I comment all over the internet. It's part of my general strategy to connect with other people and share knowledge.
And I have a great system in place to plan my own social media content in Trello, sharing posts across multiple social platforms and also writing longform content on Substack and Medium.
If you write online, you know — it's no small task to plan content. I repurpose as much as I can, and that includes taking ideas I've previously shared and turning them into something new.
Take Reddit for example. I'm not hugely into Reddit, but I'll peruse channels in r/freelancing and r/productivity. Sometimes I'll comment. And then I take those comments and turn them into future content of my own — with a little help from Zapier.
Step 1: Set Up Your Zap
The Zap for this is really simple: a new comment in Reddit is your trigger and a new card in Trello is your action step.
But this would work with any project management platform, not just Trello. You can create a to-do item in the platform of your choosing.
Step 2: Comment in Reddit
Hang out in a few subreddits and add your comments. I try to do this about once a week and may only add two or three comments.
This person felt like they were unproductive for only working a few hours per day — even though they are being paid the same, regardless of the number of hours. I had Thoughts about that, so I commented back. Don't feel compelled to work extra if you're not being paid for output!
(and yes, I do almost everything in Dark Mode)
Step 3: New Card Added in Trello
Zapier automatically adds a new card to Trello for me!
Through Zapier, I add the following:
- Card Title: the subreddit name
- Due Date: 30 days in the future
- Description: the original post plus my response
- URL: link back to the original post, in case I want to review it
In Trello, I have a list called Incoming. I use this list to organize all of my Zapier-created cards, because I may not know how I'm going to use them yet. Once I decide, I'll move it to another list (like LinkedIn, Medium, etc).
Other Resources:
- Want to use this exact Zap? Check out my Zapier template.
- Want other repurposing ideas? Here are 4 Ways to Repurpose Your Own Content.
- Ready for a deeper dive? Check out this eBook — Manage Your Time + Content Across Multiple Platforms