Article/Blog Posting Guidelines for Repurposing Content

Repurposing long-form videos into articles can greatly increase your content's reach and engagement. Videos grab attention with visual storytelling, but articles can attract a new audience and suit different preferences.

By making an article from your video's key points, you'll spread your message further, boost SEO, and prove your expertise in a format that's easy to share. Don't waste your video content—transform it into a compelling article to fully use its potential.

This is the second stage in the Content Factory, "Process", that is usually handled by Virtual Assistants (VAs) or an agency's internal team. Small startup owners will particularly benefit from this guide.


The four stages of the content factory: produce, process, post, and promote.
    Task Checklist

  • Uploading the video to Google Drive
  • Watching the video
  • Transcribing the video
  • Editing the transcription
  • Adding title and headings
  • Including images and links to support your article
  • Including the source context (video, post, brief)
  • Proofreading the article
  • Posting on WordPress site
  • Categorizing and adding keywords
  • Using RankMath plugin to adjust titles, descriptions, and body copy
  • Using LinkWhisper to manage internal links
  • Where to publish the article
  • Writing for offsite publications
  • Determining the article length

Execution Process

1. Uploading the video to the Google Drive


The first step, after creating the task on BaseCamp or similar project management software, is to upload the video to our Google Drive under the appropriate folder and sub-folder. Refer to the guide on this task.


2. Watching the video


Watching a video before transcribing it is crucial for several reasons. While transcribing, you convert spoken words into written text, and doing so accurately and effectively requires more than just listening. Here's why watching the video beforehand is essential:

  • Contextual understanding: Watching the video provides important contextual cues that aid in better transcribing. Facial expressions, body language, and visual elements can convey additional meaning beyond just the spoken words. Understanding these non-verbal cues can help you interpret the speaker's intent and emotions, leading to a more accurate transcription.

  • Accurate punctuation: Punctuation plays a vital role in transcription as it helps convey the speaker's intended pauses, tone, and emphasis. By watching the video, you can identify natural pauses, interruptions, and sentence structures, allowing you to punctuate the text more accurately.

  • Speaker identification: In videos with multiple speakers or panel discussions, visually identifying who is speaking can prevent confusion and ensure that the transcription assigns the correct dialogue to the right person.

  • Audio quality and background noise: Videos may have varying audio qualities and background noises. By watching the video, you can assess the audio's clarity, identify any challenging accents or speech patterns, and prepare yourself for potential transcription difficulties.

  • Technical terminology and jargon: Some videos might contain technical terms or industry-specific jargon. Watching the video allows you to familiarize yourself with these terms, making it easier to transcribe them correctly.

  • Filling in gaps: Occasionally, speakers may mumble, speak too quickly, or the audio might be unclear. Watching the video can help you fill in the gaps by lip-reading or using visual context to decipher the unclear parts.

  • Speaker's intent and tone: Transcribing isn't just about the words but also conveying the speaker's intent and tone accurately. Visual cues, such as gestures and facial expressions, can help you understand the speaker's emotions and ensure a more nuanced transcription.

  • Content verification: If the video contains sensitive or critical information, watching it beforehand allows you to verify the content's appropriateness for transcription or determine if any parts should be excluded for confidentiality or legal reasons.

  • Time-coding and synchronization: If the transcription requires time-coding or synchronization with specific visual events, watching the video is essential to ensure precise alignment between the written text and the corresponding video segments.

In summary, it is critical that you grasp the GCT of the content to ensure that the right context and purpose of the content is understood.


3. Transcribing the video


Transcribing through Descript is a straightforward and efficient process. Descript is a popular audio and video editing software that includes powerful transcription capabilities. Go to this task guide on how to transcribe pillar content using Descript.

It's important to note that while Descript's automated transcription is generally quite accurate, it may not be perfect, especially with challenging audio conditions. Reviewing and editing the transcription ensures a high-quality result.


4. Editing the transcription


ChatGPT can assist you by suggesting changes, correcting errors, and providing alternative word choices. Here's how you can use ChatGPT to edit a transcription:

  1. Prepare the Transcription: First, have the transcription ready in a text format. This could be the output from automated transcription software like Descript, or a manual transcription that you want to refine.

  2. Provide Context: If there are any specific instructions or requirements for the edited transcription, provide that context to ChatGPT before starting the editing process. For example, you can specify if you need the transcription to be more concise, maintain a particular tone, or follow a specific style guide.

  3. Interact with ChatGPT: Engage in a conversation with ChatGPT and share the transcription text as part of your input. You can format it in a way that allows ChatGPT to understand that you want it to help with editing.

  4. Ask for Suggestions: You can ask ChatGPT to review the transcription and suggest improvements. For instance, you might say, "Can you please review this transcription and suggest any corrections or improvements?"

  5. Review ChatGPT's Suggestions: Carefully consider the suggestions provided by ChatGPT for each segment of the transcription. It's essential to verify the accuracy of the changes and ensure they align with your desired outcome.

  6. Ask for Clarifications: If you are unsure about any of ChatGPT's suggestions or need further explanations, don't hesitate to ask follow-up questions to get more context or examples.

  7. Iterate as Needed: Depending on the complexity and length of the transcription, you might need to go through several rounds of interaction with ChatGPT to refine the text and achieve the desired level of accuracy.

  8. Finalize the Edit: Once you are satisfied with the edited transcription, make sure to review the entire document to check for consistency and coherence.

Remember that while ChatGPT can be very helpful in providing suggestions and editing assistance, it is still an AI language model and may not be perfect. Always use your judgment and expertise to ensure the transcription meets your specific requirements.

Additionally, be mindful of any sensitive or confidential information in the transcription if you are using a language model like ChatGPT that may retain information from previous interactions. It's best to avoid including any such sensitive content during the editing process.

Further polishing:

Adding small flourishes to your content helps readers retain key points more easily. Bold key statements, “italicize quotes from others”, and take advantage of headlines to break your article into sections. Recap major points at the end.

Remember:

  • Bold key statements.
  • Italicize quotes from others.
  • Use headings and subheadings to break articles into sections.
  • Reiterate major points at the very end of your article using bullet points, as we used in this list.

  1. Write succinctly. Remove flak (this can be done either on Descript itself or on the exported transcription.
  2. Break up long paragraphs for easier reading. 
  3. Be clear and concise.
  4. Start with the numbers or Metrics.
  5. Give it context by telling the story behind them, then make recommendations that form a strategy as to what they can do to improve.

Link to Thought-Provoking Content with Relevant Anchor Text.


Anchor Text is the text that appears highlighted in a hyperlinked text and that can be clicked to open the target web page.

When researching your topic, keep a list of articles that can be sprinkled into your final work. These links are usually from blogs you’ve had contact with or contributed to.

When linking, make sure to avoid using the “Click Here” anchor text. Instead, use text that portrays what the link is about, like how Joshua Crouch of Relentless Digital Took $25,000 from Matt Howard of Travis and Sons Plumbing.

Don’t over-promote yourself, otherwise, you’ll be labelled as a spammer. It’s fine to have a URL in every paragraph or subtopic to drive your point home, but absolutely NO affiliate links or blatant for-profit material.


Finally, end with an invitation for your reader to respond. “What do you think?”, “Has this ever happened to you?”, “What should I do next?”. There are countless ways to spark a conversation, so try a few and let us know how it goes (Just like that).

Seeking assistance:

For content ideas, paid services such as FancyHands and Fiverr are great resources to use. The turnaround time was a few hours and the cost was just under $3 since we have a package of 50 tasks for $130 a month. The service is limited to US customers. You can sign up at www.fancyhands.com.

You should also reach out to the authors of the blog you’ve been commenting on, asking them for a few quotes on your topic. Attribute their quote, add their photo/headshot, and link to their website.

Make sure to let them know the article is live via their Twitter or Facebook page so others who follow them can benefit from their insights as well (and get a little traffic/awareness to your blog).


5. Giving the article a snappy title and headings


Remember:


Once your article is done, it’s time to give it a killer title that summarizes what your article is about and why your audience should read it. Also, add headings that add meaning and logical breaks to the article.

It helps to lay out the numbers, what they mean, and how the reader benefits from them, such as “I have 602 Sales Reps Right Now Making Just Over $1 a Day” by Logan Young.

You could also use ChatGPT to suggest various options of titles and select the most appropriate one keeping in mind the GCT. 


  • In the body, make sure that the heading sytyle used in WordPress are H2s or H3s -- Just like an outline, H2s are subheadings for H1s (which is typically the main title) and H3s are subheadings for H2s.
  • They should be short and clear --remember most readers skim articles first and usually only end up reading the headings.
  • They should entice the reader to stop and read more.
  • They should encompass the main point of the paragraphs that follow it.
  • At least one should include your main keyword.
  • Don't use too many and overwhelm the reader.
  • When using a topical analysis tool like Surfer or Frase, try to model the ideal number of headings that are found in the top 10 search results.

6. Including interesting pictures and links to other articles to support the content.


Take screenshots that show what you’re trying to convey. Placing a colored box around important numbers is the best way to draw a reader’s attention.
  • Green for positive things, e.g. what something should look like, or what the reader should add.
  • Red for negative things, e.g. what something should not look like, or what the reader should delete.

Important Note on Uploading Images: Ensure all images are properly uploaded to the site's media library using the designated upload feature (e.g., the plus (+) icon). Avoid pasting images directly from external sources like Google Docs, as this can lead to issues with images not displaying correctly or resulting in broken links over time. Properly uploaded images ensure that your content remains visually intact and accessible to all users.

Add Image

DO NOT use stock images or ones lifted from Google Images.

DO NOT use the same link twice in an article.

DO NOT link to other sites unless it's an affiliate, partner, or client, since that bleeds link juice (which hurts our SEO). 

We DO want to link to related articles along the way and at the end.  For example, in an article on cross-posting on Facebook, we'd want to hyperlink "cross-posting" to a blog post about the different ways to cross-post (on Twitter, Facebook pages, LinkedIn, etc).  And a link to related terms-- not shamelessly, but at a normal rate (which you'd typically see in blogs).

Let's not link out unless it's a specific page for an article or affiliate code.

Every article should link back to the larger (and related) topics. For example, where the article relates to 'Common Mistakes Whn Applying for a job," this should link to the page from which one can actually apply for a job as a VA, in addition to embedding the YouTube video recording of that topic. 

For example, we don't link out to top level domains unless it's a client or one of our properties.

7. Embed the source context or source video within the article.

Excluding the source from an article makes the content puzzling for the reader due to a lack of context. Always make sure to embed the source context.


8. Proofreading/Using an editing service to tighten up the article.


Glance over your article, looking for any typos and capitalization errors. Use a spelling/grammar checker app (e.g., Grammarly) on the whole article. Trim out adjective overuse and watch out for phrases that inflate your article needlessly like “However”, “On the other hand”, “Meanwhile”, “The fact that”, and “Actually”.

Always write using active voice, not passive. A passive voice is where you promote an action as the subject of a line. For example, “I wrote this article” is active. “This article was written by me” is passive and pointlessly bloated.

Break up your article into chunks by hitting enter every 3-5 lines. This makes reading easier. That’s how this course is structured.

Editing services such as www.draftin.com have professional editors who will edit your writing for a small fee. They’ll help you with the issues above, trim down your article, and avoid other issues, such as Alliteration, which is a string of words sharing the same first letter (e.g., “Peter Piper picked a pair of pickled peppers”). Break them up or use a thesaurus.

Other examples are:


  • Don’t end on prepositions, or “linking” words like “with”, “beneath”, “on”, “during”, etc.
  • Stomp out weasel words. For example, “Some people say” is dubious since it’s not clear how many people said it.
  • Don’t ask rhetorical questions because who likes those?
  • Stay specific and write succinctly.
  • Exaggerations make your articles a billion times longer and add ambiguity.
  • Comparisons are messy, like eating a box of chocolates left in the sun.
  • If you’re short on money and/or time, ask a few friends to look it over following the above guidelines. Remember these 3 C’s for editing: Write consistently, concisely, and structure cleanly.
  • Verify that the article does not have any Low-value / Unrelated / Broken links.
  • Use Link Whisper to manage internal links and RankMath to adjust titles, descriptions, and body copy.
  • Link Whisper is just down below your article, if you scroll down. Choose which link makes sense from the variety of links they give you to include.

9. Posting on WordPress site


Creating a blog post on a WordPress site is a straightforward process. Go through this task guide.


10. Categorizing the post and adding keywords.


Before you post your article, make sure you have it properly categorized. WordPress has a robust category system that allows you to keep what you’ve written about organized, so make sure to file each article under the appropriate section.

Keywords, (or “tags” as WordPress calls them) are special words you can reference in your article to help the search function categorize the post. These also help readers glance over the article list and see what it mentions, giving a small boost to the article’s SEO ranking as well.

If you mention a proper noun in the article, chances are you can use it as a tag. For each topic, use up to five keyword tags to describe it.


11. Using RankMath plugin for SEO


RankMath is in the top right corner. Hit that button, check it out, and see if you can figure out what it does. It helps you with SEO on the page and provides steps to be taken to improve it under four categories; Basic SEO, Additional, Title Readability, and Content Readanility. Clicking on the drop down menu of each will provide the areas that need improvement:


ImageImage

12. Using LinkWhisper plugin to add links


When you scroll to the bottom of the article in WordPress, you will come to the LinkWhisper plugin (if installed), designed to help with internal linking within a website. LinkWhisper analyzes the website's content and suggests relevant internal links to other pages on your site. This helps in establishing a well-structured network of interconnected content, which can improve SEO and user navigation.

This Check the box to the left of the links you want to include and then click "insert links into post."

Image

Similarly, there is also a button to open a separate webpage to select 'Inbound' links from other posts or pages on the website. The method of selecting the links is similar to selecting the outbound links described above.




13. Where to put repurposed content


When Dennis is interviewing successful entrepreneurs about their subject matter expertise and journey for CoachYu, place it on yourcontentfactory.com. The same is true for general digital marketing content since that's what Content Factory is about.

Topical pieces will fit better on dennisyu.com-- like growing up Asian, adapting to the American opportunity, personal relationships, and thoughts.

General business pieces should go to blitzmetrics.com.


14. What to do when writing for offsite publications


  • We need to look at the publication and try to understand what value the client can give them. 
  • Look at past articles written by professionals and try to understand what kind of articles the publication publishes. 
  • Notice how these articles are structured and look at the article guidelines (number of words, headings, etc.)
  • We need to look at the content that we have of the client's (videos, his website).
  • Come up with an angle and topic that matches the existing content at the publication. 
  • Focus on giving value to the reader of the publication as much as we can. Again, this is very dependent on what the publication has already published. They know what their readers like to read.

15. How long should a blog be?


A blog post should be as short as possible to properly cover the topic (with no waste) but as long as necessary to be thorough.  

A small topic might be only 500 words while a bigger topic could be 2,500 words.

Of course, choose an appropriate title, which is what we want to rank on.

We do want to include timestamps in the blog post itself, plus other standard things in having a good blog post.



If you enjoyed this tutorial, then check our Task Library, where you can learn how to get a thousand other things done.

Also understand the context and how this fits in with the Content Factory and Content Marketing.