THE 5 MODELS OF CONTENT CURATION

The 5 Models of Content Curation began as a single blog post in March 2011, building on Rohit Bhargava's earlier and influential 2009 "Manifesto for the Content Curator," which predicted that curation would become one of the fastest-growing and most important jobs of the future. At the time, "content curation" was emerging as one of the hottest trends in social media but remained a fuzzy catchphrase encompassing many different activities. This post gave the idea structure for the first time - proposing five distinct models as "a starting point for discussion" of how curation could be applied in specific situations.

It struck a nerve. The piece was translated into Chinese, French, Spanish, and other languages, cited in academic papers and university course materials, referenced by content marketing thought leaders, and reproduced and built upon across countless blogs and slide decks. More than a decade later, it remains one of the most popular and widely cited pages on Rohit's website - a foundational reference that helped give shape and vocabulary to an entire genre of digital marketing and content strategy.

DEFINING CONTENT CURATION

WHAT CONTENT CURATION ACTUALLY MEANS.

The post built on the definition Rohit first shared in 2009: content curation is a term that describes the act of finding, grouping, organizing or sharing the best and most relevant content on a specific issue.

It is such a powerful idea because curation does not focus on adding more content and noise to the chaotic information overload of social media, but instead focuses on helping each of us make sense of that information by bringing together what is most important.

THE FIVE MODELS OF CONTENT CURATION

AGGREGATION. DISTILLATION. ELEVATION. MASHUP. CHRONOLOGY.

MODEL 1

AGGREGATION

Aggregation is the act of curating the most relevant information about a particular topic into a single location.

Often taking the form of catalog-style blog posts (such as "27 Great Resources for Small Business"), this is the most common form of content curation. Volume is not typically an issue - you may still have hundreds of pieces of source material - but the value comes simply from having it in one place rather than scattered across millions of pages.

MODEL 2

DISTILLATION

Distillation is the act of curating information into a more simplistic format where only the most important or relevant ideas are shared.

As a result, some additional content may be lost for the sake of simplicity - but the value comes from the fact that anyone digesting this content no longer has to contend with a high volume of information and can instead consume a more focused view.

MODEL 3

ELEVATION

Elevation refers to curation with a mission of identifying a larger trend or insight from smaller daily musings posted online.

Encompassing much of what trend-focused websites do, this can be one of the hardest forms of content curation because it requires more expertise and analytical ability on the part of the curator - but it can also be the most powerful in terms of sharing new ideas.

MODEL 4

MASHUP

Mashups are unique curated juxtapositions where merging existing content is used to create a new point of view.

Taking multiple perspectives on an issue and sharing them in a single location (much like what happens every day on Wikipedia) is one example. More broadly, mashups offer a way of creating something new while still using content curation as the basis for it, because you are building on existing content.

MODEL 5

CHRONOLOGY

Chronology is a form of curation that brings together historical information organized based on time to show an evolving understanding of a particular topic.

Most useful for topics where understanding has shifted over time, this can be a powerful way of retelling history through informational artifacts that show how experiences and understandings have changed.