Content Curation: Is it a new tool to share useful content?

by Carl Natale on February 4, 2011

Content Curation in a Twitter Newspaper

Is content curation a useful way for you to build a reputation as an expert?

Content curation is nothing new. Basically it is the act of monitoring many sources of content and sharing only the best sources.

Jonathan Fields describes it like this:

Why? Because I spent a lot of time sourcing, reviewing, vetting and assembling the most valuable content so that others wouldn’t have to. And, because I’ve done it repeatedly, people have come to trust my ability to do it well.

So, as you’re thinking about how you can best serve your tribe and deliver the coolest content experience possible, think beyond creation and consider mixing in curation.

via Is Content Curation The New Black?.

Steven Rosenbaum has a book, Curation Nation , coming out about content curation and describes it as a solution to these problems:

As the volume of content swirling around the web continues to grow, we’re finding ourselves drowning in a deluge of data. Where is the relevant material? Where are the best columns and content offerings? How can we balance the need for timely, relevant information with reasonable limits of our ability to find, sort, fact check and validate information?

via 4 Promising Curation Tools That Help Make Sense of the Web.

These are good descriptions of what I call filters. Content curation also can be called:

  • Journalism
  • Research
  • Blogging

Nothing really new here. What’s new is that there are tools that help your curate or filter information.

Should you curate content?

This is a good idea if you are trying to build a brand as an expert. We’re all overwhelmed by the amount of content that is available. We need trusted curators who can filter out the bad content and share useful information.

The trick is converting the audiences for that content. The tools really don’t do much for your business directly because they exist on other sites. Of course the same could be said for Facebook. But it’s a legitimate business tool.

The key is to create links between your curation tools and your website. Remember, you have a content curation tool already. It’s called a blog.

How to curate content in 3 steps

If you want to try curation, here’s a three-step plan for a basic content curation system:

  1. Create a Google Alert for a niche area.
  2. Subscribe to blogs and news sources that you trust.
  3. When you find something your audience would find valuable, write a short blog post with a short description and link to the source.

If you blog with WordPress, the “Press This” bookmarklet makes this really easy.

Take content curation to the next level

Monitoring the sources and sharing links is useful. But you need to analyze it, add context and explain why it is important to your audience. Otherwise your blog isn’t any better than one of those Twitter newspapers. Your insight will raise your reputation and the audience’s confidence in you.

So try a tool or two. See if they work for you. Or maybe use them to find trusted sources you can use to find information that helps your audience. You need filters as much as they do.

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