Introducing Templates, Embedded Topics, and WordPress Integration through Scoop.it

We started Scoop.it for a simple reason: back 4 years ago, we observed that Web 2.0 didn’t just bring all of us an opportunity but also created an expectation that would require new tools for busy professionals. With blogs, social networks and content platforms, you don’t just have a chance to become a media if you’d like to: you are now expected to regularly publish content. The content we publish determines not only how visible we are online but also shapes other people’s perception of our interests, our areas of expertise, our skills etc.

In short, you are the content you publish.

Of course, this means first of all you should participate and that’s what we’ve been focusing on enabling so far: an experience and a curation technology that makes it easier and time-efficient to discover, curate and publish quality content on our interests. But because this content is intimately connected to our online identity, reputation and brand, we’re pleased to launch today awesome and super easy new ways to brand your curated content with Scoop.it:

• As a professional looking to show thought leadership without going through the hassle of setting up and maintaining your own blog;

• Or as a business owner looking to easily add curated content to her website;

• Or even as a marketer looking to drive brand awareness and generate demand through engaging curated content without going through an extensive and painful IT project.

1. Brand your topics with templates

Something a lot of people have liked about Scoop.it so far is the great visual format that makes the content you curate so engaging. Adopting the codes of online media and magazines have made it super easy for readers to scan through topic pages, click on the content they want to consumer and repeat (the average reader of Scoop.it topics consumers more than 3 stories per visit). So far, this now classic 2-column format has been the same for everyone and that’s what we’re changing today by introducing templates.

Templates make it possible to change the layout and the look and feel of your topic in just one click: yes, it’s that easy.

Templates are very useful, powerful and simple. Check the Personal template for instance:

You can activate it in one click to transform the layout of your topic into a ⅔ – ⅓ layout that displays your content prominently while letting you add your profile, bio and customizable welcome messages in the right-hand column. Not only that but you can also display your other topics to keep your readers navigate around your curated content and discover more about you. A template like this can be a great way to strengthen your personal brand through your curated content.

Templates can be accessed through the Customization menu of your topics. From there, simply browse pre-set templates on the left and click on “Choose this template” to preview it on the right side of the screen. Don’t be afraid to try out several templates and modify the template’s parameters: changes will only apply once you’re satisfied with the preview and click Save. We’ll add templates on an ongoing basis so don’t hesitate to check back regularly for new additions.

On top of choosing pre-set templates, designers can code their own templates or evolve existing ones by modifying their HTML and the CSS.

Pre-set templates are available to Pro subscribers and above. Template editing and creation are available to Business subscribers and above.

2. Integrate without coding with topic embeds

What about if you already have a website that reflects your brand perfectly but just want to add your curated content there? While we’ve offered ways to integrate Scoop.it content in your website for quite some time, we’re now making it ridiculously simple: our new embed format lets you add your curated content to any website with a simple copy and paste.

Scoop.it will generate an embed code that you can paste in any web page just like you would do for a YouTube video or a SlideShare presentation.

To generate the Embed of one of your topics, go to the SEO/Site Integration menu and click on Generate Embed Code.

You can also pre-configure your embed code with a few options and you will see a preview directly from the configuration page so you can adjust them to your wishes.

Topic Embeds are available to Business subscribers and above.

3. Introducing the best way to integrate curated content to a WordPress blog

As we wrote back in April when we introduced our WordPress plugin, we now offer many ways to integrate with WordPress which is a major CMS for business and professional websites. However, none of these solutions was perfect in our eyes. The best implementation required some light coding skills and while the plugin didn’t require that, the integration wasn’t as rich and convenient. So we’ve decided to change that and simplify while making it much better.

The embed code of course works for WordPress sites: by just creating a page on WordPress, you can embed your curated content with the simple copy & paste described above.

But you can now also go beyond that first solution without requiring any plugin installation or any coding as we’ve created a brand new white-label WordPress integration that provides the following benefits:

• Optimized for SEO, Social Media and traffic generation: with this integration, each scoop also becomes a WordPress post with its own permalink that your readers can individually reshare and that gets indexed by search engines like Google. Worried about duplicate content? You can even hide your Scoop.it page to concentrate attention on your WordPress site and make it your sole content hub.

• Perfect fit with your WordPress template: your scoops will automatically be formatted according to your site’s look & feel and as per the format you’ve defined for your WordPress posts.

• Easy: set it and forget it.

• Perfect fit with your Scoop.it workflow: no changes required to what you already do. Curate from suggestions or from the bookmarklet and share to your social networks as you scoop a piece of content: the generated URL shared on social networks will redirect your shared scoops to corresponding WordPress posts.

• Flexibility to organize your created and curated content: your curated scoops are categorized under a WordPress category you can define at the topic level. This means you can leverage this at your WordPress template level to display curated content either alongside your own original posts or in a separate page or format.

This new WordPress integration is available as part of our recently introduced Marketers plan which also offers set-up services, VIP support and is optimized for lead generation and marketing automation.

Note: to simplify our offer to WordPress users, we’ll now discontinue the previous sharing to WordPress feature we offered to free users as a way to test drive the WordPress integration while still redirecting content to their Scoop.it pages. Instead we’ll focus on the two above simple solutions. We are however grandfathering existing users who are using that option to share to WordPress: if that’s your case and while we encourage you to consider the above solutions, you don’t have to change your existing habits.

It’s never been easier to brand and publish curated content. Leverage the above new features:

• either to brand your Scoop.it pages through templates you can activate and personalize in one click;

• or to embed or integrate Scoop.it content in your website without any coding required.

And let us know what you make of it by suggesting your beautifully branded content to our showcase.

And if you’re interested in leveraging the benefits of content curation for SEO, check out our complete guide.

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