There are three Cs that every content marketer must know – create, curate and collaborate. Although it appears the easiest, of all three, content curation can be considered as the most challenging. Content creation is the process of helping your target audience find the best possible content online. Do it wrong from the foundation and it will end up in shambles.
Even you – you are doing content curation without you realizing it. Do you have a Facebook profile? Do you share posts, images, videos, infographics, etc. that you think your friends will find fun or useful? That’s content creation.
With that said, here’s what how you implement a content curation strategy.
Proper ways to curate content
1) Provide context to the curated content
2) Mix original with curated content
3) Curate only the most valuable content
4) Diversify the content topic
5) Evaluate the fit of the curated content
6) Share content on social media
7) Attribute the source of the content
1) Provide context to the curated content
Offer your views, insights, and knowledge when presenting curated content. You can do this through a commentary or quote. Do this to each piece of content you curate. Although the content is not yours, there will be a sense of ownership because of your abstraction of the said content, for instance. Also, put a call to action with each content you share.
2) Mix original with curated content
Curated content is good, but it won’t be as good if it’s purely curation. Publish original content, too. In fact, this should be your core content strategy. Otherwise, your target audience and rivals would only think of your brand as an aggregator. As such, publish custom content that’s targeted to your niche.
3) Curate only the most valuable content
It is not enough that you curate content that aligns to the goals, initiatives, and values your brand stands for. Don’t be too you-centric, sharing content that is all about you and your brand. Know what your audience needs and wants and share pieces of content that answer their common inquiries, for instance. This instills your expertise in the subject as well.
4) Diversify the content topic
There is strength in numbers, right? Thus, make sure that everyone in the company understands that they are also contributors. They can share an interesting article that they run into while exploring their news feed, for instance. It’s the internal knowledge-sharing culture that you are building here. You may also create a content hub (perhaps using a tool) where they can share the content with the curators.
5) Evaluate the fit of the curated content
Other than selecting strong content to share, there should be a fit. You don’t just share a piece of content because you find it interesting. It should resonate with your brand and your audience. Otherwise, it will be deemed irrelevant. When structuring content curation, collect as many content pieces as you can. However, when sharing a content, focus on its quality.
6) Share content on social
Speaking of sharing, a piece of content will have no value unless you share it with your people. In Facebook, for instance, you need to share twice a day, everyday of the week. Publish brand-related content on Thursdays and Fridays and save the weekends for other, but still brand- and audience-relevant content. Post on social sites that best resonates with the nature of your business. You can’t be on every and all social site.
7) Attribute the source of the content
Give credit where credit is due. Don’t pass the content as something you create originally. That would be so wrong, and a common pitfall in content curation. You share a piece of content to your audience because you find it relevant and valuable. So, you might as well credit the source of such content and let the owner know that you are using his or her content. Who knows, he or she might share the content thereby expanding the reach of the content.
You can only trust the process when your content curation process can be trusted. Do it right, and everything will fall into place. It all boils down to being selective. If you want to be perceived as the authority within your industry, you should be sharing high-quality pieces of content. You provide your audience value through the content you shared and they will think of you as their go-to source of essential information.
