How to get started with curated content

This is something I get asked about quite a lot. Essentially curated content means finding relevant content that other people have created, that your audience on social media might like. You are sharing it with your audience, which demonstrates that you’ve got the skinny on all the latest stuff. You get brownie points.

So for example, I follow lots of ‘famous marketing people’ (unlikely as it sounds, there are marketing megastars) on Twitter. I know my followers like me to share stuff from the top bods. How do I know? From the engagement and comments I get.

Hmmm... why would people get that kind of content from you?

So now you’re wondering, why would people get that info from me, rather than directly from the top bods? There’s nothing to stop anyone going straight to the top bods, but my followers like it from me because I’m doing the leg work and sifting process. So I filter out all the rubbish and only share the good stuff. So you can argue that curating content is providing a service to your followers.

Curation is sharing not copying

Just to be crystal clear, curation is about sharing content, not copying or nicking other people’s stuff. Whatever you share must always link back to the original source. That’s the bit to remember.

Where do you start?

The good news is that there are lots of cool tools and resources that can help you. So here are a few to take a shufty at.

1. Pocket

This is a good place to start. It’s free to use. It’s a pretty way of saving content you see around the place. Much tidier than bookmarks and you can tag each thing you find, organise it into folders so it’s easy to find again. So the curated bit comes in when you click the ‘explore tab’ (see picture - the tab is on the top left). You then put in a topic you are interested in finding content for. See in the picture where I’ve put in the word ‘coaching’. Then click search, and it will present you with top trending content based on that topic that you can share with your followers.

2. Twitter lists

You can create Twitter lists of people you follow that have great content. It’s a good way of organising your twitter feed anyway, but if you create a list called something like, Great Content Ideas, and add the people you follow who have great content you want to share, you’ll always be able to find it. (If you're not sure how to create Twitter lists, click here)

3. scoop.it

This is for serious curators. It will suggest content for you based on the information you plug into the app. You can then either have it automatically post on your behalf, or you can look at the suggestions manually and decide which you want to share. It’s not cheap, it’s $67 a month. There is a very basic free version which is just about enough to decide whether its something you like before you buy it.

4. Quuu

I use this one regularly. I’ve written about it before, and it remains one of my most reliable tools which has been key in helping me build my Twitter following. There is a free version that allows you to post up to 6 pieces of content a day to send to 3 social media platforms. There is a $19 a month version which gives you more options, and a $50 a month version for power users. You also need a Buffer account.

Essentially you choose your topics and set various parameters, it suggests popular content from around the web, and it automatically sends it to your Buffer account each day. You can then choose to manually select, or let it post automatically for you.

There are others, it seems this area of tools is growing. Big companies use systems that cost upwards of $500 a month that use AI to fine tune the content they find.

Anyway, have a play around with these. If you post content every day, it could save you a few hours each week, which would justify the cost.

Let me know how you get on.

All the best

Jackie xx