Discuss: The Content Strategist as Digital Curator

1

Really great article. Proper content strategy gets forgotten or downplayed so easily in the mix of everything else …mostly because it is not realized by most how the content (and all aspects of that content & its relation to other content) is the lifeblood of the site itself.

Love the curator/ museum analogy. Thoroughly enjoyed the article. Thanks for writing it.

posted at 03:44 pm on December 8, 2009 by ewilliamson0515

2

The notion of content-strategist-as-curator, as a distinct discipline, strikes me as a merger of UX (or perhaps simply design and Web creative development) and IA. We could spilt hairs over roles and responsibilities until we’re blue in the face. Like with everything in our field disciplines are constantly evolving driven by, among other things, technology. Nevertheless the word ‘curator’ implies one is concerned with both visual presentation and content structure if you think of the museum exhibit analogy.

One could argue designers and creatives become the ultimate curators “responsible for selling the collection to users” because a site lacking design integrity or a cohesive visual aesthetic will fail to be sold on the user experience front.

posted at 07:31 pm on December 8, 2009 by Darryl

3 Strategy makes meaning

Erin, this is phenomenal! Thank you for sharing your perspective around curating—it’s more than just an accurate metaphor, as we see how so much of the thinking, skills, and issues translate from museum exhibits to web experiences.

You really drive home the point that in order to effectively display your content, you first need to know what you have. Yay, qualitative and quantitative content audits! We’ve all seen shiny new sites that just blindly siphon in the old content, sucking it in without ensuring it’s current, relevant, and brand appropriate. Perhaps it’s just as bad when a client cranks open the faucet for More Content!, and their only goals are More and New. How do they know what they need and what it should do if they don’t know what they have and if it’s working?

Moving from audit mode to curation, it strikes me that when articles, news, and information are the main wares of a site, the content strategist can adopt the practices of a merchandiser as well. Retail merchandising brings together products to make new meaning through context. Put all the red items together in a window display, and voila! It’s time to shop for Valentine’s Day! Mix together pens, folders, and lunch sacks, and look! It’s time to go back to school! As content strategists, we may more easily communicate ROI for “merchandising” content, especially for retail clients that are starting to complement product selection with rich editorial.

posted at 03:59 pm on December 9, 2009 by Margot Bloomstein

4 yay, content strategy!

Congratulations on wrangling this gigantic topic into something so coherent and deeply considered. This article should be distributed at every conference as a pamphlet.

(Elephant illustration made me laugh for like 10 minutes.)

posted at 06:30 pm on December 9, 2009 by Kristina Halvorson

5 Excellent Article

Once again, amazing content on ALA. Each paragraph in this article would be a worthy discussion in itself, so it’s hard to respond in a comment, other than saying ‘Great job’.

posted at 01:01 am on December 10, 2009 by GBKS

6 Love the Article

Erin, I loved the article. What a unique blend of the museum/library view on curation with web strategy.

Do you by any chance ever speak on this topic at conferences?

posted at 01:25 pm on December 10, 2009 by VFHwebdev

7 Right on

Wow, this article was SO much more thorough and useful than most anything I’ve read about site strategy, in weeks. I think the analogy is perfect and also underscores the potential for subject matter experts to rise to the fore if they have the tenacity to curate their knowledge via the web. One of the things I would add is that I truly believe none of this can be “faked.” In that sense, I have a bit of difficulty with the notion that you create content for “where the audience is going.” For a site that is mission-driven, you gotta stick to it our your audience will sniff you out. I could go on an on, too. Thanks for the post.

posted at 03:50 pm on December 10, 2009 by Pam

8

Like Darryl, I see overlap with your “curator” analogy and the responsibilities of user experience designers and information architects. The difference, I think, is that while UX designers and IAs create interaction models at the outset, a content curator engages users in dialogical manner by listening to their interests and needs and responding accordingly, by using “judgment and a refined sense of style to select and arrange [content] to create a narrative,” or by restructuring interaction models. Of course, if the UX designers and IAs were forward thinking enough, the content curator can spend time considering content relationships rather than remodeling interaction.

Erin, the “curator” analogy is an excellent one and creates space for much needed subject matter experts as Web content begins to mature and evergreen institutions proliferate. Thanks for an enjoyable read.

posted at 05:28 am on December 11, 2009 by stewartmccoy

9

Thank you for the thought-provoking article, Erin. Understanding web content as being worthy of deliberate curation (audit, planning, strategy and GOSH – even maintenance) is important.

I do agree with Darryl but I’d suggest the content users, or consumers, if you prefer, are the ultimate curators. In designing and enhancing UX we are now combining data from research samples as well as ever-increasing real results from real users.

posted at 02:25 am on December 12, 2009 by Rach

10

Erin, nice work, it’s nice to see the elephant dancing!

posted at 02:26 pm on December 14, 2009 by seamuswalsh