Curate Your Way To A Better Blog [Content Curation Tips]

Running a marketing team is tough. Keeping on top of content and consistently adding high quality posts to your blog can seem impossible. You feel like you don't have the resources to dedicate to it but that it is a valuable marketing channel that needs to be maintained. 

Curated content can provide the perfect solution. You can continue to post a sufficient amount of high quality content but you don't need to spend as much time dedicated to writing well-crafted blog posts. 

In this blog post, we’ll dive into the best practices for using content curation to maintain or even improve the quality of your blog. Let’s get started!

1. Select Your Sources

The first step in adding top notch curated content to your blog is making sure that content comes from a strong source. What do we mean by a strong source? That would be a source that is recognisable to your audience, has a great reputation, is trusted, reliable and relevant to your target audience. 

The sources you choose will impact your credibility with your audience. If you start posting content without giving thought to it or how your audience will receive it you may damage your reputation. It is also essential that you always fact check your sources. You don't want to be posting content that has been shown to be false or that spreads misinformation or bad advice to your audience. 

Think about the target audience that your source has. Curated content that comes from other blogs with small followings will not likely help your traffic. Recognisable names and publications will go a long way in creating credibility on your content and intrigue for your audience. 

2. Select Relevant Curated Content 

Relevancy is key in content curation. You need to be thoughtful about the content you are sharing. Step into the shoes of your blog's readers and your target audience. Ask yourself why they would be interested in this piece of content. Will this content help make them a loyal reader of your blog? 

3. Annotate Your Curated Content 

Content curation is not simply copying a blog post from one site and then pasting it on your own. It is always advisable to add some of your own content such as your ideas or comments on the topic discussed in the content. 

Why should you annotate your curated content? Glad you asked. The first and most obvious reason is copyright infringement. Even if you give credit to the original creator, this still comes across as plagiarism, especially if you do not ask them in advance if you can post their content. 

The second reason is that duplicate content is bad for your blog's SEO. This content won't rank and your website may even be penalised. 

The third reason is that it will be difficult to build a loyal following if you are simply showing your audience content they can find elsewhere, possibly on publications they already follow. 

Annotating content from your sources is a common content curation strategy that helps you avoid the three problems listed above. 

You can use information from your source in the form of block quotes, making sure to link to your source. Then you simply add some copy that explains your own thoughts, ideas or reactions to this piece of content. 

If you are still a little confused about how to do this then I recommend you go and check out the popular site The Marginalian (formerly Brain Pickings).

This is a blog that has mastered curated content. Maria Popova, writer of the blog covers topics such as art and philosophy, often curating content in the form of long quotes from articles, essays, and books, and then adding her own thoughts. 

To Sum Up 

When it comes to having a successful blog, having consistent high quality content is key. But when you are running several marketing channels, finding the time to create well-crafted original content consistently is tricky. Content curation provides the solution. But it's not a cheat code. You don't simply copy-paste other content. You still need to take the time to find quality content from reliable sources and make sure that your blog posts are not duplicated by adding your own ideas. 

See inspirations here:

Continuously generating original content for your audience can be impossible. It takes up too much time and resources. Instead, you should be mixing your original content with curated content. Find top-quality content in your niche to share with your audience with the Streams tool. Sign up for a free 14 day trial today.