As marketers, we are responsible for producing content at a seemingly ever increasing rate. According to countless studies, including Curata’s 2016 Staffing, Strategy, and Tactics Survey, content marketing is proven to help generate leads, increase traffic, and establish thought leadership, among other benefits. However, many of us lack the time, staff, or budget to publish enough original content to keep up with the demand. This is where content curation comes in.

What is Content Curation?

Curata’s definition of content curation is as follows:

Content curation is when an individual (or team) consistently finds, organizes, annotates, and shares the most relevant and highest quality digital content on a specific topic for their target market.”

At its best, curation is:

• Performed by a person, not simply a computer algorithm.
• Being discerning, discriminative, and selective.
• Added value. You offer perspective, insight, guidance.
• Not a one-time event or activity.
• Informed by a laser focus on your audience.

How Can Curation Help Your Business?

According to Curata data, leading marketers use a mixture of 65 percent created content and 25 percent curated content.

Why? The path to purchase used to be a straightforward line from point A (buyer need) to point B (conversion). It was easy for marketers to guide and even control a prospect’s journey along this narrowly defined series of steps.

The world is different now.

Buyers are hyper-connected today. They use multiple devices and channels to access an inexhaustible avalanche of information in real time. This buyer isn’t waiting for you to tell them what to do next. In fact, according to SiriusDecisions, 70 percent of the buyer journey is now completed without any sales involvement.

So, how are buyers making their purchase decisions, and—more importantly—how can you influence those decisions?

Enter Content Marketing

Businesses use content marketing to respond to this consumer environment. It’s a process for developing, executing, and delivering the content and related assets needed to create, nurture, and grow a company’s customer base.

However, as more businesses jump onto the content marketing bandwagon, it becomes more difficult for marketers to maintain the frequency and quality of content required to compete.

Content curation helps you compete effectively and efficiently, and provides unique benefits critical in today’s market.

Take a look at the infographic below. You’ll discover some of the biggest benefits of content curation. And you’ll also see how curation can help marketers overcome some of their greatest challenges.

To develop and maintain an efficient, effective, and ethical curation practice requires five primary activities:

1. Define your objectives
2. Find your sources
3. Curate by organizing and editorializing
4. Share via a variety of channels and mediums
5. Analyze and optimize your content curation performance

To learn more about content curation, including the five step process for starting your own curation program, download the eBook, Curate Content Like a Boss: The Hands-on Guide.