Content curation continually find, select, and share the best and most relevant contentContent is the currency of the social web. It’s what people search for. What makes them click, share, comment, subscribe, donate, follow or buy from you.

But creating valuable, compelling content can be quite a challenge for many entrepreneurs, businesses and organisations.

So! If you think you’re not quite ready for that particular challenge, you should start thinking about content curation.

In this blog post I will explain what content curation is, what the benefits are for you and your network, how to do it well and how to get started today!

What is Content Curation?

Content Curation basically means that – out of all the content you find on the social web – you pass on the most valuable stuff to your network.

A slightly more coherent definition of someone who curates content comes from marketing expert Rohit Bhargava:

A Content Curator is someone who continually finds, groups, organizes and shares the best and most relevant content on a specific issue online.

Content curation: what it does and doesn’t do

The benefit for your network, is that your friends, connections and followers don’t have to plough through masses of tweets, blog posts, news feeds and search results to find quality content. You have already done that for them!

This establishes you as ‘the one who knows!’. It brands you as an expert. A Trusted source. It builds your reputation and gets you kudos i.e. ‘social capital’.

So what doesn’t content curation do?

Different to content marketing, content curation doesn’t drive people through their decision making process about your products and services. For this, you would need to create tailor-made content that answers specific questions people have about specific aspects of your products or services.

Curating content: you are probably already doing it!

You are probably already sharing stuff with people in your network. E.g. an article you share via your Linkedin status update, a YouTube video you share with your Facebook friends, or maybe you are already sending out tweets on Twitter.

Effectively you are already curating content!

There are also quite a few tools that curate content for you. For example Alltop, StumbleUpon, Flipboard (for iPad), and many many many others.

However – just like with a piece of music or a new film – nothing beats the advice of a friend. And that is the real power of content curation. It allows you to be ‘the one’ who finds and points people to content they really value.

So, how can you move from being a casual content curator to the King of Curation for your network?

The art of curating content: how to do it well

I think there are three basic rules for becoming a great content curator:

Rule #1 – Do it on a specific topic: sharing interesting stuff with your friends and network is something that most people already do. But if you want people to start seeing you as a Trusted source of information, you need to pick your topic. You can’t be an expert in everything.

Rule #2 – Share only the best stuff: the more the merrier is a habit that dies hard, especially with marketers (like me :-p). But this is not a volume game. Your network is interested in a lot of things. In regards to your field of expertise; they are only interested in the cream of the crop.

Rule #3 – Do it continuously: we live in a quickly changing world. News gets out in real time. People expect you to be up to date. They will unfollow you if you haven’t tweeted in a month. You need to be continuously visible and constantly on the ball.

Content curation: how to start today!

You will not become a great content curator overnight. But you need to start somewhere. Here are 3 tips to get you on your way towards becoming the King of Curation for your network & niche!

Tip #1 – Set-up Google Alerts on certain keywords.

Tip #2Set up a Google RSS Reader & start monitoring relevant blogs & news sites

Tip #3 – Start updating your Linkedin status with links to top notch content.

A final note on content curation

I will soon post more on content curation. I’m working on some posts that talk more indepth about tools that help you become a great content curator, the infrastructure you need to make it work for you and tips and tricks to search and find more content that is of value to your network.

Until then, happy curating!