Relevant and Renewable: How Evergreen Marketing Can Boost Digital Content Efforts

While a certain amount of your content should be directed toward time-sensitive items, evergreen marketing can be just as beneficial to your digital content efforts. From blog posts to tweets, evergreen topics provide a cost-effective, consistent way to reach existing and new audiences. In this blog post, we share strategies you can use to grow your evergreen marketing content.

​What is evergreen content? Think of those sturdy pine and spruce trees that give us a splash of color even on the dreariest winter days. Evergreens are content that remains fresh and consistent over a long period of time. They don’t depend on the latest trends or news, and as a result, give your audience some breathing room to learn more about your products or services. From annual events to “about us” content, evergreens are essential to building a strong, sustained digital marketing strategy.

Why Use Evergreen Content?

• It saves time and sanity: In one meeting, staff can brainstorm dozens of ideas for evergreen content that could be used months from now. This gives them time to create and review content, with no last-minute rush required. Plus, content can be easily updated and used repeatedly, even on social media.   
  
• It improves content quality: It’s tempting to focus only on content that’s new or fresh, especially when scheduling social media posts. But there’s plenty of rich content to be found in educating your audience about the basics of your business. From your organization’s mission to quotes from satisfied customers, it’s important to routinely share who you are. 
  
• It increases content quantity:  The Covid-19 pandemic has provided an important reminder about the benefit of having evergreen content for social media channels. If events are cancelled, products delayed, or outreach postponed, pre-written evergreen posts can be immediately used to maintain regular connection with your audience.  
  
• Its value grows over time: Evergreen content tends to rank higher in search engines, which results in higher traffic to your post for a longer period of time. While the number of views may be higher for time-sensitive content, it can drop quickly. The trajectory for evergreen content may be lower, but views remain steady over time.  
  

Developing Evergreen Marketing Content

If possible, gather a group of staff together to brainstorm evergreen content. This fosters creativity and brings forth different aspects of knowledge about the organization. (Plus, it’s more fun!) When refining your list, focus on content that genuinely connects your audience to your organization. Some tips:
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• Use a calendar. Consider both nationally-recognized holidays and social media “holidays” for inspiration. It’s helpful to establish some guidelines. For example, if your organization posts about Christmas, will it also post about Passover or Ramadan? Be especially careful with social media “holidays.” Unless your organization focuses on animals, don’t try to force content related to National Puppy Day (even though they’re so dang cute).
  
  ​Key moments don’t have to appear on the calendar of course. What more personal milestones will be important to your audience? Seasonal changes, industry-only events, or school-related milestones can provide great connections back to your organization. Scan old social media posts for items that can be used as-is or easily updated.
  
  ​Don’t forget your own milestones, such as Giving Tuesday or other annual fundraisers, board meetings, or even work anniversaries for key leadership positions. 

• Dig for treasure. There’s a treasure trove of evergreen content in your own website. Do you have FAQ’s, staff bios, or descriptions of services, just begging for attention? Break it up into tidbits of information to use on social media channels. This kind of “Did You Know?” content can be used anytime, with the added benefit of linking your audience back to your website. You can also share successes through case studies, testimonials from satisfied customers, and shout-outs to ongoing partners or regular clients.

• Share your expertise. Teach your audience, while also establishing your authority, by providing useful information. If your organization serves children, consider a list of the Top 3 things to consider when searching for child care. A real estate agency can provide tips on the most important room to renovate for resale value. One warning: avoid linking to external sites, as these might change over time. ​
  

Strengthen Your Evergreens

In order to maximize the benefits of evergreen content in digital marketing, we recommend:

• Using keyword research to optimize evergreen content pages on your website for SEO. This boosts your website search rankings and increases traffic to your website long after the content has been posted.
  
• ​Planning content at least quarterly. The gift of evergreen content is that it can be written in advance, but only if you know what’s coming. This also helps you make sure there’s a balance between timely and evergreen content. 
• Using a spreadsheet or other internal document to preserve content. This makes it easier to remember annual milestones, and update the copy if necessary.

Unsure how to maximize the benefits of evergreen content? We offer Same Page Content Planning sessions that result in efficient, repeatable workflow for social media planning. We also provide support for organizations to strengthen their SEO strategy through keyword research and local search optimization.

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Lisa Applegate
​Lisa is grateful to have honed her writing and editing skills as a newspaper reporter in Virginia for a dozen years before becoming a freelancer. Throughout her career, she has helped media outlets, non-profit organizations, and businesses uncover their most compelling narratives and provide content that engages and inspires.