How to Connect with Content Curators to Build Links, Audience, and Traffic

Getting included in round-ups and other curated posts is a very effective strategy for promoting your content and growing your traffic, permission marketing assets, and link equity.  So I was surprised when we surveyed BuzzStream customers and found that less than a third were looking for content curators and roundups as promotion opportunities.

So today I’m going to show you how to find content curators, connect with them, and gain links, traffic, and audience.

Why Reach Out to Content Curators?

Content curators – the people that publish round ups, links of the week, and the like – actively look for new resources to include in their content.  If you’re publishing content on a regular basis (like a blog that’s regularly updated), it’s perfectly appropriate and often welcome to reach out to them and ask them to take a look.  (This stands in stark contrast to most link opportunities, where you have to persuade someone to do something they would not do normally.)

These curators are often experts in their fields – after all, they read hundreds of articles in putting these round ups together, often for years – so not only can they help you build audience, but they can help you make better, more differentiated content – the sort that makes the people that land on your pages, and know and trust your brand.

So Who are These Content Creators?

Content curators create content by finding the best of other people’s content.

An example you might be familiar with is the great Daily SearchCap over on SearchEngineLand:

But these curated roundups aren’t limited to the search space. You can find them in areas like software development:

Digital Art & Design:

And even news about the arctic:

How Can You Find Curators Interested in Your Content?

So now that you know what you’re looking for, how do you find these opportunities in your niche?

You can find them through appropriate queries Google search and Twitter search.

Using Web Search to Find Content Curators

One method you can use to search for curators is prospecting queries.

Ross Hudgens shared a great list of query stems specifically for finding curators at MozCon:

• “links” KW
• “links of the week” KW
• “links of the day” KW
• “daily recap” KW
• “post roundup” KW
• “links roundup” KW
• “blog roundup” KW
• “posts of the day” KW
• “posts of the week” KW

In this case, the keyword is the sort of roundup you’re looking for.

For example, if I’m publicizing my new blog about
the paleolithic diet and carb-free recipes, I’ll use queries like:

If you’re using Google, you can improve the quality of your results by using Google Blog search, or by restricting results to the last month or so – so you only find active roundups.

You can also use BuzzStream’s Prospecting Module search for these queries, and BuzzStream will send you new opportunities every 2 weeks:

Twitter Search

You can also find roundups through Twitter search.  While there are lots of great tools that search Twitter, Topsy is my go-to for finding curators and round-ups.  Any of the queries you’d use for web search will work in Topsy – keep in mind that it doesn’t handle synonyms quite as well as Google so you might need to spend some time playing with queries to find one that works.

How Do You Pitch Them?

Now that you’ve found some curators, you can pitch them.

When you pitch curators, take your newest, most recent content, and send it over to them in a customized pitch, asking them to take a look at it and “see if it’s a fit for this week’s round-up.” (You should, of course, replace “week” with the time interval the round-up covers.  And if they’ve branded their round-up and given it a specific name, try to use that name in your outreach.)

Because people do these every week, even if this week (or month) isn’t a good fit or is on a specific theme that your content doesn’t work with, leave the door open and build a relationship, so you can be thought of as nice and respectful for the next time.

As always, try to follow the 3 Ps of Great Outreach and make your pitch personalized, positioned, and persuasive.

Quick Tips for Successful Curator Outreach

• Ask for Feedback – These curators see a lot of content so don’t be afraid to ask them what they think or how you can make your content better – especially if you’re just starting out.
• Share the Round-Up if You’re Included – This is not only good manners, but also a good way to build a relationship for future round-up inclusion. If you’re creating content on a regular basis, you want to do your best to build a network of friends who also create content on a regular basis and help each other.
• Look for Curators in Adjacent Content Markets– If you have a piece that appeals to more than one segment of websites and curators, you can pitch it curators in both markets. For example, if say you used quantified self equipment to measure the impact of your paleo diet, you can reach out to both quantified self bloggers, as well as paleo bloggers. This is a great way to build your audience by appealing to people who are interested in topics that intersect with yours.

Closing: Do What Others Don’t

If you’re regularly creating content and you’re not promoting it, you’re leaving money on the table. (If you’ve learned nothing from the BuzzStream blog, learn that.)
And in an era where more than 70% of marketers employ blogging as a tactic, links, traffic, and audience are hard to come by. Reaching out to curators is a great way to get more return out of your existing content investment.

How Do You Promote Your New Content? Do You Reach Out to Curators? Have Any Tips?