Published Date: March 25, 2012

I think — HOPE — everyone agrees with me that there is value in content curation. If you don’t agree, you probably won’t like this business idea.  The idea is one I first mentioned this idea on my personal blog, but I wanted to expand on the idea a bit here…

Particularly in an age where the web is littered with useless crap (IMO), finding sources of news that cut out all the useless news in a given vertical is valuable to me. That’s content curation. At a high level, the business idea I’m referring to is to follow the most influential individuals in a given vertical — meaning Facebook, Google+, Twitter, and whatever other platforms are prevalent in their vertical — and summarize the absolute most relevant/interesting/important conversations and links that they share. There ARE people out there (like me) who want to follow that news, but don’t have the time to wade through everything to find the nuggets of value.

Why I like it:

  • Time intensive, but no capital is required beyond building a basic website, and an email service like MailChimp or AWeber.
  • Builds your personal brand and credibility
  • It can be done from anywhere with an internet connection
  • It works with ANY vertical. Travel. Ecotourism. Microfinance. House Sitting. Astronomy. Budget travel. NASCAR. Barbie dolls. Handicrafts. Seattle Mariners. You get the picture..

Challenges to Overcome:

  • ALL the data is public (at least in the beginning until you start to get offline tips from your audience), so anyone can easily out-curate you.
  • You need to get to know the influencers and build real relationships with them by providing value to the discussion

Business Model:

  • Charge a few dollars a month to individuals to sign up for the mailing list. once you have a few hundred paying subscribers, you start to have a real business.
  • Curate for free — and monetize your audience later with consulting, selling other products, affiliates, etc

What do you think?

[Photo via iloveseo.net]


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