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Syndicating your client’s content requires a bit more effort beyond promoting via social media and other marketing channels, but it has the potential to drastically increase your client’s visibility and drive greater brand awareness.
We’ve compiled 23 new ways that agencies can syndicate client content in addition to their regular promotion plan in order to considerably increase their content’s reach.
But first, let’s take a closer look at what agencies need to know about content syndication, and its benefits.
Content Syndication vs. Promotion
Many use the terms promotion and syndication interchangeably, but that isn’t technically correct. Here’s the difference, in a nutshell:
Content promotion: a method of amplifying your content via social media or advertising
Content syndication: allowing others to republish your content (or a portion of the content) on their site with proper attribution to you as the author
Both methods are absolutely useful to agencies and marketers looking to get their client’s content in front of the right audiences. When using both methods in tandem, you’re ensuring you get the greatest impact possible of out your client’s custom content.
SEO Considerations
Some agencies and marketers are weary of content syndication for fear of creating duplicate content and getting their client’s dinged in search engine results. However, syndication can actually be a very effective method if done correctly.
A few ways to avoid any possible negative SEO effects include using:
- a rel=canonical tag, which tells search engines the syndicated copy is just that – a copy of an original
- a NoIndex tag, which keeps the syndicated content from being indexed by search engines (and thus only the original content is discoverable via organic search)
- ensuring the third-party publisher includes a direct link to the original content (though there is a chance that the more authoritative publisher gets the credit for the content rather than your client).
To some, the increased visibility and brand awareness generated for their client through syndication is more than worth any potential SEO side effects.
Benefits of Content Syndication
There are many benefits of recommending content syndication to your clients, including:
- Exposure to considerably larger audiences. Your client is guaranteed to reach tons of new visitors and potential customers by leveraging syndication channels relevant to their niche with a following in the tens or hundreds of thousands.
- Link earning from high-authority websites. You’ll be earning high-quality links back to your client’s website by syndicating their content on large sites with strong rankings.
- Social media shares. Capitalize on others’ social media networks to create a viral effect for your client’s content.
- Reputation building. By associating your client’s brand with well-known, powerful media sites, you’re positioning them among top thought leaders.
23 Ways To Syndicate Your Client’s Content
1. Free content publishing networks
Free content networks allow anyone to submit content. You could choose to create custom content for these platforms, but also consider syndicating portions of your client’s original posts with a link back to their blog. These networks include sites like:
2. Paid content discovery platforms
Quickly becoming a favorite of agencies and content marketers, content discovery platforms like Outbrain and SimpleReach allow paid users to promote their client’s content on hundreds of premium websites.
RELATED POST: 10 Proven Ways To Make Your Content Go Viral
3. LinkedIn publishing
Previously invitation only, now anyone with a LinkedIn profile can publish original content on the social platform. This can be a great way to syndicate client content while also highlighting the company’s leadership – encourage your client’s CEO’s and Directors to use their accounts to publish excerpts with links to original blog posts, and instantly share with their professional networks.
4. Social bookmarking sites
Social bookmarking sites are easy and quick ways to generate some extra referral traffic. Drop a link to your client’s recent blog posts on relevant threads while executing your regular social sharing plan (I simply made bullets here and I may have messed up this sentence in the process).
5. Personal networks
Don’t be afraid to encourage your clients to leverage their personal and/or professional networks with a personal appeal. Draft emails that include new content and have client’s send them to their personal network, asking recipients to read and share. Of course, work with your client to identify only those personal contacts that the content might be interesting and useful to.
6. Quora
Quora, the popular crowdsourced Q&A forum, is quickly gaining traction with agencies and marketers for it’s potential to speak to audiences in a genuine way while also gaining critical insights into brands’ target markets. But it’s also a great way to syndicate your client’s content and spark a conversation – submit a question relevant to your client’s content topic, and include a thoughtful description and link to the content.
7. Skyscraper Technique
Another way to syndicate your client’s content is what is known as the skyscraper technique. It’s a laborious manual process, but one that can be highly effective. In a nutshell, you search for content in your client’s niche that has been wildly successful, create similar but better content for your client, then reach out to leading third-party publishers who shared the content and present them with your client’s new, better content. If all goes well, your appeal will encourage these publishers to share your client’s content and gain vital exposure.
8. Include embed codes with infographics
Make it easy for your client’s blog readers to syndicate content for you by including an embed code within blog posts. This way, a reader can easily copy and paste the code snippet and embed the content on their own site – this works great with visual content like infographics.
9. News aggregators
News aggregators like the Huffington Post offer the ability to pitch blog posts or become a contributor to any of its relevant subsections. With an incredibly vast readership, creating author profiles for your clients and syndicating their content here can launch their brand in front of national audiences.
10. RSS feed submission sites
Prominent online publications such as Social Media Today allow registered users to submit their blog RSS feeds to directly add their content the site. Just sign up and submit your client’s content for publication here.
11. Other blogs
While typically guest blogging involves creating custom content for someone else’s blog, working with other blog editors in your client’s niche to repost different versions of your client’s content or spin-offs of posts is a great way to repurpose content and expand its reach. Do this by researching similar blogs in your client’s space and building real relationships with editors and marketers for some mutually beneficial promotion.
12. Slideshare
Slideshare is an easy way to get more out of your client’s content. Repurpose blog content into a visual presentation and publish to the site with a link back to your client’s original post. You can then embed the slideshare version of the content on your client’s blog for a better and more interactive post.
13. Email marketing
Utilize your client’s blog subscription lists to send blog posts as soon as they’re posted, or as curated weekly roundups. Test out several formats (like teaser copy, images, etc.) to see what gets your client’s audience to click through to the content.
14. Visual.ly
Visual.ly is great for syndicating your client’s visual content such as infographics. Just submit a visual to their community hub and put together a quick profile for your client. Boom, a quality link, and potential to drive traffic.
RELATED POST: 10 Ways Your Content is Guaranteed to Suck
15. Buzzfeed Community
Enormously popular Buzzfeed now offers a community sectionwhere anyone can submit fun, visual, list-style posts. Perfect for lifestyle, retail, or other lighthearted client brands, work a Buzzfeed-style roundup of posts into your content strategy, and potentially make the Buzzfeed front page to launch your client to internet stardom.
16. Mashable
Mashableis a top source for news in social and digital media, technology, and web culture with a 40 million+ readership. If your client is a good fit for the platform, submit a news story or a review of your client’s innovative services for a chance to gain massive online coverage.
17. Business 2 Community
Business 2 Community is a content aggregator that allows anyone to apply to become an author. Once approved by B2C editors, syndicated content then gets promoted on B2C’s large social network, reaching thousands of new users.
18. Medium
Medium is a popular new blogging platform that allows users to create profiles, publish articles on any topic, and even create publications for users to follow. It offers agencies a new and visual platform to syndicate their client’s content for free or generate a successful content campaign.
19. Examiner
Examiner.com is a news and lifestyle network in which writers can apply to publish content. As a publisher, your syndicated content would reach 20 million+ readers in the U.S. and around the world.
20. User generated blogs
User generated blogs like YouMoz let anyone submit a post relevant to the search and marketing industry, which is a great opportunity for agencies to market themselves and build thought leadership. If a submission is deemed really good stuff by the blog’s editors, it can be promoted to the blog’s front page. For agencies and SEOs, getting on the front page of Moz is not only a huge traffic booster, but a strong reputation builder. But, allow several weeks for posts to even be reviewed by editors, due to the quantity of daily submissions and high content standards.
21. Blog Directories
Submit your client’s blog to Blog Catalog to gain exposure within their industry niche. While many blog directories aren’t worth the effort and can be spammy, Blog Catalog has a relatively positive reputation and a nice visual format for gaining more traffic and brand visibility for your client.
22. BlogLovin
Make your lifestyle, fashion, and other clients’ blog easily discoverable to users on the popular blog-following app BlogLovin by adding their blog to a follow list. Users can then find and follow your client’s blog while searching by their interests.
23. Video sharing and distribution sites
Video and multimedia content is rapidly becoming the preferred content type for users, and it’s likely many of your clients are focused on producing these types of content. Ensure that you best leverage it by posting all video content to video-sharing sites like YouTube and Vimeo, but also consider RhythmOne to distribute and monetize short-form video content.
Are there any other ways you syndicate your client’s content? Tell us in the comments!