However, coming up with original content to share on a consistent basis requires creativity, resources and a great deal of time. Even then, there’s no guarantee the content you create will resonate with your audience and leave a positive impression.
To keep your audience engaged without spending all your resources on creating original photos and videos, it’s extremely helpful to learn how to curate social media content like a pro.
What Does It Mean To Curate Social Media Content?
According to Sprout Social, “Content curation is the act of finding and sharing excellent, relevant content to your online followers.” They go on to say, “With content curation, companies deliver a wide variety of content to their customers, keeping them engaged with well-organized and meaningful material.”
In other words, curating social media content involves compiling resources for your customers. Types of resources can include articles, statistics and other forms of information. What you share with your customers will vary depending on your organization’s brand image, goals and needs.
9 Benefits Of Curating Content
According to John Desyllas at Trujay, six awesome benefits to curating content are:
- Providing resources to your team.
- Establishing yourself as a thought leader.
- Following industry trends.
- Building your audience.
- Improving brand awareness.
- Boosting visibility online (SEO).
Creating content is a required piece of your marketing strategy. However, writing blog articles, crafting social media posts or creating YouTube videos takes time, energy and effort to be done correctly. Curating content is much easier than purely relying on creating it all on your own.
For that reason, many marketing professionals insist on repurposing your long-form projects as snackable content
Snackable content takes the work you’ve already done and converts it into a bite-size format that even the less committed members of your audience will enjoy. Many people don’t want to commit to reading an entire blog post, but this new format ensures your hard work gets the results you’re looking for. This format also has the added benefit of serving as a preview for your longer content. So make sure to include a link to the source material and encourage your audience to read more.
Repurpose your long-form content by curating snackable content on your social media.
If you’re looking to provide your audience with a helpful resource and showcase your brand as a thoughtful expert, content curation can make it easy for your audience to find insight and inspiration – and minimize the amount of time they need to spend on the hunt. Make your social media pages a one-stop shop for all things relevant to your brand!
How Much Social Media Content Should You Be Curating?
Now that you know what content curation is, you need to decide exactly how much content you want to curate. Now, while these “golden ratios” vary from business to business, Rock Content found that the top content marketers use these guidelines:
- 30-60% curated content
- 40-70% original content
Test out a few different ratios of content types and see what your audience responds best to. You may find that your ratio will shift depending on what metrics you want to improve on your social media platforms.
Create Curation Categories
What you don’t want to do is overload or bore your social media followers with daily articles on the same subject. Knowing how much of which topics to post about depends on your brand and what you want to share with your viewers. Some companies only publish content strictly related to their brand, whereas others prefer a broader approach.
For example, if you own a small business, say a liquor or barber shop, in a tight-knit town, you could not only share an article about the top 10 haircuts or drinks of 2020, but you could also share the top 10 reasons to shop local this year.
It may seem odd for a barber shop to share a “shop local” article, but since a large portion of their customer base likely enjoys supporting their community, there’s a good chance that their audience will appreciate the article and find it useful.
Other companies like Ben & Jerry’s take a broader approach to their content, taking stances on social justice topics and humanitarian concerns.
Identify Reliable Sources For Content Creation
Now that you know what types of content you want to share, you need to figure out where to find them! It’s important to be conscious about where you get your information. The last thing you want to do is spread fake news or share a bad link. Here are a few questions you can ask yourself when you’re selecting your sources:
- Was this resource posted within the last year or two?
- Is there a newer, updated version of this same article you could share instead?
- Does the organization who posted this have other beliefs that conflict with my brand?
Some companies have other branches or sister companies that they watch, engage with and reshare content from. For example, if you own an insurance agency, you should follow your brand’s official account, so you can easily share their posts.
Follow brands that are similar to yours – and not just your competitor across the street. If you own a coffee shop, research what the top shops are doing on social media. Take notes to inspire creative ideas for your page or find other sources of content they’re curating that you might want to consider following as well.
You can also think about businesses that complement your brand. Follow their Facebook or Instagram pages so you can repost relevant content. This does more than support a fellow business by pushing their content to a whole new audience. It also makes your brand look like a “good sport” to your followers. Maybe a bakery created a list of the best pastries to complement different types of coffee; that would be useful for your coffee shop’s followers, too. Get creative in your search for stellar content and think outside the box.
Include Seasonal Topics In Your Social Media Marketing Plan
Seasonal content can help keep things fresh on your social media page.
Holidays are the perfect opportunity to share fun content that is relevant to your brand. Let your creativity flow and share exciting timely things. Check out what your local Chamber of Commerce is posting; there could be a local holiday event your audience would be interested in.
An effective strategy to stay relevant in the vast world of social media is to stay with the times. You should know what your audience is interested in! As a marketing business in Washington we know that every August our Chamber organizes the sleeping arrangements for participants of one of the largest bike rides in the United States: The Portland To Seattle Bike Ride. Many small businesses in Yelm, Washington take this opportunity to share updates about the event, knowing that their local followers will appreciate it.
So, when you’re mapping out your marketing plan, think about the time of year and what may be going on in your audience’s lives. Another resource to check out is Days of the Year, which offers lesser known national and international days that might pertain to your business. Acknowledge the holidays, big and small, because you never know what will resonate best.
Holiday themed social media curation reminds your followers that there are real people behind your brand.
By sharing something excellent that has already been created, you’re keeping the conversation going. If you believe your followers will be excited about a certain holiday, time of year or trend, talk about it! Great content is great content, whether it came from you personally or not. Just remember to share the original source so you can show them some love and form a relationship, too.
Social Media Content Curation Tools
Hopefully you’re now feeling inspired and ready to curate your social media content! But before you get started, I highly suggest taking advantage of a couple of content curation tools to stay organized and on top of your game.
Google Alerts is a free, easy way to be notified when relevant content is published on the internet. With Google Alerts, you can choose keywords and phrases for your account to be aware of. For example, as a local marketing agency, many members of our team have Google Alerts set for phrases like:
- Social Media Marketing
- Women In Business
- Instagram Algorithms
For a step-by-step list on how to set up your Google Alerts, click here.
Now that your Google Alerts are set up, you’re going to have to keep track of all your new content! What you don’t want to do is share numerous articles about the same topic back to back.
Trello is an outstanding tool that allows you to create different boards, with lists full of outside links or pictures. Imagine you take a bulletin board, and section it off with titles of content relevant to your brand. You then check your Google Alerts and pin articles to the correct categories. This way, you can easily stay organized and keep track of what you have already used.
Now that you understand why and how to curate social media content like a professional, it’s time to get started! Of course, you can always visit our blog for other tips and tricks about the vast world of online marketing.
Let Three Girls Media Develop Your Social Media Strategy!
Are you feeling overwhelmed about the idea of curating your own content, or maybe you’re nervous about creating original posts for social media? We can help! If you want thoughtfully crafted social media content that will have your audience pawing for more, look no further than the combined forces of Three Girls Media.
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