You hear this everywhere: “Content Is The New SEO!” What does this actually mean? Most articles you find online take you through incredibly complex strategies, clever use of terms, and showcase beautiful graphics. It seems as if the writer tries to convince you that this is brand new when the truth is that:
“Content Was Always The New SEO!”
Search engine optimisation always revolved around having really good content. In many situations, articles that were really good ended up being ranked high for competitive terms without many backlinks. This is because of CONTENT MARKETING, which basically means promoting content. If the promotion is good and the content is of high quality, rankings are easier to gain.
In one of our Facebook photo posts, we focused on whether or not you know how to create great content. This is what counts the most.
Content marketing appeared when SEO appeared. The new Penguin updates simply make great content more valuable. The trend is visible but let us not talk too much about this. The main focus here is content and understand the importance it has.
Clicks Click Clicks
In our SEO packages we include the homepage content for the sites that we optimise. This is because it is really important. We actually focus more on the homepage content of our clients than the homepage content of this site. This is because of the clicks that come in.
When you create content, you have to think about 2 things:
- Credibility
- Shareability
A clear sign of good content is the ratio of clicks generated on the links that are included and the number of social network shares that appear. If visitors often click and share, you can be sure that the content is good. On our homepage, we have a different target audience than with 99% of sites in other niches. Those that land there are already interested in SEO. They will naturally go to the Blog, will look at packages, or will maybe want to look at details about the DM team.
With other sites, the homepage is really important because it needs to bring in the wish to share it or to click on some of the links presented there. The content needs to be better and more focused on the two things we mentioned above.
Too many talks about optimizing for search engines. Some will actually focus on other search engines simply because they do not rank as high as they want to on Google. Well, focusing on optimising the content that is created so that the target readers will find it with ease and want to share or read is the secret you are looking for!
No matter how a visitor finds your content, if he/she does not click or share, the content has no chance of becoming viral, which is the number one thing you want with every single article you create. The perspectives or advice you offer has to be exciting and of interest for the readers.
Purpose
Every article you publish needs a purpose. In this article, I want to highlight the fact that a focus on SEO should come secondary as the focus on the content that is created. If you write about losing weight, you, most likely, need to convince people that your weight loss advice is accurate and helpful.
Combining SEO with content creation means reaching the right readers. If your content is average and will not offer applicable information, maybe even unique, you will not get too high in search engines.
At the same time, writing really good content is just 50% of the equation. If you publish that content in an inappropriate place, engagement is diminished. One mistake that many make is writing tremendous articles and publishing them on reputable sites with high traffic while forgetting about the audience of the site.
As an example, this article about content creation and SEO would be USELESS if published on Ezine Articles or on CNN. If it would be published on Search Engine Land, it would be much more useful since the visitors are actually interested in the topic. They would share if they like it and it would make sense to get it there. (Obviously, it is also a fit here since we normally talk about SEO, Marketing and related topics).
SEO As A Byproduct
This is not a new idea. In fact, most of the ideas highlighted here are not new but they are so often forgotten or not taken into account in an SEO world that is dominated by a wish to get as many backlinks as possible. If your content is BAD, you can have millions of backlinks that are relevant, and eventually, your site will drop even if it reaches rank 1 in SERP.
SEO stands out as a byproduct of really good content. If you are patient and you do take the necessary time to create really good content, articles, podcasts, videos, books, and so on, the results will be a lot better in the long run.
Conclusions
Never think that you can manipulate the search engine results. This is a huge mistake. You cannot manipulate Google rankings with keyword stuffing, backlinks, or articles that are just rewritten. Google actually does not care that much about backlinks at the moment and it becomes visible. The company did recognize that they are testing a search algorithm with less focus on backlinks.
SEO rankings are nowadays a combo of sharing and creating really good content, creating sites with the visitor in mind, proper on-page SEO practices, and getting links that visitors will actually click in order to get to your site. Having a link is not enough anymore! That link needs to be clicked in order to become really valuable.
Extra Advice To Consider When Creating Content For SEO Results:
- Tell Google that you published new content on Twitter! Don’t share with an URL shortener. Just use your site link!
- Make sure your title is as good as possible. This is the one that will get clicks.
- Solve a problem that the visitor has or cover a need.
- Improve page loading speed and focus on words instead of graphics. (Exception with infographics, of course)
- Engage with the people that comment on your site.
- Outsource content marketing but only outsource content creation if the content is guaranteed to be really good.
- Start slow. Do not produce dozens of articles without promoting any of them.
- Use content marketing as the main strategy but never forget about the other opportunities available.
- Research is sometimes more important than writing. Remember that!
- Write both long and short articles on your sites.
- Analyze results and refine your strategy in order to optimise it.
