Repurpose One Video Transcript Into Four Posts With n8n
Content Repurposing System: one transcript into 4 platform-ready posts in 18 seconds. THE PROBLEM Every video cost me two hours turning it into posts for Twitter/X, LinkedIn, Skool and Instagram. The writing wasn't hard. The context switching was. Four platforms, four tones, the same idea rewritten four times. Built during the Skool x Hostinger n8n hackathon, Dec 2025. Still my daily workflow. STACK: n8n on a Hostinger VPS, OpenAI, Google Sheets. 13 nodes. HOW TO BUILD IT Manual Trigger. Swap for a Form or Drive trigger if you want it hands-off. Set node "Set Transcript", one string field: transcript. Leave a real sample transcript in the default value so anyone can hit execute and see output immediately. IF node "Check Transcript", two conditions with AND: transcript is not empty, and {{ $json.transcript.length }} > 50. False branch goes to a Stop and Error node. Four minutes of work. It's why I've never burned 5 API calls on a blank field. OpenAI node "Analyze Content", model gpt-5.4-mini, Simplify Output OFF: You are a content analyst. Analyze this video transcript and extract: Main topic/theme 3-5 key insights or takeaways Target audience Tone (educational, motivational, technical, etc.) Any specific examples, statistics, or stories mentioned Transcript: {{ $json.transcript }} Provide your analysis in a structured format. I don't send the transcript to four writers. I send it to one analyst first, and all four writers read that analysis. This lifted quality more than any prompt tweak: the posts share one reading of the material instead of each model guessing. The stronger model goes here for the same reason. Wrong analysis, four wrong posts. 5-8. Four generators, all gpt-4o-mini, Simplify Output OFF, all wired from Analyze Content's single output. Each pulls the same two inputs: Content Analysis: {{ $('Analyze Content').item.json.choices[0].message.content }} Original Transcript: {{ $('Set Transcript').item.json.transcript }} Then its own rules. Twitter (temp 0.8): hard hook, under 280 chars, one insight, no hashtags. LinkedIn (0.7): 150-250 words, 2-3 line paragraphs, ends on a question, no hashtags. Skool (0.8): 100-200 words, always a numbered list of actionable takeaways, ends by inviting replies. Instagram (0.8): 125-175 words, 5-8 hashtags, plus a detailed "Visual suggestion:" for a designer or image model. LinkedIn needed a tone block after v1 read like a press release: talk like you're with a colleague over coffee, use I and you, never "leverage", "in today's landscape", "fast-paced". Naming banned words works. "Write conversationally" does nothing. Merge node "Collect All Posts", 4 inputs, one generator per index. Aggregate node, mode All Item Data. Puts all four posts on one row instead of four. Code node "Format Output". Reads each generator by node name, each in its own try/catch, so one failure still writes a row. Builds a readable timestamp, a 100-character transcript_preview, and status: 'Generated'. Google Sheets, Append Row, Map Automatically. THE SHEET Seven columns, headers in row 1, named to match the Code node exactly: timestamp, transcript_preview, twitter_post, linkedin_post, skool_post, instagram_post, status. Status is a dropdown: Generated > Reviewed > Scheduled > Published. The system drafts, I decide. FOUR THINGS THAT COST ME HOURS Turn Simplify Output OFF on every OpenAI node. Every expression reads choices[0].message.content, which only exists in the raw response. Leave Simplify on and you get four empty columns with no error explaining why. No title row above your headers. I had a merged title in row 1, headers in row 2. Map Automatically stopped seeing my columns and silently built duplicates beside them. Extend data validation down the whole column (G2:G1000, not G2). I set the dropdown on one cell and every appended row arrived as plain text. Kill markdown in the prompt, not after. I wasted an evening regex-stripping ** in the Code node. The fix was upstream: tell Skool and Instagram plain text only, CAPITALS or "quotes" for emphasis. Zero artefacts since. Post-processing cleanup means your prompt is underspecified. RESULT Two hours per piece became 18 seconds of runtime plus 5-10 minutes of review. I tested 20 transcripts across five content types (tutorial, interview, news, explainer, motivational). Most were publishable with light edits. The failure mode never changed: rambling transcript, vague analysis, four vague posts. Which is exactly why the analyst node gets the better model. Budget 30 minutes to rebuild. The prompts are the product. Copy the structure, then rewrite the platform rules in your own voice. That's what decides whether it sounds like you or like everyone else.
0 comments