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February 10, 2020 Content Chat Recap: Turbocharging Your Social Media Content Curation and Promotion

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When curating social media content, many marketers know to use the 80/20 rule: Just 20% of your content should be promotional, while the remaining 80% should engage your audience by helping them do their jobs better or providing information relevant to their interests. The process of finding and selecting relevant content to highlight is more important than you may think, though, especially since the content you share can be a direct reflection of your brand’s credibility.

In this #ContentChat, longtime community member Paula Kiger (@BigGreenPen), editor of the SmartBrief newsletter, took the hotseat to share tips for finding the best sources for content curation, including how to identify influencers in your space, ways to optimize content for different channels, and the tools you need to work efficiently.

Q1: If you’re just starting out with curating content for a new topic or publication, how can you identify the best sources for curatable content?

Before looking for sources for curatable content, you need to understand your audience, their interests, and where your brand overlaps with those interests. Ideally, you should have a list of keywords and topics that are relevant for your audience that you can then use as the foundation of your search.

Find experts or thought leaders on those topic(s) that your audience is interested in, and explore the content that they are creating, sharing, or linking to.

One way to find these experts is by looking for trade or niche publications that regularly discuss these topics of interest.

Tools like BuzzSumo, SEMrush, and Right Relevance can identify widely shared content or most-searched topics for you to then explore relevant publications or experts.

LinkedIn, especially with its Pulse articles, is another place to find experts, as well as a few of the highly regarded outlets and companies that Vraj identified.

View this process as a journey, not a one-and-done exercise. After you identify your initial list of content sources, create lists or follow experts on Twitter, subscribe to newsletters, and sign up for Google Alerts so that you are constantly being fed new potential sources.

Q2: When you aren’t that familiar with a new industry, how can you tell if the source for that juicy piece of content is reputable or not? What are the tell-tale signs of trashy clickbait publications that are not worth your audience’s time?

It’s best to stay cautious of an article or outlet until you can confirm that it is reputable. There are a few ways to spot if an outlet may not be the best choice, including if many of the articles appear to be pulled from a different site (in which case you should go to that original source).

Check how many external resources are linked in an article to get a feel for whether the claims made are supported by valid sources. If a piece of content just links to more content from that same author/company, that is a red flag.

Search for the people quoted in an article to see if they have expertise in the space. Google their name to see where else they have been quoted, what articles they have written, or if they have been speaking at events. Their LinkedIn page and associated work history can also clue you in on how credible they are.

Assess the tone and cleanliness of an article to gauge a source’s reputability. Is the site riddled with ads? Does the copy have many typos? Is the tone a match for your audience?

You can take this one step further by assessing if an author or outlet has an agenda they may be promoting/if there is a potential bias in their work.

And, finally, assess what type of people are interacting with a piece of content. Are actual professionals commenting on it, or is it just bot activity? Does the outlet or author get meaningful interaction on social media?

Q3: Do I have to read through every piece of content I curate and share? Is it OK to share a piece of content from someone notable without reading it first?

General consensus: Always read a piece of content before you share it.

Why should you always read the content before sharing it? First, put yourself in the author’s shoes. Would you want someone to share your content with commentary that may misposition the point you were trying to make?

Also, the purpose of curating content is to provide value for your audience and in many cases spark conversation. If you have not read a piece that you share, you can’t confirm it will be valuable, nor can engage in a conversation about it.

If you fail to curate reputable and valuable content for your audience, they will gradually become disinterested and disengaged with your brand.

Luckily, the time spent reading content has multiple benefits. By reading through a piece of content, you can then explore other resources that it links out to. And if you do decide to post the piece, when you’re reading it you can grab pull quotes or information you want to call out when you share the piece.

Follow Derek’s guiding principles when selecting content to curate:

Q4: When is it OK to curate the same piece of content more than once in a newsletter or other publication? What about for social?

For newsletters, content can be curated multiple times if there is a new value add or positioning or audience engagement stats justify the choice to reshare a piece.

Social media is more of a free range for resharing content, but you should not be copying/pasting the exact same copy across channels.

Generally, high performing content is a prime candidate for being reshared.

And tailor your content for the different audiences on your channels.

Q5: @biggreenpen how do you extend your @SmartBrief newsletter topics beyond the typical two-sentence summaries?

Paula shares some specific examples below. Do any of these spark ideas for what you could do with your content?

Q6: How can we use video as a way to curate content?

The content you curate should reflect how your audience prefers to consume content. In many cases, video is a welcomed content form.

If you want to create your own videos, you don’t have to go all out when first starting. Try a simple video—you can even just use a phone to record—with a neutral background to get a feel for the process and to see if it’s something your audience wants and it is something you can scale.

Experiment with different video lengths and styles to see what works best for your audience. When possible, include subtitles so the content can be consumed from anywhere.

Paula and Derek share a few examples of video done well.

Q7: What are your tips for curating the same content across different social channels, so people who follow you in more than one place don’t feel spammed?

When curating content, showcase one point that the audience will love (versus trying to do a full recap or cramming every point into a single post).

As mentioned above, tailor content based on the intended channel, its unique features/capabilities, and your audience on that channel. Hashtags can extend the reach of your content on channels that support them, and keep content length requirements in mind when writing your content (Twitter has to be concise, Facebook and LinkedIn can be more lengthy).

Q8: What tools or resources do you use to make your content curation and social promotion easier?

The community shared their top tools for content curation and social promotion below. Are any of your favorites missing? Let us know in the comments.

About Alek Irvin

Alek Irvin is a content marketing professional with a rich history in social media management, executive thought leadership development, and media relations. As a consultant at Erika Heald Marketing Consulting, he creates human-focused content and thought leadership platforms that help brand leaders connect and engage with their communities. Alek has worked with a range of startups and Fortune 500 companies across the B2B technology and consumer spaces, including IBM, Dell Technologies, Hitch Works, Emtrain, Integrate, and Frameable. Connect with him on Twitter @AlekIrvin.

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