When it comes to making content for your school, your faculty and their academic work might be an untapped gold mine.
Faculty research gives you a wealth of proprietary content for blogs, social media, premium content pieces, and more. Plus, using faculty expertise contributes to your school’s credibility and gives you concrete, reputable pieces of information to use in your organic reach strategies.
As a core part of your school and as subject matter experts in their own right, your faculty has a lot to contribute to your digital marketing. Chances are, your faculty is already creating relevant content on a regular basis. By collaborating with other departments and faculty members, you can elevate and amplify your faculty’s voices while drawing prospects into your marketing funnel.
The importance of repurposing content
Research is very academic by nature and sometimes written in a way that plays up the prestige (read: not accessible). In its current form, it probably won’t work for marketing. But with a little selective editing, you can translate your faculty member’s research into a really engaging lead generation piece.
And remember — content doesn’t inherently lose value after it’s been published. You may already be putting effort into optimizing and refreshing your school’s content from time to time, but repurposed content can come from a variety of places. Whether you’re refreshing existing blogs or reusing content from old sources, repurposed content keeps your site up to date and relevant while leveraging your school’s existing resources.
10 ideas for reusing your faculty’s research
1. Break it down into blogs
Academic papers are packed with valuable information, but — again — they’re not always easy to read. Break them into short, focused blog posts that highlight key points, insights, and takeaways for an easy way to make research more accessible and keep your content calendar full.
2. Create an infographic
You can create visual interest by turning complex findings into a clear, eye-catching infographic. Whether it's for a blog post or a quick social share, visuals make data easier to understand (and way more likely to get noticed!)
3. Build a research landing page
For a research-focused institution, creating a dedicated page that showcases your school’s latest research projects gives you a great backlinking opportunity and highlights your university’s feet on the ground. You can feature faculty work, share updates, and show how your institution is making a real-world impact all in one spot.
4. Transform it into educational content
By using research as the foundation for webinars, mini-courses, or even short learning modules, you can spotlight faculty expertise and offer something valuable to your community, prospective students, or casual learners.
5. Turn it into a video
Summarize the research in a short, engaging video or faculty interview. Videos help put a face to the findings and bring the story to life, and they are perfect for sharing on social or adding to your website.
6. Feature your faculty
Shine a light on the people behind the work by writing a quick Q&A or profile that shares a bit about the research and the faculty member behind it. Faculty spotlights are a great way to connect the dots between the work and the people driving it.
7. Send a themed email campaign
You can use ongoing research as a regular feature in your email updates. Share quick highlights on what your faculty are working on, how it ties into current events, or where it's making an impact. Add a simple CTA encouraging readers to explore related programs or learn more about your school’s academic strengths.
8. Turn it into a pillar page
If the research lines up with your programs or SEO goals, build a long-form page that ties it all together. Include links to related content, embed videos or graphics, and position your school as a leader in the space.
9. Interlink or reuse quotes for related content
Your faculty’s original thoughts and research are powerful resources to include throughout your existing and upcoming content. Sprinkle them into blog posts, social captions, emails, or more to add depth and keep your messaging consistent.
10. Use it as the foundation for an ebook
Bundle research highlights into a polished, downloadable ebook and link to it throughout your other content to generate leads and give people a deeper dive into your school’s work.
Maximize your content to increase awareness
At Direct Development, we help colleges and universities turn existing resources into powerful, audience-ready content. From SEO strategy to storytelling, we know how to make your school shine.
Interested in using your content to the fullest to bring attention to your school? Watch our webinar, Increasing Awareness with Content and SEO, to see real examples and actionable tips in action.
