Why Curation is Essential for Your Content Strategy

By: Coleen Ryan, Account Manager Is content curation a part of your current content marketing strategy?If not, you may be missing out on a powerful tactic that can help you stay ahead of the content curve. Creating enough original content to maintain a fresh and relevant feed is a huge challenge.But curating content is a great way to add some valuable diversity for your audience, build your own content ideas and establish your brand as a thought leader in your industry. Curated Content vs. Aggregated Content Content curation is becoming increasingly common with about one-third of all marketers sharing industry news, blogs or other information resources daily. Some of this daily sharing, however, is more likely to be defined as aggregated content, which isthird-party content that’s shared without any edits or added comments. Alternatively, curated content involves adding a bit of your own unique editorial flair. You might highlight important points or add your own comments before you share the content.No matter how you choose to editorialize it, curated content can keep your company’s social media feeds from getting stale and set your brand apart. Why Curate Content? Among most marketers, thought leadership is the biggest draw for content curation. However, there are several other compelling reasons to add this practice to your marketing strategy: It saves resources: When your time and resources are limited, content curation can help keep a steady flow of material coming through your social feeds in addition to helping guide your original content strategy. It can boost your SEO: If you can position yourself as a leading source of information in your industry and get more people going to your page, that can be a big SEO boost. Sharing videos and infographics will help you get the best SEO benefits with one study showing that posts containing videos attract up to 3 times the number of inbound links as text-only posts. Additionally, sharing content may get you some engagement from the original poster. It fills in the gaps: If you want to stay visible and build strong connections with your social networks, it’s important to post frequently.Unless you’re producing several original posts a day, there can be undesirable gaps in your schedule. Curated content helps fill these gaps and keep your visibility high. Best Practices Content curation can be powerful, but it only works if you do it well.Keeping a few best practices in mind will help you get your own curation efforts right: Maintain a healthy balance: There’s no definite ratio of curated-to-original content that will work for every brand. To add another layer of complexity, different social channels will have their own optimal frequency. Ideally, you should have as much original content as possible and then fill in the gaps with curated pieces. Post on a consistent basis: There are varying opinions on how often a brand should be posting content, but experts tend to agree that consistency is key.Don’t overwhelm your following with a barrage of content one day and then disappear from the social media landscape for days.Spread out your content over hours and even days (there are plenty of tools to help you schedule posts).Not only will this maintain a steady flow of content to keep your audience’s attention, but it will also help you catch the eye of users that are online at different times. Be picky: Not all content is worth sharing.Don’t fall into the trap of automatically sharing posts and tweets from specific sources.Take the time to read articles and select only those that are truly relevant and insightful. Be sure to fact-check your curated content as carefully as you would an original piece. Inspire engagement: Curated content can act as a terrific conversation-starter between your brand and its following.When you share content, throw in a comment about why the piece was relevant or interesting, or add an opinion on the item.Many brands like to tack on a question that gets their audience thinking and commenting.Content that provokes discussion is more likely to be shared, which will broaden your exposure and boost your following. Takeaway: While content curation is an effective tool to help establish yourself as a trusted source for information, it’s only one piece of the puzzle.You also need to be creating your own high-quality content to attract more readers and demonstrate your originality – nothing can take the place of your own fresh, original content. But content curation can, and should, play a key role in nearly every business’s marketing mix.