In 2024, the whole world will be active on social media. So, to make your content stand out to billions of people (or a subset of these people), you’ll need to be insightful and unique.

After all, there are more than trillions of content pieces online, and there is only so little limited time people have, so why should they spend their precious seconds interacting with your content?

We have an answer to make your audience happy and allow you to position your brand as remarkable and valuable: curated content.

Dig in to find all the need-to-know information about curated content, including what it is and how it can help elevate your brand.

What’s curated content?

Curated content is any type of content that you didn’t create but share on your social media channels.

In most instances, if you’re the one who creates the curated content piece (read: original content), you’d also add your insights or commentary to it. For example, consider listicles or round-ups like these:

On the other hand, examples of curated content include:

• Sharing ready-made relevant content in the form of quotes or insights

• Adding your insights to someone else’s posts

• Sharing user-generated content on your feed

• Writing case studies on other brands

• Creating reaction videos

In most instances, because curated content requires less manual work in‌ creating the content yourself, it becomes a great way to:

• Create content when you’ve restricted time or resources

• Keep your social media calendar full

• Engage with your users

Benefits of curating social media content 

With the basics out of the way, let’s dive into the main benefits of social media content curation and how it can help your brand.

1. Curating social media content allows you to build a reputation

Since curated content allows you to add your opinions or insights to someone else’s posts (something like this):

Or ‌you can break down someone else’s processes through the help of case studies (e.g., Foundation Inc. regularly provides insights on how companies were able to set up their process and build their valuation).

In both instances, such additions, which also allow you to show your insights and expertise, position you as a thought leader in the industry.

It’s also important to consider studies reporting that 60% of decision-makers think thought-leadership content is a credible basis for judging a brand.

If you do such type of curated content often (that positions yourself or your brand as a thought leader), the impact will directly affect your image and reputation, which is why it makes sense to be strategic.

For example, Tailor Brands uses curated content to underscore its branding expertise, sharing insights and analyses that reinforce its position as a leader in the branding space. This strategic use of curated content enriches their audience’s knowledge. It showcases the depth of their understanding of branding, making them a go-to resource for businesses seeking to enhance their brand image.

Here are a few tips that might help:

• Try to share insights that add value (aka, say something that only you can know due to your experience — for instance, with the examples above, since Masooma is a remote worker and Foundation Inc. is a marketing agency, both are credible sources to share their insights on the respective topics).

• If you’re doing a long-form post on them, try to get their permission to feature their insights.

• Never bash the other poster (if you disagree with their opinions, say so respectfully).

• Provide the other poster with the necessary credits.

• Always try to use helpful, conversational language.

2. Provides an avenue to share information

Curated content is also a great way to share information with your peers. Especially in political or health-related discussions, getting ‌information from credible sources is extremely important.

For example, Henry Meds is a well-known brand name in the medical field for weight management solutions. The brand also realizes that the drug (Ozempic) is in massive demand right now, and people are often taking it without realizing the implications of it.

To enhance credibility, it usually features studies on its Instagram page from credible publications that provide further insights on how frequently folks should take Ozempic and alternatives to Ozempic (such as semaglutide), and who should be taking them according to doctor’s recommendations.

The brand also leverages curated content by sharing customer testimonials, quotes, ratings, and studies to add social proof.

3. Helps you diversify content sources

Curated content also allows you to diversify your content sources by getting insights from different mediums, such as podcasts, webinars, social media, blog posts, etc.

It’s a secret recipe for any content marketing strategy.

There’s also the benefit of not relying on one person’s insights or thoughts — it allows you to understand and consider different perspectives and insights from multiple subject matter experts (SMEs) who might belong to varied industries, not just your own.

For example, suppose you start a blog on ‌personal finances — in such an instance, you can explore multiple subjects, from budgeting to automated investing.

The best part is that you can source insights directly from the average individual (through user-generated content) to understand what roadblocks they face when learning to invest their money.

You can also get the approval of SMEs to feature their insights on personal finance, or you can ask SMEs from a different industry, such as banking, to present their user-generated insights (e.g., they could explain certain investing schemes banks have).

4. Build trust through social signals

If you add your insights to someone else’s post that’s doing exceptionally well, there’s a high possibility your posts would do well, too.

Or, if you partner with well-known influencers or celebrities to publish their posts on your social media pages, those posts will likely do well, too.

Similarly, 92% of content marketers said that user-generated content featured on company pages performs better as audiences think it’s far more authentic (consumers are 2.4 more likely to find UGC content more authentic than content created by the brand).

Better content also results in more shares, likes, and follows. For new users coming onto your site/social channel, such content provides social signals that your brand is reputed and can be trusted.

Some folks also report getting leads and offers for influencer partnerships through the help of these posts.

5. Encourages interaction among your target audience

We know that brands and people design all types of content to elicit emotions and cause viewers to interact and engage with your content, but curated content especially does the trick.

Why do we say this? When you’ve shared your thoughts on a video/post and people are likely to agree, they’ll let you know through your comments or DMs.

Some great examples to consider are Shabazsays and TheSpeechProf (both are Instagram pages with content creators who mainly make reaction videos).

This type of curated content is where they see a lot of traction and engagement with their users, and most folks have followed them for the humor commentary style.

Oh, and while they do get a lot of engagement with folks who agree with them, they also get a lot of engagement with folks who disagree with them.

6. Enables you to keep a pulse on industry trends

When you’re often active on a social media platform, and you interact with others, only then would you know about:

• The discussions happening in the industry

• What opinions others are having

• What the trends are

Then, once you have a pulse on industry trends or a decent engagement level with your audience, you can then create curated content that’ll see some likes and shares.

The alternative to this is you’re not active on social media platforms — you create curated content based on your perspectives only without considering industry-wide trends, expert opinions, or the larger rhetoric/context, and your curated post might fail to get the traction it deserves.

As a side note, being active lets you identify the leading voices in your industry with whom you can collaborate later.

7. Let influencers and collaborators get in touch with you

The benefits of strategically curated content are aplenty:

• Lets you build a reputation for your brand and yourself.

• Allows you to engage with your audiences

• Positions you as a thought leader

• It boosts your social signals

This also means that with such pros on your hands, it even opens doors to possible industry collaborations, and you might see influencers, followers, and peers wanting to get in touch with you to

1. Ask you about your opinions on XYZ topic

2. Invite you to an event (e.g., an interview)

3. Buy your product/service

4. Create content with you

Manage your social media feed with Flockler

If you’re interested in creating curated, original content for your social media channels, the next step would be to learn how to place this type of content strategically into your website to increase conversion rates.

And that’s one area where we can help you. Start your 14-day free trial with Flocker, and let us manage your social media posts to boost the time spent on your site and improve conversions.

Work smarter, not harder, with the help of content curation tools to take your social media accounts to the next level. Your content calendar will be complete before you know it.

It’s one of the best content strategies worth investing in. With the touch of a button, you can publish content that resonates (read: high-quality content) without all the heavy lifting.

How will you integrate a content curation strategy into your social media strategy in 2024?