In honor of Earth Day, it’s time to explore some easy ways to recycle content and create new value from old posts. Whether you’ve got a case of writer’s block, are hitting a busy time where you just don’t have the hours to crank out something completely new or you’ve grown your readership and want to expose them to a previous post that you think still has a lot of value, there’s plenty of good reasons to look to the past when trying to keep your blog fresh and exciting.

So in the name of maximizing resource utilization and conserving (mental) energy, here are some tips and tricks for extremely efficient blog recycling:

Reframe an old piece with a new update
Many bloggers use this platform to talk about the new and exciting moments in their life, whether it is starting a new project to getting a new pet. If your readers cared enough to read your initial post they certainly will want to hear about what happened next. Think about what old posts could use an update. Here’s an example from After Orange County that gives readers an update on a log cabin renovation first mentioned in a previous post.

Make interlinking a habit
Maybe you’re talking about your son’s first day of middle school. It’s pretty easy to slot in a call back to the post you wrote on his first day of kindergarten or on his last day of elementary school. So wipe away those tears of nostalgia and never forget to link back to any of your previous posts.

There’s no shortage of opportunities for historical callbacks to previous posts, here’s an example from Mom Meets Blog. As a rule, any time you type “as I mentioned in a previous blog post” you should be LINKING to that previous blog post.

Use the calendar
Last year (or two or three years ago) you posted a great Thanksgiving recipe. Last time we checked, Thanksgiving is happening again this year. Give your old post a shout-out with a mini-post pointing readers back to old, but once again timely, content or just posting the entire thing again. Here’s a calendar-driven re-posting from Clover Lane on the seasonally appropriate activity of waxing Fall leaves.

Try out new names on social media
As we covered in our post What’s in a Name? 9 Keys to Great Blog Post Titles, there are plenty of tactics for coming up with an engaging headline for your post. While you can only use one title on your actual blog post, social media gives you the opportunity to try out lots of names, all pointing back to the same exact article. This can help you attract new readers that didn’t connect with your original title as well as keeping your social media feeds looking fresh while still giving potential readers multiple chances to discover your post.

This particular trick is used by all the heavy hitters on social media, and Twitter is a particularly good platform to see it in action. Even trying out a different hashtag or two might score you some new followers.

Make your own listicle
You read posts all the time that are just lists of links a common theme and if you have been blogging long enough, you’ve probably touched on related topics frequently enough to create your own.

Do you review products on your blog? Create a “Best of” post with links back to the individual reviews like this one from Write Not Reviews. Or maybe it’s just a list of your craziest parenting moments or favorite cookie recipes. Regardless of your blog’s genre, there’s bound to be some theme that runs through a few posts to create something new that links back to the old.