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Nearly every good content marketing strategy budgets at least some time and resources to content curation.
Content curation is the practice of finding content that is valuable to your audience and then sharing that content with them.
When done correctly, curating content leads to a larger audience, more shares, more discussion, and higher brand visibility.
The ultimate result of all this is, of course, increased conversions.
Of course, the assumption is that you are curating the right content in the right way.
Poor content curation practices can alienate audiences, and derail inbound marketing efforts.
This is why it is important to follow these:
7 Killer Content Curation Practices to Boost Your Content Strategy:
1) Identify a Limited List of Sources Your Organization Will Use For Curation
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If you had limitless time to spend looking for relevant content to curate, you could probably find dozens of articles, blog posts, videos, graphs and charts, podcasts, and social media posts that your audience would love to consume.
Since you don’t have that time, your second best option is to create a list of content sources that have proven to be the most fruitful when it comes to finding relevant content. Here are a few sources to consider:
- Headline Aggregating Websites Such as Alltop
- Local Newspapers and Magazines
- Industry Blogs and Publications
- Blogs and Websites That Appeal to Your Ideal Customer
2) Use Curation to Provide Customers With More Content Variety
Your reason for curating content shouldn’t be limited to simply providing more content. It should be to provide content that is different, in some way, from what you normally provide.
For example, if your original content tends to consist of straight forward blog and social media posts that don’t contain many visual elements, look for videos, infographics, charts and graphs, and even interactive content to curate.
If the topics you cover in your content are limited in scope, curating content is your opportunity to widen that scope (and hopefully your audience). Your audience will appreciate the variety, and the fact that you are considering their needs beyond what directly relates to your products and services.
3) Take Advantage of The Wide Variety of Tools and Resources Available to You
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If you simply share and repost content that you believe will be interesting to your audience, you are technically curating content.
Unfortunately, you cannot curate the amount of content you need to become a viable source of content for your audiences using this method.
You also cannot manage and promote your curated content.
If you want to curate content in a way that creates growth, you need to consider using at least a few of the following content creation tools:
- Pocket: Collect content as you find it and move it into Pocket for later review. This ensures that you don’t miss out on any content that may be relevant to your audience.
- DrumUp: When you create your DrumUp Account, you are given the opportunity to enter in keywords that are relevant to your industry and to your audience. The tool then begins finding and streaming content directly to you. You have the option of connecting drum up to your blog feed, and to associate DrumUp with up to two social media profiles.
- Trust my Paper: An excellent online resource for all types of content curation, along with blogs dedicated to small business writing and inbound marketing.
- Pinterest: This social media platform is ideal for storing and sharing content with your audience. Be sure to install the Pin It button on your browser.
4) Publish and Promote Through Multiple Distribution Channels
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Many people are hesitant to publish and promote outside of their social media channels.
In fact, there are some who are reluctant to curate or promote even outside of a single social media channel.
One of the primary reasons for this hesitance is to avoid the appearance of spamming.
This is a valid concern.
We’ve all been targeted by over zealous social media marketing campaigns that involved spamming content on social media. It’s important to remember that promoting and publishing is not the same as spamming.
Sharing curated content across social media channels, using a variety of lead in posts isn’t spam.
It is making sure that all members of your audience can find the curated content regardless of their social media platform of choice, or when they are available to consume content.
Finally, don’t forget your website and email marketing list as valuable channels for distributing content.
5) Build Relationships By Curating Content From Prospects and Other Associates
Your relationships with your customers and potential customers are extremely important. That should always be your prime focus. However, as a small business owner, there are other relationships you also want to foster.
Owners of other businesses in your community, vendors and suppliers, bloggers who create content that is relevant to your audience, are just three examples of people and entities with whom you want to form mutually beneficial relationships.
One way to do this is to use these as sources of content curation.
It’s also a very simple method of curation.
Simply share and repost content and provide links back to the original source.
6) Republish Content in a Way That is Both Ethical and Mutually Beneficial
If you want to avoid any appearance of attempting to take credit for content that you did not create yourself, you could limit your curation to sharing snippets of text and linking to everything else.
The problem with this is that people hate clicking external links. In lieu of doing this, you can use a few other methods for keeping things on the “up and up”.
For example, if you plan to curate content on your own website or blog, simply ask the author. You should also do yourself and the person whose content you are sharing a favor and follow Google’s rules when duplicating content.
7) Add Your Own Input to Curated Content
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Your audience doesn’t just want to see other content.
They follow you because they want your thoughts and opinions on the content that you share.
So, give that to them.
Let them know why you selected the content to share, and why you believe it is relevant.
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Final word
There are so many benefits to curating content.
Curation is a tool that allows you to provide your followers with added value, drive more traffic to your website, and create engagement.
Taking the time to follow good curation practices benefits your customers by insuring they get the best content possible.
In addition to this, you benefit by maintaining good relationships with other content providers and by staying within Google’s guidelines for curating content.
How about you? What is your favorite killer content curation practices ?
The post 7 Killer Content Curation Practices to Boost Your Content Strategy appeared first on Cloudswave Blog.
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