the best chance at being retweeted each time.

Do this regularly for your other past roundups, and posts moving forward, for maximum effect, and do this for each of the sources mentioned in the post and you’ll see your traffic numbers soar.

Things to Avoid

Remember that roundups can help your brand, but they are not just ‘easy roads to success.’

There are four big ‘no-nos’ when it comes to your roundups.

1. Getting and Not Giving

You need to remember to provide something of value to your expert. This could be a backlink, exposure, or a pleasant interview experience. You need to be respectful of your contributors and the assistance they are willing to provide for you.

2. Adding Quotes and Links to Your Post Just to be Done with It

Just because you have a contributor to provide your content doesn’t mean your content won’t still need lots of editing.  You can’t just throw together some responses into a post and call it a day.

Make sure that your post has a great flow to get better results from your readers.

It works best if your responses build off each other, with extraneous content removed.

3. Never Contacting Your Source Again

You want to build outreach around your roundups, so keep track of the contact information of your contributors and reach out to thank them when the post goes live.

If you have a lot of contributors and you put a lot of customization into your outreach than this may take several hours, but its worth it to build a network for the future.

4. Being Lazy

Roundups are easier to write to its tempting to leave out relevant sources by just picking a bunch of posts from your archives to recirculate.

This will leave your roundup without a clear idea or main theme.

This will make your roundup a waste of time and might even drive readers away.

Doing this will also devalue your blog in the long run because it will appear that there isn’t a plan behind the content you’re sharing.

Final Thoughts

Adding a roundup to your blog post lineup can be a great way to recycle old content in a way that brings in new readers as long as you follow some simple rules to keep your post relevant to your viewers.

Have you tried a roundup before? How did it work for you?

Written by
Juntae DeLane

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