Content Curation

Over the past year I’ve been thinking a lot about content curation. Why? Because for those who can’t create, aggregation is the key to asset building & audience growth in tandem for those still learning (or for those who aren’t necessarily upskilled in a specialized subject matter).

The point of curating as a means to build an audience & asset is because they can be leveraged for procuring oppurtunities. Then use the oppurtunities to create something of value within that space.

It’s the type of thing that takes time, and the only real way to sustain efforts over time is to build something around an interest or passion.

“But what if I’m not passionate about any one thing?”

This is something I’ve been struggling with. While I’m interested in almost anything, I have a hard time thinking about any one subject matter about which I’m passionate. Generally my interests are so scattered and rudderless that I end up blanking when I think about curation.

The only 2 things I enjoy enough to do consistently (and maybe I just haven’t explored enough things yet) seem to be writing & interviewing people more interesting than me. So, I started doing a podcast interviewing people across various career paths and writing several different newsletters, with and without formats (this one floats freely of formatting and is more geared toward self-expression).

I guess the podcast is a mix of creation and curation, but let’s be honest, why should people care about what I’m trying to build and what I have to say? They shouldn’t. The truth is I’m not very good at it (yet) and I lack industry experience which would otherwise give me the edge of expertise - but that’s not the point. The point is to do something I enjoy consistently and to get better at inquiry, thinking, and communicating.

Great, but I still have no clear goal towards getting eyeballs on a new podcast or newsletter created by someone without any interesting experiences.

And while I could be taking clips from podcasts, turning them into short-form content, and posting across social media to expand reach, I can’t help but feel like my time & energy could be rendered more impactful by looking elsewhere. By looking at an area I could tap into that would provide undeniable value to others.

You see all these aggregation style or commentary based YouTube channels, newsletters, podcasts, etc. Couple this with the fact that the majority of online education and courses are purveyed by fake gurus who repurpose generic cookie cutter basic knowledge without any real world application.

So what does this mean for the future of social media and the future of branding in general? It means that people who can source & find better information from creators will have more opportunity than generic “creators”.

It means that you don’t have to be an expert in order to finagle your way into a lucrative opportunity because people without experience can find opportunities by aggregating and distributing better content on a given subject in a digestible format.

I’m not saying there’s any shortcuts to creating opportunity and I’m not saying you can monetize a content strategy without highly contextual information. What I AM saying is that the most knowledgeable industry experts often don’t create courses or distribute their knowledge at scale in a digestible format.

This is a gap which can be exploited by deciphering what makes advice or material high quality vs low quality and understanding what audiences are looking for. So, one could engage with experts in a given field and aggregate key information through a Question & Answer format so that people can see themselves in the questions being asked which is fundamental to understanding new information or for those who are looking to become up-skilled in a given subject.

Initially I was considering building some type of curated asset around the eCommerce marketing space. Actually, I did sorta start doing that - I started writing newsletters and making videos about this, but it’s not my main focus. Why? Well, see yesterday’s newsletter on my thoughts on eCommerce. Essentially, it’s a rapidly changing space where there’s a lot of mergers & acquisitions, and a whole lot of brands going out of business. A race to the bottom.