Content curation is the process through which one discovers and shares digital information that is relevant to a specific topic matter or area of interest. Unlike content creation, which relates to the origination, development, and publication of material from scratch, content curation is the process that involves the collection and organization of the available content to make it more useful for the audience.
Every content marketer needs a thorough understanding of ‘what is content curation?’
Let’s Understand Content Curation With An Analogy
You’re a fruit seller who serves healthy relish-worthy fruits from your garden to your audience. Now, you can be the best producer of one fruit, or maybe two. But your audience needs all sorts of fruits, including some that you do not produce.
How do you serve them with those varieties of fruits?
Ideally, you would start producing it (not a scalable approach unless you have a lot of money, expertise, and resources to burn). If you are tight with money, a better approach could be to source it from your peer horticulture practitioners. With this approach, you’ll meet your client’s needs. Your clients will stick with you as they would appreciate that you’re hustling for their comfort. As a result, over time, your client base and your fruit sales might even spike up.
How amazing would that be?
You might ask, “How is his fruit seller theory related to content curation?”
In the content world, you’re selling your knowledge in the form of blog posts (fruits = knowledge). And you share your knowledge in lieu of either the audience’s time, or both ‘time and money’. But often it is seen that your knowledge (fruits that you produce) is limited to your niche (fruit varieties), or a few niches that are interrelated. You might think, so what if I produce limited content? I’m best at what I do. My clients would keep coming back to me for the value I provide. True. They will. But your clients need info and help around all the things that may help them grow their business. It might be related to the services/products you provide or may need help beyond what you’ve expertise in. And in search of that, they will keep wandering around looking for other service/product/solution providers (fruit sellers).
Content curation could be your opportunity to bolster relationships with clients.
I know, you are aware of the fact that your clients are looking for solutions beyond your focus area. Of course, it would be a case of over-expectations, if your clients seek anything from you other than your core business offering. But trust me on this, most of us are always ready to compromise a bit with the quality of products or services if the overall offering size is huge, or if the savings are huge on a deal. And the only thing that can beat this inclination towards ‘the more benefits’ is personal relationships. That includes a professional relationship with the person (rapport), or with the brand.
An example of the power of personal bondings in sales
I would definitely buy branded apparel with a small negligible flaw if I get two at the price of one. I would let go of the deal where I get flawless apparel at its original cost. But I would pay a premium to buy from a store where I’ve developed personal bonds with the store manager or salesperson. I would let go of the brilliant deal of two flawed products even if I get them at the cost of one.
Using content curation to build personal relationships with the audience
The last example works for the content as well. I’m sharing useful business blogs with the intent of enabling you to grow your business, and along the way, I’ll build relationships with you. Content curation helps maximize this. How? Most people out there care about the timing of the information more than the quality of the information.
For example, wouldn’t you have hugged me if I could have told you about Bitcoin back in 2011 rather than doing quality coverage of the same in 2024? The point is, this need for timely content makes us love people who share it. But we can’t produce content about everything that could be of interest or beneficial to our audience. This is exactly why you should collaborate with other content publishers. You can share the content others publish on their blog. Push it to your audience/client base using content curation tools. This will help you in building-
- A personal relationship with your audience.
- A brand persona that is community-first, not competition-first.
- Your confidence and trust in your services/product.
But yeah, the execution of the content curation strategy should be flawless. Else, it could fire back.
The next question is how do you share curated content?
Short answer, using top content curation tools and platforms.
In the current digital age, the volume of information on the internet is so vast. Content curation tools, therefore, douse the din and allow both individuals and companies to deliver the most appropriate and relevant content of quality to their customers. Basically, using content curation tools you can share useful insights and inputs from multiple sources of inspiration.
What Are Content Curation Tools/Platforms
The software tools, aka platforms for content curation, make the process of discovering, collecting, organizing, and sharing content easier. Such tools save one’s time, maintain uniformity, and increase the general effectiveness of content strategizing. They are quite necessary for every marketer who is aiming to build an online presence and engage the target audience by publishing relevant content.
Read this insight as we cover the need for content curation tools, key features, types of content curation tools available, popular platforms, how one can select the right tool, best practices for curation, and consider some of the trends too. Reading this insight would give you an in-depth understanding of content curation tools, and by the time you finish this, you will be all prepared to squeeze value out of these tools.
What Builds The Case For Content Curation Tools
Vast Amount of Available Content Online
The web world is just full. It’s bulging with all kinds of content for every possible subject that one can think of. Navigating and sieving through the enormous pile to identify what is of critical value to businesses and individuals can be daunting.
- Content curation tools do the heavy work such as weeding out irrelevant content and presenting only the most pertinent information. This process, where there is more manual search and curation will be too time-consuming, resulting in very low efficiency, with huge data liable to misidentify high-quality content that is very relevant.
- Curation tools, on the other hand, utilize machine learning and advanced algorithms to easily pick out the relevant content and give preferences based on the users’ criteria.
Time Efficiency
- Manual content curation takes a long time— search, evaluation, and then organization. It may turn out to be laborious and take away time from other major tasks at hand.
- Automation tools for content curation facilitate the operation with ease in getting attention fast—sharing the content fast and with much ease over doing it manually.
Curation tools facilitate access to information on any content that is made available. Furthermore, the tools allow the curators to distribute the available information instantly across multiple platforms; this adds value and coverage to the curated information.
Supplementing Content Strategy
While original content is instrumental in maintaining a unique brand voice, curated content can reinforce the same or even provide additional support to the earlier pieces of content. Moderation allows a healthy coexistence of creating both types of content, as the audience gains an even more enriched experience.
Thought Leadership
Businesses and individuals will become thought leaders within their industries with the continuous sharing of quality, relevant information. This creates an impression that the one sharing possesses in-depth knowledge of the topics and the wish to provide the audience with valuable information, so the effect is brought back to the power of credibility and authority.
Key Functionality of Content Curation Tools
Content Discovery
- Good content curation tools have, at their core, advanced search algorithms and artificial intelligence. They support the discovery of relevant content by analyzing vast data and understanding user preferences. By utilizing these technologies content curation tools should be able to give highly relevant content recommendations and thus make this curation process more efficient and precise
- Users can have defined feeds tailored to their preferences for content discovery around some topics, key terms, or sources. With user-predefined feeds, they can stream the most recent content on whatever interests them, with incredible confidence.
Content Aggregation
Content curation tools can aggregate content from any source, individual blogs, news sites, even social media sites, and all the other online platforms. This very facility of aggregation will guarantee users of getting a diverse view and information. Hence, enriching the content through curation.
Content Categorization
A good curation tool will offer facilities to categorize content or put content into collections so that it can be easy to manage and present. Users let themes, topics, or hashtags create segmentations that will help make the overall structure and coherence of the curated material nicer.
Content Filtering and Personalization
- Advanced filtering options help users to filter the material shown by specifying date, relevance, and source credibility, amongst other criteria. Such filters facilitate curation in a better form; raising the quality of the final content pieces shared.
- Content curation tools are usually endowed with personalization features that give one the power to organize content based on the audience’s preferences and behavior. A curator can select pieces of interest and present content in the right mood, hence raising the levels of interaction and satisfaction with the content that was presented.
Content Sharing and Distribution
Most of the curation platforms available include scheduling and publishing tools, which make the planning and automated sharing of curated content a cakewalk. These kinds of tools help support a continuous and timely distribution strategy and ensure continuous engagement with the audience. Content curation tools support distributing across multi-channels like social media, email newsletters, blogs, and more. This all-channel approach maximizes the reach and effect of curated content and helps in engaging a larger audience.
Analytics and Insights
Analytics features in content curation tools help users track how well their curated content is doing by tracking views, clicks, shares, and engagement rates. These metrics will enable users to understand what kind of information is more effective for the target audience and thus curate on the same lines. Where some tools are limited to providing basic engagement metrics, others go further to offer advanced analytics that draws meaning to the combined performance of curated content. This can take the form of sentiment analysis, trend identification, or other insights on audience behavior, which would then be whittled down to provide an all-rounded view of how well the curated content is performing.
Types Of Content Curation Tools/Platforms
Automated Content Curation Tools
Automated curation tools discover, aggregate, and structure required content using algorithms and AI with minimal human involvement.
Pros
- Saves time and effort since human involvement is less, and the process can be automated.
- Consistent updates are given, and it provides real-time recommendations on the kind of content to be curated.
Cons
- Human curation typically has subliminal meanings and context which these tools do not offer.
- Little control is vested in the quality and relevancy of the content
Manual Curation Platforms
Manual content curation platforms: These manually involve a human curator who selects and organizes content that is relevant to the topic. Examples: Pocket, Evernote, MissingLettr Curate.
Pros
- Total control on selecting content and its quality.
- Provides personal insights and context.
Cons
- Quite time and resource-intensive.
- Tendency is directional, dependent on expertise and curator availability
Hybrid Solutions
Hybrid content curation will provide automated features as well as manual features. The best strength regarding efficiency and personal touch can be seen in these types of tools. Examples include Flipboard.
How to Choose the Appropriate Content Curation Tool for Your Needs
Audience Engagement
- Determine how the tool will help engage the target audience with relevant and valuable content.
- Reflect on how the tool can help to customize content for different segments.
Content Strategy
Reflect on the relevance of the tool to your overall content strategy. Would it complement your originally created content and augment your content marketing agenda?
Usability and User Interface
Evaluate how user-friendly is the tool. It has to be intuitive and user friendly for you to easily curate and manage content.
Integration With Other Tools
Check on the integration of this tool into the existing systems in use for content planning. Can you directly publish to social media platforms and community groups? Is customization available? Integration has to be seamless for easy operation.
Cost
- Compare these features and constraints between the free and paid content curation tools, and find out which one yields a total value for the money you invest in.
- Consider what kind of return on investment (ROI) the tool will yield; the time it can help save; the added engagement it offers; and how much better homogenized the content quality will be.
Trial and Feedback
- To evaluate the true worth of the tool, take advantage of the free trial that is available with most of the content curation tools. In that period, test the features and the performance of the tool you prefer to go with to make sure it fits your needs.
- Get your team on board with the process. Introduce the tool to them. Then listen to their feedback on usability issues, efficiencies, and how productive the tool is likely to be for your goals and content strategies. This inclusive strategy guarantees that the tool selected performs the function for all concerned stakeholders.
Best Practices for Effective Content Curation
Ensure the Relevancy of Content
- Continuously update and check your source’s relevance, timeliness, and quality of content.
- Schedule regular time to do an audit of your content that has been curated to weed out old information and replace it with new and relevant information.
- Understand your audience’s preferences and interests to be able to curate content that they will be drawn to.
- Analyze comments, responses, and reactions to understand what works and what does not, and make sure your content curation strategy follows this data.
- Engage your audience in surveys, direct interactions, or polls to understand their preference for the content.
Ethical Content Curation
- Always give credit to the original creators when you curate content. It involves attributing the work to the owners of the content you are curating via hyperlinks to the primary source. Ethical curation builds trust with your followers and keeps your reputation intact.
- Ensure that you follow the copyright regulations and observe IP protection rights.
- Never pass aggregated content as your content. Clearly separate genuine content from the curated content.
- Add value to the curated content by providing your comment, insight, and context—not to mention just copying and pasting.
Balancing Curated and Original Content
- Use curated content to augment the original content you create and show that your brand voice remains true to form. This curated content should be representative of your brand’s message and values. Don’t overly indulge or rely on curated content.
- Intermix curated content as well as original content to offer your audience a diverse and rich content experience.
- Insert one’s style and voice in curated content. This is through view, context, and analysis among others consequently injecting added value above and beyond the material being curated.
- Curated content will provide a vessel for dialogue, and insight and encourage the audience to engage in conversations.
Conclusion
Content curation tools could be a good addition to your overall content marketing strategy. Especially if you are in IT services or SaaS business. It can also be a mechanism to test the interest of your audience before you invest money into creating content pieces. If you want help with content curation strategy, SaaS content marketing, or SEO marketing, feel free to contact us.
