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4 Reasons Why Content Curation Has Gone Mainstream

This article is more than 10 years old.

Guest post written by Pawan Deshpande

Pawan Deshpande is CEO of Curata.

With the help of Pinterest and other consumer-oriented companies, content curation - the process of finding, organizing and sharing online content – has gone mainstream. More and more people are looking to content curation to help them navigate today’s chaotic online world. But it’s not only consumers that are benefitting.

Curata's 2012 Content Curation Adoption Survey of more than 400 marketers found that the vast majority are utilizing content curation as a key component of their content marketing strategy. In fact, 95 percent of respondents said they have curated content in the past six months – though some did so unknowingly, as they were not familiar with the term. Why all this buzz around content curation? What is driving the adoption of the practice?

Here are some of the key findings from the survey:

  • Growing quantity led to sinking quality

Of the marketers who took our survey, 56 percent reported finding quality content was their greatest content marketing challenge. The explosion of information on the Web has led to an overwhelming amount of content, making it more challenging to locate the best and most relevant.   Curated sites are a solution to that problem, providing a one-stop destination that sifts through the sea of mediocre content to find the most timely and relevant information on a certain topic. Those sites that do a good job at regularly providing beneficial content are the most successful. As content marketing becomes increasingly central to the overall strategy, marketers look to content curation as a way to help cut through the clutter and provide their prospects with the valuable information for which they are looking.

  • Trust is invaluable  

Some 85 percent of the survey group said that establishing thought leadership was their main content curation objective. Customers want a brand to engage with them prior to the point of sale. By providing quality content, both original as well as from competitors and industry luminaries, brands can position themselves as thought leaders in their space as well as go-to resources for prospects. Once this trust is established, prospects are more likely to become customers when they are prepared to buy.

  • We live in a social world

Social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are creating a way to get on-demand news. Several of the latest big news stories - like the U.S. presidential candidate announcements and Osama Bin Laden’s death - broke first on Twitter. People increasingly are relying on social media as a resource for the most timely and relevant information. Social media tools have become more popular in helping marketers identify the right sources and find relevant content. Some 79%  of the marketers surveyed cited social media as the preferred service for finding content to share.

Once consumer find content manually or through a technology solution, many marketers then curate it on their sites, adding their unique perspective. Social media has also become a means of sharing content online, proving to be one of the effective channels for marketers to push out relevant content to their prospects. Through content curation, marketers can quickly and more easily get their content out in the social sphere and keep their prospects aware of industry information.

  •  Content is powerful  

All major brands today are online - providing their prospects with information, customer service and even e-commerce offerings.  What this means for marketers is that being “searchable” and having a “sticky site” are more important than ever.  A key to having a site easily accessible to those who are interested in the specific product or service is search engine optimization. Content is the sure-shot way to win the battle for first page results on Google. Quite simply, providing fresh and relevant content in an organized way, improves SEO for the site it lives on – which is likely why 65 percent of respondents we surveyed cited boosting SEO as one of their main content curation objectives.

Companies like American Express and Whole Foods are pioneering the role brands now have in providing honest, unbiased content to their customers.  Our survey suggests that today, having content online is a must-have for brands.  95 percent of those we surveyed said that they are engaging with their prospects through content online – providing customer support and best practices via their website, e-mail newsletter or social media platform.  As the online world continues to grow and likely become more chaotic and overwhelming, technologies and strategies for organization and sharing the best, most relevant content will be impossible to ignore.