Do you want to know if your content curation strategy is successful? If you’re a business owner or marketer, the obvious answer is “Yes!”
Content marketing is a general term for any article, video, email, or social media post made to attract leads and keep existing customers engaged.
People decide whether or not they like a company based on the content they produce. High-quality content will help turn first-time visitors into life-long customers, while a poor content marketing strategy can turn people away from your business.
Today, I want to show you how you can use content curation to improve your content marketing strategy and grow your business.
We will start by defining content curation and sharing a few examples so you can see how it works. Then, we will review key content metrics you should track through your website, email, and social media. Along the way, I’ll share a few actionable tips you can use to boost conversions and get more value from your curated content.
Let’s begin!
What is Content Curation?
Before we go any further, let’s define the term content curation. Simply put, content curation is a subset of content marketing that involves finding and sharing high-quality content made by other content creators.
The benefits of using content curation are plentiful and certainly worth your time. For one thing, curating content is cost-effective. Instead of creating something from scratch, you can gather existing material, spin it, and make it your own.
Many marketers use curation as a way to connect with other businesses and publications in their industry. A well-planned content curation strategy could easily help you spark new partnerships.
As a result, you can improve your brand reputation and build your name in the industry with the right strategy.
Let’s not forget the biggest reason you should use content curation; it attracts people to your brand. Your website, emails, and social media will all generate more traffic and get more engagement when you mix curation into your usual content.
Videos, products, brands, and articles can all be curated in interesting and engaging ways for your audience. For example, here’s a blog post that shows a curated list of marketing tools:
People discovering this list are likely interested in learning about different types of email marketing software. Curating this list will lead to people sticking around and reading the full post. Similarly, the recent comments feature on the sidebar is another form of curated content. It encourages readers to click through and see what other people are talking about.
Content curation is so popular that some businesses exist solely to repurpose existing content. These sites are made using tools like the Scoop.it Curated Content Hub. One of the best examples of a place that exists mostly as a curation platform is Medium.com.
Now that you know a little more about content curation, let’s look at the three main places to create and share this type of content. I will cover several important metrics you should track if you want your curation strategy to succeed.
Content Curation Metrics You Should Track
On Your Website
First, let’s look at some of the important on-site metrics that can help you determine the effectiveness of your content curation strategy. I recommend adding Google Analytics to your website so you can quickly and easily track data and the following metrics on blog posts, landing pages, and other high-traffic locations.
Pageviews
Pageviews are the number of times someone lands on your website via a browser. This number is important, especially when you look at it for specific posts. If your site gets a ton of organic pageviews, people are discovering your website, which is great!
You should frequently check the pageviews on your curated content so you can see how it compares to blog posts created from scratch. It’s also important to track how you’re marketing each piece of content so you can maximize the views on everything you create and share.
One of the best ways to boost your pageviews is to publish more curated content for your blog. Research shows that when companies blog, they see 67% more leads and significantly more organic traffic (pageviews) than non-blogging businesses.
Not only are people discovering your content through social media, but they are also finding you through search engines. That’s because blogging businesses get 524% more pages indexed by Google.
All this extra awareness means more eyes on your website, which translates to more pageviews.
Bounce rate
Bounce rate represents how many people visit your site, then leave without visiting a second page. There are quite a few reasons this could happen, which is why the average bounce rate for a website is between 40 and 70%.
For instance, someone might leave after reading a blog post they found on Google because it answered their question. On the other hand, you may have a high bounce rate because prospects don’t fully understand the purpose of your product, which is a problem.
One of the best ways to improve your bounce rate is to show readers curated content throughout their journey. When they reach the end of a blog post, show a list of other relevant articles they should explore next.
On-Page Engagement
On-page engagement is a broad term used to describe the smaller metrics you should track if you want to measure the success of your content curation strategy. These metrics indicate how users interact with your content, such as whether they download a lead magnet, share your post, join your email list, or reach out to a customer support representative after visiting a page.
Tracking conversions, clicks, and comments will help determine if your curated posts resonate with readers. If they are not leaving comments or otherwise taking action, it may be because the context is irrelevant or poorly written.
I recommend gathering visitors’ feedback and building buyer personas so you can better understand your target audience’s goals and pain points. Using this strategy makes it easier to personalize curated content for each reader.
When you consider that 4 out of 5 people say they want to do business with brands that personalize their content and promotions, it’s easy to see how this one change can dramatically improve on-page engagement.
By tracking these metrics and creating content with your audience in mind, you can better understand how users interact with your brand and make necessary adjustments to your content curation strategy.
Via Your Email List
Did you know that many marketers use their email lists to share curated content? Newsletters and best-of lists are extremely popular email marketing tactics. By analyzing specific metrics related to these campaigns, you can gain valuable insights into the success of your content curation strategy.
Open Rate
Your open rate is a vital metric that indicates the number of people who open your email out of the total number of emails delivered. Companies with a high open rate tend to get more engagement by piquing subscribers’ curiosity and encouraging them to explore their emails
.
The average email open rate varies wildly based on the industry, primary audience, and much more. Curated emails tend to have a higher open rate when they align with the readers’ interests. Asking your email subscribers to share their preferences is a great way to improve your personalization strategy and open rate.
If you want more people to open your curated emails, I suggest crafting concise yet attention-grabbing subject lines that accurately reflect the value of your curated content. You can do this by tying the theme of your email to a common customer goal, interest, or pain point.
Click-Through Rate
Your click-through rate measures how many email recipients clicked on one or more links within your email. This metric is a crucial indicator of your campaign’s success. If people are opening messages but not clicking through, you’re missing out on opportunities to engage with your target audience.
On the other hand, a high CTR suggests that your audience not only opened your email but also found the content compelling enough to take the next step.
You can boost your CTR by ensuring your curated emails are mobile responsive, easy to read, and include clear and enticing calls-to-action (CTA). Much like our previous metric, make sure the content in your emails lines up with the needs of your target audience if you want to see more clicks.
Subscriber Growth
If you want to accurately measure the success of your content curation efforts, make sure you track long-term subscriber growth. Your growth rate will help you determine if new visitors find your curated content interesting and engaging. A healthy subscriber growth rate indicates that your content curation strategy is resonating with your audience and attracting new subscribers, which is the goal of business leaders and marketers across all industries.
Businesses that don’t grow their email list tend to see stagnant sales and gradually lose customers over time. Every product or service has an average customer lifetime value. If you’re not pulling in new customers, it makes sense that people will gradually fall off and stop responding to your marketing emails.
In my experience, optimizing your email sign-up process is the best way to improve your subscriber count. For instance, you may want to create a lead magnet based on curated content so users are more receptive to these types of posts in the future.
Unsubscribe Rate
Monitoring your unsubscribe rate is essential for understanding how well your content resonates with your audience. Brands with an abnormally high unsubscribe rate often struggle with engagement and long-term growth.
A consistently high unsubscribe rate may indicate that your content is not meeting your audience’s expectations or simply isn’t relevant to their specific needs.
Use this metric as feedback so you can better understand how people feel about your curated content. If you see a surge of unsubscribes after sending a curated email, it may be time to refine your buyer personas and create content that resonates with subscribers.
On Social Media
Leveraging social platforms to curate and share content can help you boost your reach and skyrocket engagement. I believe this is why 82% of marketers say they see benefits from repurposing existing content for social media.
But here’s the thing; tracking specific metrics on social media is vital to understanding how people feel about your curated content. Let’s look at a few key metrics that can determine your success.
Channel Growth
Channel growth is a vital metric you should track across all of your social media profiles. Essentially, it’s the measurement of your followers over time. If you have a growing audience, it indicates that your curated content is attracting new users and keeping existing subscribers interested in your content.
If your channel is losing subscribers, it’s a sign that you need to go back to the drawing board and reassess your content and engagement strategies.
To improve channel growth, focus on sharing high-quality content that aligns with the interests and preferences of your target audience. Are you looking for inspiration? You can also create polls and encourage subscribers to tell you what they want to see next. I also suggest responding to comments and messages since people are more likely to follow brands that actively interact with visitors.
Shares
The number of shares your curated content receives on social media can help you determine if it’s helpful for your followers. If people think your posts are valuable and interesting, there’s a good chance they will share your content with others, which helps to spread your reach and boost your follower count.
You can easily create shareable curated content by reviewing your customer personas and compiling products or posts that resonate with their needs or interests. I like to check in on our shares once a week so I can figure out which posts result in the most engagement.
Improve your shares by including social shares buttons on your website by asking readers on social media and your website to share your post with others. Before long, you could see your curated content go viral.
Comments
Engagement is a key aspect of social media success, and comments are one of the most impactful forms of engagement. Meaningful comments on YouTube or any other social site signify that your content is relevant and interesting enough to spark conversations.
If you consistently see zero comments on your posts or videos, it may not be resonating with your followers in the way you hoped. As a result, your long-term content curation strategy will take longer to have a noticeable impact.
You can encourage more comments by asking thought-provoking questions and inviting users to share their experiences on your curated content. When you engage with commenters and do things like respond to their questions, they’re more likely to hit the follow button and visit your social media profile in the future.
Final Thoughts
Content curation is a powerful tool for business owners and marketers across all industries. By creating high-quality curated content from various sources, you can effectively connect with your audience, establish credibility, and boost brand visibility.
The key to improving your content curation strategy is to track the right metrics across your website, email campaigns, and social media channels. The various metrics discussed today will help you anchor your strategy to the most important points so you can accurately determine the success of your campaigns.
I believe consistency is the most important piece of the puzzle. If you regularly share curated content and monitor your analytics, you’ll find plenty of opportunities to keep your customers happy and cultivate long-term growth.
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