WritingThoughts

Content is the hot topic right now. You’ve probably read a lot about the importance of content lately, but do you really understand it?

To make full use of content for your business, you need to understand both content creation and content curation. Many businesses lean towards one or the other, but both are important.

In some ways, content creation and content curation are two sides of the same coin. You can’t really have one without the other. Your social media strategy won’t be nearly as effective without some elements of both.

In this post, I’ll compare content creation and content curation and explain why both are important to content marketing.

Content marketing is important because it helps draw attention to your brand. It also allows you to demonstrate your knowledge in a particular area.

Content Creation

Content creation refers to the creation of original content. When you think of content creation you may think of writing posts or articles. And you’d be partly right.

But content creation actually includes more than writing. Original content can also include:

• Videos
• Photos
• Graphics
• Cartoons
• Infographics
• Apps
• Slideshows
• Podcasts

Even reviews and news could be considered a form of content. Ebooks and forums are also content.

Let’s look at the other side of the coin.

Content Curation

Content curation is the collection and sharing of high quality relevant content to a targeted audience.

When I think of content creation, the site that immediately comes to mind is Nononina’s Alltop site. The site collects and shares high-value content through site users in a number of targeted areas.

Of course, most of us don’t curate content to the extent that Alltop does. But if we share content in a thoughtful and purposeful manner, we are engaged in content curation.

Here are some easy examples of content curation that most freelance writers can do:

• Sharing topical posts through social media.
• Creating a roundup post that links to selected content within a particular topic.
• Compiling and distributing a newsletter comprised of links to specific content.

Learn More

To learn more about content creation, check out these posts and articles:

• How to Create Content That Actually Resonates With Your Readers from Corey Eridon on the HubSpot Blog. Corey provides a very comprehensive post about how to create web content that works.
• 11 Fundamental Skills Your Content Creation Team Needs
  from Heidi Cohen’s blog. Heidi identifies the skills needed for content creation.
• Content Plays Critical Role Throughout Tech-Buying Cycle from Nick Stamoulis on MarketingProfs. Nick examines how content fits into the tech-buying cyles.

To learn more about content curation, check out these posts and articles:

• 4 Reasons Why Content Curation Has Gone Mainstream from Pawan Deshpande on Forbes. Pawan examines some of the trends affecting content curation.
• 5 Tips for Great Content Curation from Steve Rosenbaum on Mashable. Steve identifies some key characteristics of good content curation.

What Do You Think?

Is content marketing a part of your marketing strategy?

What did I leave out?