Memes can teach you a lot about blogging

If you’ve spent any time online these past few weeks then chances are, you’ve seen the meme based on the American Chopper father/son argument. It’s a meme that’s been brought back to life from its 2009 airing to give voice to 2018 jokes and grievances.

Conversation: 'Why aren't you on twitter'? 'my clients aren't there. 'They are!' 'Are you going to tell me to blog next?' 'you betcha!'

As Peter Suderman’s take states, “The whole point of memes is that they can be endlessly recycled into new context”. This is something that can also be said about business blogging. Let me break down Suderman’s words under two main points that apply to business blogging:

1. Recycling

Observe any prolific writers and marketers and you will eventually catch on that they are not simply creating original work multiple times a week. They are working smart as well as hard.

Recycling content has been a trend for many years and it has multiple benefits, (including two big ones: SEO and brand consistency).

Here’s an example of how it would work with this blog I’m writing right now for example:

Week 1: Post this very blog

Week 3: Write a blog post focusing on tools that help you recycle content in different formats

Week 5: Interview a thought leader on their recycling techniques, post the transcript

Week 7: Write a blog post about the best business memes of 2018

Week 9: Create a new bumper version of the original blog post incorporating the other elements from previous weeks, and share it under a different title.

2. New Contexts

While the example I’ve just given focuses on recycling within the same format (blogging), it’s also important to think about how a piece of content that begins as one thing (a blog) can translate into other formats (i.e a podcast).

There are again multiple benefits to recycling your content into new contexts such as:

  • increasing the chance of the right people seeing it
  • reaching new audiences that might not hang out on the platform you originally created it for
  • can be in a format that is more appealing to your audience
  • brand awareness (personal and/or professional)

This all sounds great in theory, but how can you apply it?

Let me again use this very blog post as an example of how you could transform it, incorporating the plan I used before:

Week 1: Share the meme associated with this blog post

Week 2: Share this very blog post

Week 3: Host a webinar on the topic of this blog post

Week 4: Write a blog post focusing on tools that help you recycle content in different formats. Attach the slides from the webinar as a Slideshare.

Week 5: Host a podcast with a thought leader on their recycling techniques

Week 6: Share the transcript of the podcast as blog post

Week 7: Create multiple Instagram pictures with quotations from the podcast and your blog posts. Schedule them to post twice a week for a month

Week 8: Write a blog post about the best business memes of 2018

Week 9: Make a series of 4 LinkedIn videos breaking down the topics discussed above. Share them over the course of two weeks. Link to your posts in the comment.

Week 10: Post those same videos to YouTube, share in the description links to your various posts and accounts.

Week 11: Create a new bumper version of the original blog post incorporating the other elements from previous weeks (including videos, Slideshares, podcast, images), and share it under a different title.

You essentially have there the bones of a focused campaign built around a single post. Does it get more meme than that?

The Tools

Ok, you might say, that sounds great Claire, but what are those tools you keep hinting at that might make these things possible?

Good question!

Here are some of my favourites:

  • For LinkedIn videos I have shared my favourite tools here. If you don’t want your face to be on the video then Lumen5 is your friend – an easy way to turn blog posts into videos.
  • For Instagram graphics you can’t go wrong with Buffer’s Pablo tool. It’s free and it’s fast.
  • For podcasts I recommend Zencastr which is easy to use and done in-browser.
  • For webinars there is a wealth of choice. GoToWebinar is a classic, but if you have the budget then ON24 is excellent.

All that’s left for me to do is sign off with my own take on the meme:

 

Claire Trévien is a guest author for ClearView Social and a B2B Content Marketer, you can connect with her on her website or on LinkedIn.