Over the past several months we’ve spent a lot of time talking about content curation. Sure, sharing content produced by others is more efficient than creating custom content of your own, but it still takes time to find, save and eventually share that content. Need to see real ROI before you dedicate the time and resources to curate content? This new study from Livefyre will help you make the business case for content curation.
58% of brands are curating content
Overall, 58% of survey respondents say they are using social curation to connect directly with their audience. When we break it down, it’s clear that Twitter is the most popular place to curate content, but Facebook comes in a close second place. Here’s a closer look at those numbers:
- 93% are curating social activity from Twitter
- 89% are curating social activity from Facebook
- 50% are aggregating and displaying YouTube videos
- 41% are curating pictures from Instagram
The ROI of Content Curation
Now the important question: are brands seeing a return on investment for their content curation efforts? According to Livefyre’s study, the biggest benefit of social curation is a boost in user engagement; 82% of businesses said they increased user engagement as a result of curating social activity about their brand and integrating it into their websites and mobile apps. There were also a number of other slightly less common benefits. 57% of respondents said social curation led to an increase in website traffic, 53.9% said it helped them establish a direct connection with their audience and 42.3% said that curation led to an increase in average time on site.
In a press release about the study, Livefyre Founder and CEO Jordan Kretchmeyer noted that, “Social curation enables marketers to tap into what people are already saying about your brand on social networks and then use it to promote their products in an effective, authentic way.”
Social curation is not the only type of curation; sharing whole or partial content through web properties is also growing increasingly popular. For a closer look, check out this piece on the difference between sharing licensed versus unlicensed content on your blog or website.
Monetizing Content Curation
Content curation is being monetized at an unprecedented rate. As publishers struggle to find revenue streams in the age of ad blocking and GDPR, ecommerce is rising as an option worth exploring. Publications from Forbes to Wired are using affiliate marketing pages to curate lists of product content that is then monetized through referral fees. If you’ve ever read a “Best Of” list in one of these online publications you know what I’m talking about. In fact, we have created our own curated products listings to take advantage of this growing trend. Check out our first big list here: https://lonelybrand.com/blog/best-bluetooth-headphones-under-100-dollars/
