Key Takeaways
Optimize Channel Selection: Focus on search engine-like platforms (YouTube, Pinterest) for longevity and high organic reach channels (Podcasts, LinkedIn, TikTok) that align with your strengths.
Balance Trends with Evergreen Value: Prioritize trending channels alongside evergreen ones like blogging and YouTube, ensuring a mix of current relevance and long-term visibility.
Smart Content Utilization: Employ competitive insights cautiously and embrace content repurposing across various platforms to maximize reach and efficiency with fewer resources.
Deciding Which Content Channels to Use If You’re Starting from Scratch
In today’s world, there’s a plethora of content channels available.
Focusing on everything at once is not feasible, especially if you’re juggling multiple tasks and are swamped with daily work.
Choosing the right content channels for your business is crucial in such scenarios.
What should you consider when selecting a content distribution channel?
Selecting a platform that doubles as a search engine is wise.
Content on these platforms tends to have a longer lifespan compared to, say, a platform like Twitter.
How often are old Tweets sought after? Practically never.
Three platforms stand out as both search engines and content hubs:
- Blogging
- YouTube
While your blog isn’t a search engine, it’s indexed by Google, the world’s largest search engine.
YouTube, owned by Google’s parent Alphabet, is the second-largest search engine.
Google incorporates relevant YouTube videos in its search results, benefiting YouTube creators.
Surprisingly, Pinterest also functions as a search engine, with its content often appearing in Google’s search results.
Another factor to consider is organic reach, unless you’re prepared to pay for every viewer.
Here are three channels currently excelling in organic reach:
- Podcasts
- TikTok
For podcasts, consider:
- Uploading to YouTube to leverage its search engine.
- Distributing across multiple podcast platforms.
- Leveraging guest promotion to attract more viewers.
LinkedIn and TikTok are witnessing significant organic reach.
LinkedIn has evolved from a recruitment platform to a vibrant content hub.
TikTok, once seen as a youth platform, now attracts a broader, older audience as it becomes more mainstream.
Choosing Content Channels Based on Your Preferences and Personality
Self-awareness is key in selecting content channels.
Building an audience on any channel requires significant time and effort.
Consider your personality in your choice.
For instance, not everyone is comfortable appearing on camera for YouTube, and others may find writing challenging.
Recognize what you’re comfortable with.
Remember, initial attempts may not be perfect.
If your first YouTube videos make you cringe but you enjoyed the process, keep going.
Enjoying content creation is crucial. Your first 20 videos might be lackluster, but by the 100th, you’ll have gained competence.
Persistence is vital for success.
There are no shortcuts; consistent action and practice are all that’s needed.
Audit Your Competition and Find Out What Content Channels Work for Them
Competitive research is crucial, especially when starting from scratch without any personal data.
Remember, don’t simply imitate what your competition does.
There’s a risk they might not have it figured out, which could lead you astray.
To discover which content channels are driving traffic to your competitors, use SimilarWeb.com.
SimilarWeb is a free tool providing insights into various data points, although it might miss smaller sites.
If the site you’re analyzing is indexed by SimilarWeb, you’ll gain valuable information.
Consider searchenginejournal.com in the SEO niche, for example.
In SimilarWeb’s Traffic Sources section, you’ll see the breakdown of their traffic sources:
- 25.02% Direct Traffic
- 2.12% Referrals
- 65.84% Search
- 5.04% Social
- 1.96% Mail
- 0.02% Display
This data indicates that SearchEngineJournal’s primary traffic source is their blog, making blogging their main content channel.
Also, social media platforms contribute significantly to their traffic, warranting further investigation.
On social media, their key channels are Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Examining SearchEngineJournal’s social media, they post high-quality content 10-20 times per day on Facebook and cleverly repurpose it on LinkedIn.
This highlights the importance of content repurposing, a topic we’ll explore more later in this article.
Researching your competition in this manner is informative, but always take findings with a grain of salt.
Content Channels That Are Over-Performing Right Now in [year]
Understanding which content channels are currently over-performing saves frustration.
Why? Without this knowledge, organically reaching and growing an audience is challenging.
Consider Facebook. Apart from Groups, organic reach for posts is minimal.
Facebook’s organic reach is estimated between 2-6% of a page’s total likes.
This implies Facebook might be viable for established pages with large followings, but new pages face difficulties in reaching a substantial audience organically.
So, let’s shift focus from Facebook to other channels.
We’ll dive into current high-performing content channels that you should consider.
Podcasts
Over 100 million podcast listeners in the US are part of a growing trend.
54% of these listeners are likelier to consider advertised products, showcasing podcasts as not just popular, but also influential in purchasing decisions.
Podcasts are more than a trend; they are an engaging medium with a direct impact on listener behavior and purchasing choices.
They are also an excellent networking tool, offering significant value for your time.
Podcasts represent a largely untapped market in many industries, particularly when considering local dynamics.
Even if you’re new to podcasting, you can become an industry pioneer in your local area.
By starting a podcast and inviting other business owners, you can forge connections that positively affect your bottom line.
Gone are the days when LinkedIn was just a business and recruiting platform.
Now, LinkedIn generates 15x more content impressions than job postings, highlighting its evolution.
With 1 billion users globally, LinkedIn is a thriving content platform.
LinkedIn’s diverse audience means any content can find its place, regardless of the business focus.
The platform’s content consumption rate is surpassing production, resulting in a generous algorithm for organic content sharing.
Even a new account can gain views with just one post, emphasizing LinkedIn’s potential for reach.
TikTok
TikTok takes the concept of content consumption and organic reach to a whole new level.
With 1 billion monthly active users and 4.7 billion downloads to date, TikTok’s scale is immense.
Though known for a younger audience, TikTok is attracting increasingly older users.
Even if you think your audience isn’t on TikTok, like for example lawyers, they are.
Ignoring TikTok means missing out on a huge opportunity for organic growth—one your competitors might leverage.
Evergreen Content Channels
We must highlight the evergreen platforms that have consistently performed well over the years and are poised to continue doing so.
I’ve touched on these platforms earlier, but they deserve a more detailed mention.
Their content frequently appears in Google SERPs as relevant results.
Significantly, two of these platforms are search engines themselves,
This matters because people use search engines to find solutions to their problems.
Thus, being present on these platforms means your content has the chance to be found organically.
Blogging
Blogging has been a staple for nearly three decades.
Small businesses that blog experience 126% more lead growth than those who don’t.
61% of consumers have made a purchase influenced by a blog.
Blogging has evolved but remains highly relevant.
Gone are the days of churning out short 500-word articles. Now, relevance, comprehensiveness, authority, and expertise are key.
Google’s algorithm now understands content almost like a human, sidelining tactics like keyword stuffing.
Despite intense competition, blogging is more crucial than ever for business results and stands as an evergreen content channel.
YouTube
Owned by Google, YouTube is the world’s second-largest search engine.
Surpassing 2.7 billion monthly users in 2024, its audience isn’t just watching cat videos.
Over 50% of users turn to YouTube for learning new skills or information.
YouTube helps with everything from car repairs to making informed purchases, establishing it as an indispensable, evergreen content channel.
With 482 million monthly users, Pinterest may seem smaller but is a significant content channel.
A third of its users follow brands and companies.
80% of active weekly users have made purchases based on Pinterest content.
Users often seek solutions to their problems, and Pinterest’s built-in search engine handles over 2 billion monthly searches.
Pinterest content, especially for visual queries, frequently appears in Google SERPs.
Surprising to some, Pinterest firmly holds its place among the evergreen content channels.
Choosing Content Channels Based on Content Repurposing Opportunities
If you’re eager to maximize the potential of your content channels, I have exciting news.
There’s a holistic approach to selecting content channels that’s highly effective.
Consider how SearchEngineJournal repurposes their Facebook posts on LinkedIn. This strategy is an amplified version of that.
Content repurposing is about using the same content across different platforms, extracting every bit of value from it.
It’s essential to adapt content to each platform’s unique environment; it won’t always be identical.
Imagine this scenario:
You have a podcast that you also film. Most people would just upload the episode to their podcast platform. However, they’re overlooking numerous opportunities to create multiple pieces of content from one episode:
- Upload the podcast to five different podcasting platforms – 5 pieces of content
- Post the full podcast on YouTube – 1 piece of content
- Transcribe the podcast for a blog post – 1 piece of content
- Share a photo or graphic with the guest on three social media profiles – 3 pieces of content
- Cut the video into topical segments for YouTube – at least 3 pieces of content
- Adapt and upload these segments to LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram – 12 pieces of content
- Post key thoughts or ideas on three platforms – 3 pieces of content
That totals to 31 pieces of content from a single podcast episode, and that’s a conservative estimate.
Yes, it’s a hypothetical and a lot of work, but consider the competitive advantage.
Is your competition creating and posting dozens of pieces of content regularly?
Imagine the lead you’d gain by doing this consistently.
Gary Vaynerchuk is a proponent of this method. Check out his article on creating 64 pieces of content in a day for a detailed guide.
If you’re inclined to try this, assess all content channels from long to short-form and decide which ones to use.
I suggest a route similar to the one outlined above, offering a mix of long and short-form content platforms for comprehensive channel presence.