The third pillar in your content marketing strategy is content circulation, or content syndication. No matter what you call it, you have to create original content, curate content, and then make sure that content gets circulated.

In other words, if you create content, you want people to see it. Content circulation is the key.

Content Circulation Is the Final Piece in Your Content Marketing Strategy

You can create and curate all the content in the world, but if nobody sees it, what's the point? The whole goal of internet marketing, remember, is to market whatever it is you're trying to sell.

And by “sell,” I don't necessarily mean sell in the normal vernacular: You don't have to take money in exchange for offering a good or service. Instead, by “sell,” I mean get somebody to “buy” your idea, sign up to your list, buy a real product, etc.

In short, marketing is selling and selling is convincing people that they should do something with whatever it is you're marketing 🙂

You dig?

So create great content. Curate content from authorities in your field. And get that content circulated so that people can find it.

There are two main ways to get your content circulated. One is through syndication, the other is through good onpage and offpage SEO. I've talked at length in the past about SEO, so I won't bore you with that again. You can go here and here to find more info about SEO.

As far as content circulation goes, here's the deal. I'm going to give you a content circulation system that you can follow. It's step by step; add or edit where you wish. Mine is not the best or the only system. Please feel free to modify this.

The first part is creating great content. Assuming you've done that, now is the time to promote that content.

Every bit of content you create should be on your website. If you created a video for YouTube, make sure that you embed that video on your website. If you have a presentation that you put up on SlideShare, make sure you embed that presentation on your site.

This system works whether your content is text, image, video, presentation, eBook, white paper, whatever. It doesn't matter.

What does matter is that it's always best to convert your content–in whatever form it's in–to other media formats.

That is to say that if you have a Powerpoint presentation that you want promoted, try to convert that presentation into a YouTube video, for example. Take that content and put it into words and share it on another site, say a WordPress.com or Blogger site. Link back to your original post on your website.

In short, all roads should lead back to your website.

Any posts you make on your own website should be shared–initially by you–to the bigger social media sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, and Twitter. If you have images in your blog posts (you should), then “pin” them to Pinterest.

Step by Step Content Circulation System

1. Create great content. It can be curated content or original content created exclusively by you. Publish your post.
2. Use a tool like WPSyndicator to send out an initial promotion. You will need to set up all the social networks it posts to beforehand. I have several “sets” of social media sites that I can post to. I set one up on WPSyndicator.
3. Set up HootSuite for an initial second blast. If you don't want to spring for WPsyndicator, you can do the work yourself. Set up Facebook, Facebook pages, Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
4. Go to the public version of your post. Use your social sharing tools to share your content across various social media channels. I like to use digg digg and Shareaholic. Feel free to share your content in places you didn't cover in #2 and #3.
5. Send a note to your email list (you have one, right?) telling your subscribers that you just posted something. Encourage (i.e., call to action – ask) sharing.
6. Run a press release. Make it newsworthy, not product-focused.
7. Set up some linkwheels. I know, “linkwheels are dead.” Except that they aren't. Then post links back from your linkwheel to your post. I have a service that offers 2 linkwheels for $497 and $997. If you are interested, please make a comment at the bottom of this post.
8. Guest blog on somebody else's site on a related, relevant blog. Link back to your new post. There are some good guest blogging services like My Blog Guest that will help you get started.
9. Make sure you mention your new post on your personal Facebook profile page. If you have a good following, you will get eyeballs on your post. Again, encourage sharing. You can try Sponsored posts. I haven't yet, but I may try them in the near future.
10. Take your content and decide how to you can leverage it on other social sites. For example, if you have an image in your post (and you should have one in every post), make sure you pin it in Pinterest. There are bookmarklets and WordPress plugins that will help you do this. If you have a presentation that you're starting from, put that presentation in a blog post (in words), share the presentation up on SlideShare, and then embed it in your post. Make sure that you use all the social sharing functions on SlideShare to get the word out about it.
11. I use Buffer and the HootSuite “hootlet” bookmarklet to share not only my blog posts but other awesome content I find across the web.
12. BONUS: Sign up for Paper.li. Install in your browser the Paper.li bookmarklet. Set up some sources that the service will publish (think authorities in your field). Post your new blog post into your own Paper.li production. The Paper.li service will publicize your content for you 🙂

A caveat: Don't make everything you share about YOU. Share other people's stuff, too. In fact, share other people's stuff 5 or 10 to 1 over your own stuff. Get in the habit of doing some of the above for other people's content. It's good karma.

Plus, you will assemble a tribe of loyal followers who know they can come to you for quality information that has been filtered for them.

Like lemonade without the pulp (I happen to like the pulp).

Here's a link to the presentation I did at my local Meetup about Content Circulation.