Invite colleagues
Sometimes I take a look over the old blog posts and I am amazed at how some articles still receive a good level of attention and continue to attract inbound links.
So here's the point of this blog... how do I share the 'good old posts' with today's new community members- the vast majority of the new members having never left the confines of the home page and venturing into the depths of the post archives.
In the ever-increasingly connected world, new people are finding our community/blog all the time so what I think is old content (assuming it’s not time-sensitive, like news, obviously) it is seen as brand new and fresh to new readers.
So here are my thought on this..... the best way to do revive the best of your older pages can be as simple as having a top 10 list. Going back over your personal favorites and providing a commentary about the best in "Social Media" or "greatest from 2009" etc. This categorization makes it interesting and relevant to your readers that have a particular interest in a topic area. Not simply a list (as this can be gathered by a Google search) but a paragraph or so on why this post made your list. This human touch gives context and will be appreciated by your readers.
Another interesting technique is to re-posting an old story that has have updated with more relevant links or newer information (if using an old post- leave the old URLs alone so that any existing inbound links don’t break). I don't suggest just a cut and paste as this duplicate content adds no value to your readers... it is the updates and involvement of the old comments into the newer post that adds most value.
Moreover, it is also worth spending time understanding what Joomla/Wordpress modules (or the modules for the platform you are using for blogging platform) that you can use to bring old content to the home page. Given we have now moved our DMIC community onto a Joomla platform I spend most of my time reading about these new functions. I am quite interested in using the "Featured Articles" or "Article Showcase" ones that provide the flexibility to draw content from deep in your posted archives. The often use AJAX front ends and have extended features like rotating content or can use image/content transitions to garner interest.
Well if you have some more suggestions on ways to make your re-posted blogs more interesting or just have a comment on this, then log in am write your thoughts below.
Written on Saturday, 13 March 2010 16:48 by Matt McDougall
