Curated content examples from health & wellness blogs

(Originally published Nov 2017, updated with even more awesomeness May 2019)

Content curation (as opposed to creation) is a blog post where you round up the best information on a topic without creating it yourself. You can use curated content examples from around the web to show your audience that YOU are a hub of great information for them.

Plus, it allows you to make connections with experts, colleagues, and those who create the awesome content that you curate and share. It helps you keep on top of trends. And, when it’s pretty clear that you only share the BEST information out there on your topic, it builds your credibility!

Here are some curated content examples from health & wellness blogs.

What is content curation?

According to Neil Patel,

Content curation is the act of collecting high-quality sources from the web and sharing it with my audience. (ref)

It’s rounding up awesomeness from other blogs and experts, and packaging it nicely into a new blog post for your audience (while only posting excerpts and linking back to the original sources).

It’s essentially a blog idea that shares link love. <3

I’ve curated a nice selection of examples of blog posts that have curated recipes, news, and expert quotes. (Is that curated squared???). I hope you can get inspired to pick and choose what you like to create your own curation.

PRO TIP: Don’t copy and paste any more than a short quotation from someone’s website. You don’t want to come across as stealing or infringing copyright. Post just a short excerpt or quotation, and always ALWAYS link back to the original source.

Recipe Content Curation

Greatist: Chia pudding recipes

One of my favourite sites for curated recipes is Greatist. They find a bunch of recipes on a particular food or meal, e.g., chia pudding recipes, and put them together in a beautiful way.

Here’s one of my favourite posts that I keep coming back to for breakfast inspiration. It’s 36 Chia Seed Pudding Recipes That Taste Like Dessert.

NOTE: Even though I’m always looking for new chia recipes, I admit, most of the time I keep coming back to #31 Maple Walnut Chia Seed Pudding. It’s amazing!

What I love about this curated post is:

• The content delivers what the headline specifically promises (it’s not clickbait).
• All the recipes are organized by sub-headers: Fruity, Chocolatey, and Other Amazing Flavors.
• The individual recipe titles are numbered, large, and underlined so it’s easily skimmable to find the best recipe they’ve curated.
• Big bold delicious pinnable images of each recipe (hover over them to see the Pinterest button magically appear).
• It includes a short description of the recipe along with the link.

Leesa Klich: Turmeric recipes

I have a few posts with curated recipes too. My most popular one is all about Turmeric vs. Curcumin, where I explain the difference, and then link to over 100 turmeric recipes. I even have a backlink from Problogger on this post as an example of evergreen content! 🙂

What I like about this curated post:

• It’s got a bit of education at the beginning because turmeric contains curcumin, it is not curcumin.
• There’s a quick video for fun.
• I requested delicious turmeric-containing recipes from my nutrition colleagues to showcase.
• It’s sorted by type of recipe: spice mixes, breakfasts, snacks, etc.
• You know the recipe name and website you’re going to before you click the link.
• Each link opens in its own tab (this is a pet peeve of mine; pleeeease have your links open in new tabs so readers don’t accidentally close your whole site when they’re actually trying to get back to it).
• At the end of the post, I welcome additional contributions by saying “Did I miss your favourite recipe??? If so, PLEASE post it in the comments below. Thanks! ?”
• Even though the post was originally published in 2015, I updated it in 2017.

Wellness news content curation

Health Writer Hub: Health communication research review

One of my favourite roundups is the Heath Communication Research Review on the Health Writer Hub blog (Michelle is one of my online health writing instructors).

In this roundup post, Libby Evans curates the best news and studies about how to best communicate health information.

What I love about this one:

• She sticks to the specific topic of health communication (and the topic is right up my alley, so I am biased).
• Each article has its own subheading and an intro that’s a few paragraphs long.
• She links to the actual sources of information–the studies themselves–instead of linking to an article or news piece about the study.

Summer Tomato: For the love of food

I’ve been following Darya Pino Rose for several years now. In fact, I requested that the Public Library in St. John’s Newfoundland where I was living at the time purchase her book Foodist when it came out. They did. And I was the first to read it. (If you’re in #yyt, I highly recommend you borrow and read this book. It’s upstairs at the A. C. Hunter library… Or better yet, grab yourself a copy!)

On the Summer Tomato blog Darya curates health, wellness, and food news to share in her weekly column For the Love of Food.

What I love about the latest edition of For the Love of Food is:

• Her “Links of the week” section clearly shows each link with an underlined title and its own bullet point.
• Instead of a summary or description, she adds her opinion on each link she’s included.
• She credits the content creator/website source at the end of her description (in parentheses) so you know where you’re going before you click.
• Most of the links are actually news and within the last week or so.
• Each link opens in a new tab (please do this too!).

Wellness expert content creation

Naughty Nutrition: Look inside these wellness experts’ fridges

Here’s an example from my friends at Naughty Nutrition: Take A Look In These Wellness Experts’ Fridges For Healthy Cooking Inspiration

What I like about this post:

• It’s “behind the scenes” so you get info that’s not normally shared online.
• You can actually see into people’s fridges with the photos (show, not just tell).
• Each contributor has their photo, bio, and links beside their info.

From The Lab Bench: Why We Scientists Do Instagram

Paige Jarreau, PhD, is a science communication (#SciComm) researcher and pro. She curated a bunch of quotes for her blog post: Why We Scientists Do Instagram

What I like about this post:

• It’s in response to an editorial questioning the value of putting effort into #SciComm when there are other pressing issues in science.
• She and her colleague Samantha Yammine, PhD(c) used a hashtag on Instagram to put a call out to scientists to share the reason why they communicate their science (hashtag: #ScientistsWhoSelfie).
• She rounded up some great quotes and included each person’s Instagram handle and a direct link to that quote.
• Her summary is based on the quotes she collected–the true motivations as to why scientists choose to spend time on social media.

Leesa Klich: How can online health & wellness pros build blogging confidence?

I asked a bunch of health & wellness bloggers to give their advice on how to build blogging confidence.

PRO TIP: I set up a Google Form and collected everyone’s responses, images, bios, and a link to publish along with their answers.

What I liked about this post:

• It answered a very common question (and roadblock) that many online health & wellness professionals have.
• I used it to create the opportunity to showcase dozens of health & wellness bloggers.
• There are several different perspectives, ideas, and advice, so it’s certainly not “one size fits all.”
• I alternated image-quote, then quote-image (left-right) to maintain readers’ attention in a long post like this.
• To go the extra mile, I created a pre-written Click-to-Tweet for every single expert contributor.

A few tips to dive into curating content

1 – Make sure you have a great topic. What is your audience looking for, and how can you find the BEST info online to share with them?

2 – Only include content that’s high quality. It should be good enough for you to share with your audience and give a generous backlink to the creator. Always read through the entire post with a critical eye before including it in your curated post. Don’t just Google a topic and link a few posts from page 1. Be picky!

3 – Add your perspective. Include an introduction or your opinion for each link, and/or a summary of your thoughts at the end. You want this curated post to be your new fresh look at the topic that adds something for your readers and isn’t just a list of links.

4 – Ensure each link opens in its own new tab. Please. You don’t want someone to close the post they just opened to get back to your next link, and they’re both gone because they were in one tab.

5 – Organize the post into subheadings as you would any other blog post. You probably noticed above that I talk about recipes, news, and experts.

6 – I mentioned this before but it’s just so damn important that I have to reiterate: Only take excerpts and always give backlinks. Don’t copy any more than a short quotation, and always, ALWAYS, link back to the original source.

7 – Give the peeps you’ve quoted a shoutout on social media so they know you love and linked to their awesome content. Especially if they didn’t knowingly contribute. It shows your appreciation and helps to build a relationship with them.

8 – Don’t use content curation as a way to stop publishing your own unique content, instead add a few of these types posts to your content mix. 🙂

Conclusion

Curating awesome health & wellness content is a great way to build relationships, credibility, and become known as a hub of awesome information. You can curate your favourite recipes, news, and even get experts to contribute, making sure to always give them full credit and a backlink. Use content curation as a fresh blog post format every once-in-a-while and only share amazing content.

These curated content examples from the health & wellness industry show some of the different ways to do it. Plus, curating content can be a great way to build your brand by becoming a hub of the best information in your niche, even if it’s not only created by you!

It’s a great way to mix up the format of your posts from week-to-week.

Signing off and toasting: To great examples of curated content from health & wellness blogs.

Over to you

What do you think? Do you already curate your own wellness content? How well does your audience love it?

Are you inspired to create a curated post?

I’d love to know (in the comments below)! Feel free to post your link!