Creating content can sometimes seem like a daunting task. How do you ensure that your content appeals to the right audience? What are the current SEO standards, and how can you meet and, hopefully, exceed them?
We’ve taken a closer look at the content marketing strategies that will help you connect with your audience, make your content more effective and keep Google happy!
What is SEO Content? The term refers to any information that may help your web pages rank higher in the search engine results. Popular SEO content examples include, but are not limited to:
- Pillar content
- Blog content
- Social content
- Images and videos
- Infographics
- Headings and metadata
- Product descriptions
- Landing pages
Let’s take a closer look at these SEO content types, when they might be appropriate, and how to use them correctly.
- Pillar content
Pillar content is long-form, informative SEO content optimised for your higher-level keywords. It is called pillar content because it’s the foundation of your website. Well-optimised websites may have four to five pillar pages that address the main ideas behind your products or services with informative, engaging content.
- Infographics
Infographics are sharable, linkable pieces of informative, engaging content and are therefore helpful in link building. They increase your chances of ranking higher in image search results, a separate SERP feature.
- Blog content
Blog content is strategically planned, long-form content used to build authority in your field and answer questions about your products or services. Generally, each blog lives on its own web page covering a specific sub-topic of your blog.
- Headings and Meta Data
Headings and meta tags are elements that can provide important information about a page’s content to search engines. Headings and metadata can easily help you rank for low competition keywords.
- Social content
Often disregarded when optimising for SEO, social media content, too, can help your web pages rank higher in the search engine results. Using your keywords in short-form social media content and hashtags will help new audiences find their way to your content. Not only will social content improve your brand’s visibility and reach, but it’ll also increase your organic traffic to your website.
- Product descriptions
Product descriptions on eCommerce product pages not only describes products for the customer's benefit but can also help product pages rank higher in search engine results. An optimised product page with a descriptive heading, a unique product description, title tag, meta description, and high-quality images is sure to net the attention of search engines.
- Images and videos
Images and videos are valuable pieces of SEO content that can give your website extra visibility and improve user performance.
- Landing pages
Landing pages are web pages designed to capture traffic by converting paid and organic traffic into leads.
Why Does Engaging Content Matter for SEO?
Before we can address the “how to’s”, we need to understand why we’re looking to write engaging SEO content in the first place. In other words, why didn’t we simply call this blog “how to write SEO content”.
Engaging content is behind every great search ranking
To stay competitive in SEO, some say you have to master backlinking, some say you need to become a content writing wizard, and others claim only keeping up with the technical aspects of running a healthy website will get you there. Not to overwhelm you, but in truth, you will need to understand all the high-level fundamentals that make up a holistic SEO strategy. Over recent years, three key factors have moved into the centre of attention; authority, relevance and experience of both users and search engine bots visiting a page or website.
- Authority refers to the importance given to a page and website. It is largely determined by page rank, gained when other pages link to a page.
- Relevance refers to the relevance of the content of the page and website and impacts how valuable a link might be considered relative to a search query.
- Experience refers to how users and bots may experience pages and websites a search engine sends them to.
The latter has recently been given more and more importance. So much so that some SEOs now prefer to speak of Search Experience Optimisation.
Thanks to advancements in language processing and machine learning, search engines can accurately assess the content on a page, including how well it reads and how relevant and valuable it may be to a user.In other words, search engines can tell how engaging any piece of content is. This information is then used to determine whether or not a page deserves to rank higher in search results.
And so, without further ado, here are some key strategies you can apply to create more engaging SEO content.
- Prioritise readability
Readability is a good starting point for anyone trying to improve user experience, whether humans or bots. Readability measures how easy a piece of content is to read and understand. The better the readability of your content, the easier and clearer it is for large audience segments to understand your content, and the more likely they will walk away with a positive experience.
It means users spend more time on a page, are more likely to share your content with others and think favourably about your brand.
- Click here to learn more about readability, a user experience essential.
- Use keywords strategically
Keywords are at the heart of every great SEO strategy and help search engines find pages relevant to a search.
Keywords are focus terms, words or phrases you would like a page or website to rank for on search engine results pages when a person looks up that particular term or phrase. In an attempt to manipulate a site's ranking in search results, keyword stuffing was once an effective way to secure a spot at the top of search results. But a text that contains many of the same words and phrases is not at all a pleasant read. And if you can tell that someone’s keyword stuffing, rest assured that Google knows, too. A blog post stuffed with keywords, for example, becomes monotonous and hard to read, which is something search engines will pick up on these days. Consequently, your content will be pushed to the bottom of results in favour of more engaging articles.
- If you want to do better, visit our blog “Beyond Content” for the ultimate keyword research checklist.
- Give your content depth
Perhaps you’ve already noticed, but the top-ranking pages for any given keyword rarely lead to 300-word content pieces that only scratch the surface of a topic. On the contrary, top-ranking pages usually offer in-depth answers to search queries and link to relevant content that the user may also find helpful in their research. Let this serve you as inspiration: Google’s algorithm updates keep rewarding genuine efforts at sharing expert insights and providing depth of knowledge. It is why you should always prioritise your readers’ interests by offering a variety of related subjects around your focus topic.
- Diversify your content
Last but not least, think about bringing some variety to your current SEO and content strategy. You probably already have a content calendar in place, with your favourite types of content all mapped out. But don’t forget that different types of people will favour different types of content. Not only that, but people also get bored relatively quickly. These are great arguments for experimenting with varying types of content and seeing which ones work best for your audience.
Over to You
Most importantly, don’t leave without taking advantage of the expertise of our content and SEO specialists! To schedule an obligation-free consultation with the team at Anchor Digital, contact us online or call us on 1300 971 392! We’d love to hear from you!
