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With the digital landscape moving at lightning speed from day to day, sometimes your online marketing efforts can feel futile and useless. Marketers and brands must roll with the fast pace of the, getting content out quickly, only to see it get buried a few minutes later. There is one strategy that can help you get some additional mileage out of your efforts, it’s called evergreen content.

Evergreen content withstands the test of time and maintains its relevancy and value. It can be a useful tool when it comes to your blog, social media post or a marketing campaign. “How To” articles or video tutorials are great examples of evergreen content. They not only deliver an ideal experience for your customers over a longer span of time, but help marketers add longevity to their campaigns.

Home Depot is the perfect example of a brand producing evergreen content that is so successful it drives customers to their stores in search of materials for DIY (do it yourself) projects. The home improvement giant uploads roughly 40-80 videos a month on YouTube and currently has over 95k subscribers to their channel. The “how to” videos give step by step instructions on an array of topics, from building your own backsplash to painting the interior walls of your home.

Published to their YouTube channel back in August 2014, Home Depot’s “How to Install a Tile Backsplash” remains a useful tool for consumers and continues to attract views.

For Home Depot and other brands, this strategy is a surefire way to improve your inbound marketing with evergreen content that is timeless and always useful. And instead of rewriting content or reshooting video campaigns for your brand that contains ideas that stay the same, evergreen content only requires updating on occasion, saving you time while ensuring that their content is still working for you.

To gain additional insight into the use of evergreen content, we spoke with Heather Hueman, the Founder of Sweet Tea Social Marketing and Convince and Convert’s Jay Baer, a digital marketing pioneer and New York Time’s best-selling author.

Baer explains the unfortunate reality of what happens with everyday content and advertising we spend valuable time on, and why evergreen content can be beneficial for any brand.

“Once you stop paying for distribution, the value of advertising falls to nearly zero,” Baer said. Adding, “If you stop paying Google for PPC ads, the value evaporates…poof! If you stop buying TV ads, radio ads, outdoor ads, direct mail, or just about anything else in communications, the benefit is gone other than perhaps a vague whiff of brand recognition.”

“But evergreen content is the exact opposite. It pays an information annuity that provides benefit every day, forever (or nearly so).”
There is a key to creating the everlasting content, Hueman points out.

“Anyone creating evergreen content must remember this key thing, technology changes as does the vision and goals of many marketers, but many things remain constant like solid business principles and how people connect with people,” Hueman said.

Hueman also pointed out that evergreen content doesn’t just come in the form of video tutorials or how-to articles, it’s any type of content that relays an overall message about your brand. “Nationwide is on your side.” The insurance company’s catchy slogan is the perfect example of an evergreen message that can be used repeatedly, helps relay a positive brand perception and really sticks with consumers.

“The subject may change, but have an evergreen message focusing on the importance of the relationship that is needed between businesses and potential customers, they’ll hit a homerun each time as it relates to their marketing strategy.”

Brands like Kleenex and Dunkin Donuts are also great examples of letting evergreen content benefit their brand. They have found the common thread among their consumers, using it to create timeless campaigns that cater to human need.

“Kleenex will always and forever have the emotional needs for tissues; weddings, funerals, first day of school moments for parents. And more of just a few examples that no matter the change in technology, no matter the generation differences, people will always need a Kleenex.”

“When it comes to Dunkin Donuts, people will always be on the lookout for a quick something to eat as they hurry about their day so marketing in this industry can always have an evergreen piece circulating. Another idea for Dunkin Donuts is to keep in mind there are people of many ages that are always going to be looking for employment at a great job, so including a piece of the teen that gets their first job or the mom looking to raise a family with a solid job, that employment aspect is going to shed great positive energy on the company and be evergreen as well.”

So just remember before you get discouraged with the rapid daily turnout of marketing content, evergreen content like shareable videos, listicles that resonate, Facebook posts, or an evergreen message, can continue to attract web traffic and interest long after their publish date. Especially now that IZEA has determined the true lifetime measurement of a blog post is much longer than previously thought by the experts. Baer’s knows firsthand.
“I have blog posts on my site that I wrote seven YEARS ago that still generate hundreds of views every business day. That’s the value of evergreen content. Your communication IS your distribution vehicle, over the long term.”

Proof that the creation and maintenance of evergreen content is well worth the effort.