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A recipe for success – serving up smart comms on a budget

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A recipe for success – serving up smart comms on a budget

For those of us who work in comms, we know that often our teams aren’t exactly rolling in spare time or unlimited budgets. Yet the appetite for content keeps growing.

Leadership wants visibility. Employees want clarity. Audiences want something engaging, now and next week.

It’s like being asked to cook a five-course meal with just a chopping board and a tin of beans.

But here’s the thing: you don’t always need to create new. Sometimes, the secret isn’t doing more. It’s doing more with what you already have.

Repurposing is the comms team’s secret superpower. It’s about multiplying your teams’ impact and delivering value without draining your resources.

 

Why repurpose content?

Repurposing content means taking an existing asset (like a blog post, video, internal campaign or infographic) and giving it a new life in another format or channel. It’s about squeezing every last drop of value from the content you’ve already worked hard to create.

Here’s why it’s a smart move:

  • Maximise your investment: You’ve already invested time and energy into creating content. Repurposing allows you to extend its lifespan and reach, boosting return on that investment.
  • Reach different audiences: Not everyone reads blogs. Some people prefer short videos, bite-sized social posts or downloadable resources. Repurposing helps tailor your message to different preferences.
  • Save time and budget: Creating new content from scratch is time intensive. Repurposing is faster and more cost-effective. Perfect for lean teams.
  • Reinforce key messages: Repetition builds recognition. Sharing your core messages across different formats helps them land and stick.

 

Ideas for repurposing

Here are a few practical, low-cost ways comms teams can breathe new life into existing content:

  1.  Turn blog posts into bite-sized LinkedIn carousels
    Break down a blog into 4–5 key slides with bold headlines and visuals. Add a strong call to action, and you’ve got an engaging post ready to go!
  2. Create quote graphics or audiograms
    Pull strong quotes or soundbites from interviews, podcasts or articles and turn them into visuals for social media, newsletters or intranet content.
  3. Use long-form content as a series
    Have a detailed guide or report? Don’t just share it once. Break it into a content series with themed weekly posts or internal updates.
  4. Build toolkits or how-to resources
    If you’ve run a successful internal campaign, why not turn it into a reusable toolkit that other teams can adapt? Think templates, checklists, FAQs.
  5. Turn video content into blog summaries
    If you’ve hosted a webinar or town hall, write a quick summary post with key takeaways and a link to the recording. Perfect for those who didn’t attend.
  6. Revisit high-performing content
    Look at what’s performed well in the past and give it a refresh. Update stats, tweak the messaging, and reshare with a fresh visual or format.

 

Bake repurposing into your strategy

Repurposing shouldn’t be a one-off tactic. It works best when baked into your content planning. Start asking yourself early: “What else could this become?”

Think ahead about how to design content in modular, flexible ways. Consider visuals, quotes, data points or stories that could stand alone.

It’s not about doing more work. It’s about doing smarter work and getting your message in front of more people without blowing the budget.

So, hopefully you’ve thought of some new ways to repurpose your content! And it’s always important to remember that great content doesn’t have to be brand new to be valuable. For comms teams working with limited resources, repurposing is more than a clever tactic. It’s a survival skill. So, dig into your archives, get creative, and start turning your existing content into new opportunities to connect and engage.

 

Thinking about your future internal comms strategy and need a hand? Give us a shout and we’ll pop the kettle on.

 

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Kath Evans — Director of Children’s Nursing at Barts Health

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Lianne Springer — Communications and Engagement Lead

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Louise Burnard, Head of Marketing and Communications UK — Be | Shaping the Future

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Dr Anna Batho — Clinical Psychologist – Critical Care, UCLH

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Georgia Beech — Internal Communications Specialist, Ocado Group

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Alana Khaytin, Communications Specialist — Braskem America

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Sara Langston, Patient Engagement & Marketing Manager — italk

“Alive are unique in how much they deeply listen and invest in you and your ideas. I have not come across a company that listens as much as they do to ensure your needs are understood and met (actually - they always exceed my needs and expectations). Everyone I recommend Alive to has an equally brilliant experience. When you work with Alive, you are not only getting some genius creativity brought into your life, you are also hanging out with some of the best examples of human beings I’ve ever known.”

Steph Tranter, Hybrid Exec Coach & Psychologist — StephTranter.com

“The (Alive) team were able to creatively pull together and document (in just over 2minutes) everything our service has achieved over the last few months, from thousands of prescriptions deliveries to hundreds of phone calls made to the vulnerable. The final product was so powerful and reflective of what our service has and continues to achieve. It couldn’t have been better received within the service – thanks Alive for once again helping us to communicate our vision!’”

Emma Wright — South Yorkshire & Rescue

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At a time like this, its never been more important to share the amazing work that our staff have done and continue to do on a daily basis under very difficult circumstances. We wanted to shout about this and recognise that when the time came, South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue stepped up to the plate. We didn’t want an ordinary thank you post on social media or a basic email sent out internally, we wanted something special. Enter Alive. ”

Emma Wright — South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue

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Keren McCarron, Head of Corporate Affairs & Communications — KP Snacks

“Boom!
Thank you so much. Incredible work done at incredible speed by incredible people.
Outstanding work as ever and what a turnaround. As for the concepts – wow. These are that good it would be an insult to describe them as just good. It’s a joke, quite frankly. This is exactly the Alive effect I was after. Right now I feel like I am living in an Alive With Ideas wonderland. Thank you!”

Jack Grasby, Campaigns Manager — SYFR

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Amy Lilja, IC Manager — Hennepin Healthcare

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Julie Odams, Assistant Director of Communications & Customers — Derbyshire County Council

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