You’ve heard it repeated over and over, ad nauseum.
It’s a cliched phrase.
And yet, we’re going to say it again anyway (with enthusiasm!), because it’s true:
Content is king. (Or queen ?.)
In other words, it’s kind of a big deal.
Without content, you can’t rank on Google’s first page.
Nope. Never. It’s not going to happen.
This is because content does two things for search engines:
It provides information on what a web page is about, plus a roadmap for how the other pages within the domain relate to each other (called “interlinking”).
It answers a user’s questions and/or fulfills their search intent.
Both contribute to rankings.
To find out whether your page nails either one of them, search engine crawlers will look for major clues – dead giveaways that your web pages provide exactly what the user and the ‘bots are trying to find.
If you don’t have content on your website, these ranking clues will be nonexistent.
That means your site and pages will not get indexed, let alone hit the coveted top 10 or top 5.
Content MUST be at the base of your rankings strategy. According to Search Engine Land, “Get your content right, and you’ve created a solid foundation to support all of your other SEO efforts.”
Content is not only king or queen; content is key.
If you want high rankings for your content and pages, you have to have it.
How does it work? Why does it work? Let’s explore.
7 More Reasons High Rankings in SERPs Depend on Content
1. Content Tells Search Crawlers What Your Page Is About
How do search crawlers figure out what your page is about? How do they know which keywords to rank you for (and if your page is worthy of ranking)?
They crawl the entirety of your page, from the code to the content.
The code helps distinguish your page, but much of the clues to what your content is about comes directly from it (Google calls these clues “key signals”).
The parts of your content that help organize the information for readers is also helpful for crawlers. Think:
Headers
Sub-headers
Keywords and keyword placement
Link anchor text
Hierarchy of headers (H1s vs. H2s and H3s, etc.)
2. Content Is a Framework for Natural Keyword Use
Once upon a time, you could repeat a keyword on your page with zero context and rank for that term. According to Moz, this meant search results had extremely limited value.
Conversely, think about search results today and how relevant they are – how they answer the questions you have or fulfill your information needs. This is possible because search engine engineers have improved the way results match up with user queries.
Search ‘bots don’t just look for instances of keywords anymore. Instead, they look at:
The context of those keywords/phrases
The relevance of the content to the user’s search terms
In other words, natural keyword use matters more than your primary keyword appearing X number of times on the page.
And, of course, the best foundation for natural keyword use on your page is to write comprehensive content on your topic.
3. Content Gives Users What They’re Looking For
Think about doing an online search. Most of the time, when you type some keywords or a question into the search box, you want something.
Content fulfills your search intent, depending on what you’re looking for. According to Yoast, search intent falls into four categories:
Each type of search intent has corresponding content:
Navigational: Homepages
Informational: Guides, how-tos, articles
Transactional: Sales pages, landing pages
Knowing your audience and building content to match their search intent will help your site pages rank well. For Google, especially, satisfying users is #1.
4. Updated Content Keeps Your Website Fresh
Another factor for ranking that search engines look at is freshness – has your site been updated recently? Is someone taking care of it? Or has it been abandoned or forgotten?
The freshness of your content tells search crawlers that somebody is still keeping house. The lights are on, and yes, you’re home.
Publishing fresh content helps crawlers establish your relevance, but updating old content is helpful, too – it keeps the information you offer up-to-date and accurate.
Plus, according to Moz, “Websites that add new pages at a higher rate may earn a higher freshness score than sites that add content less frequently.”
This means publishing fresh content consistently will work in your favor for higher page rankings.
5. It Keeps Users on Your Page Longer
The longer visitors stay on your page before returning to a search engine, the more relevant it must be to their needs.
Makes sense, right? This concept is called dwell time, and it could be a Google ranking factor.
Similarly, “time on page” is the amount of time the user spends on your page before navigating off-page (the destination doesn’t matter).
Both concepts are relevance-related. That means, if your content fulfills your user’s search intent, they’ll spend more time on-page. If your content isn’t relevant (or, let’s face it, if it sucks), the user will leave more quickly – sometimes immediately.
If you keep your visitors on-page longer, it’s a good indicator of your page’s relevance, which can contribute to better rankings.
How do you create topically relevant pages? With quality content.
6. It Builds Connections Between Your Site Pages
Search crawlers can’t index your pages without links between pages. These links help the ‘bots understand how your entire site ties together and the various page hierarchies you’ve put in place.
Content with links to other pages on your site helps the ‘bots AND your users make connections between them. These are “breadcrumbs” that show the way, so to speak, so both crawlers and users don’t get lost navigating your website.
Without a defined link structure, your website will become a maze of pages that are too hard to navigate. (Image via Web Style Guide)
A logical link structure, including content pages that link to each other, helps create relationships that are easy to follow and understand. It’s a literal map to your website. (Image via Web Style Guide)
Interlinking your content pages in a logical way is a best-practice for higher rankings, because it makes your site user-friendly.
7. Great Content Helps You Build Links and Content Rankings
Let’s not forget one of the greatest advantages to publishing content on your website: link building.
It works like this:
If the content you publish is high-quality, in-depth, accurate, and meets your audience’s search needs, they’ll find it valuable enough to share.
As the piece is shared, your authority strengthens.
Based on the authority built from your high-value content, people may start linking to your pages as trusted information sources.
These are called backlinks, and they’re ultra-high on Google’s list of ranking factors.
Backlinks are literal clues that people trust you, like your content, and find it relevant to their needs. They are votes for your page to climb the rankings. And, according to Backlinko, Google counts these “votes” heavily in your favor.
In fact, the number of referring domains/backlinks a site has directly correlates to their Google position. If you have more, you’re more likely to hold the #1 spot.
Therefore, a GIANT key to high rankings in SERPs is high-quality content. You can’t build authority without it. And, without authority, no one is going to want to link to you and “vote” for your site.
Want High Rankings in SERPs? You Need Content
Undoubtedly, content is the way to rank highly and advantageously on Google SERPs.
Without content, you’ll be attempting to steer a boat with no sail, rudder, paddles, engine, or any other key part that makes it move forward.
Instead, you’ll float aimlessly and get nowhere.
If you want better visibility online…
If you want higher authority and rankings…
If you want your website and brand name to matter…
Who doesn’t love pirates? Google, and those of us who take pride in our creations from movies to music to content. We’re not talking about spunky and sometimes spooky fantastical characters. We’re talking about real, live cyber pirates who hand users illegal versions of programs, movies, music, and more. We’re talking about repeated copyright infringers, the thieves who make off with our content and spread it about the Internet. According to a recent Torrentfreak report, the latest Google Pirate update has had a noticeable impact on many torrent sites.
Most of us have heard of torrent sites, but unless we’re big downloaders, we probably don’t know much about them. A BitTorrent is a protocol for peer-to-peer file sharing. BitTorrent protocol distributes huge amounts of data over the Internet. Torrent files can be anything from legally sharable software, like OpenOffice, to highly illegal shares, like cracked copies of Adobe Photoshop or pirated movies and music.
Google’s Pirate Isn’t Torrent Friendly
According to Searchmetrics, Google has been repeatedly criticized for “not doing enough against Piracy.” The nature of the Internet makes it next to impossible to police the proverbial waters effectively. It’s been argued that there’s no proven means of halting piracy on the high cyber seas, but Google’s Pirate update appears to be a step in the right direction.
Since the update released at the end of October, popular “pirate” sites—BitTorrent and torrent sites—have seen massive drops in search traffic. It appears that the search engine giant is “policing” the high seas by deterring search traffic from locating these sites in the first place. Search Engine Land’s coverage of the update included the following screen shot of the SEO visibility for the site torrentz.edu:
According to Wikipedia, as of 2009 peer-to-peer torrent websites collectively accounted for an estimated 43 to 70 percent of all Internet traffic, depending on geographic location. Jump to February 2013, and these websites are suddenly responsible for 3.35 percent of all worldwide bandwidth. This is more than half of the 6 percent total bandwidth dedicated to file sharing.
There’s no denying that the distribution of pirated material has grown rampant. One might argue that it is virtually out of control. And it’s not just torrent sites that are the problem. Any site can be guilty of stealing content. Some event claim stolen content as their own. The Internet is so massive that it’s almost impossible for copyright holders to track down and report all offenders, but the incentive to do so just grew.
Whom It Affects
Google’s Pirate Update 2 works much like Panda and Penguin. Leveraging the data and queries collected by the first Pirate update from two years ago, Google’s new and improved swashbuckler is smarter than ever. You might say this buccaneer is sat proudly in the crow’s nest, actively on the lookout for copyright infringements. Any site where it spots a violation receives a huge drop in rankings. In some cases, sites are completely removed from search results.
But Google’s not just spotting and dropping copyright infringing sites. The king of the cyber seas is applying real, verified complaints and reports to the algorithm. Any site with a filed report through Google’s DMCA system will be the recipient of a sizable drop in rankings. The site risks immediate removal from the SERPs.
According to Searchmetric’s analysis, affected site are not receiving a mere slap on the wrist. You might say these sites are being made to walk the plank. Some have seen a 98 percent loss in SEO visibility, which is enormous. So far, it’s been unauthorized television and movie sites, peer-to-peer torrent sites, and various free download websites that have taken massive hits.
Are You in the Bullseye?
The good news, at least for most of us, is that Google’s Pirate is on a precise crusade. It seeks to spot and slash piracy websites. The current reports indicate that only mass download websites and those blatantly guilty of copyright infringement are being hit. It’s been about two weeks, and we haven’t seen any indication that there are bystander casualties.
Chances are you’re not in the Pirate’s bullseye. However, there’s certainly nothing wrong with making sure that you’re not ever skirting the outer edge. After all, the websites hit by the swashbuckler are getting hit hard. Your goal should be to hold to best practices:
Give credit where credit is due. Did you see the image credit earlier in this blog? You’ve probably noticed similar credits throughout numerous posts. It’s called giving credit where credit is due. When you “borrow” or share content, always give credit. It’s also smart to review the source. Read their terms and conditions. Confirm they are okay with their content being shared. See if they request a specific credit.
When it doubt, cut it out. If you can’t verify the source of any type of content, don’t display it. If you verify the source, but they state their content is not to be reproduced in any manner, don’t reproduce it. If they are okay with reproduction, but it comes with an express permission clause, contact them for permission. If there is even a sliver of doubt, cut it out! Don’t share or reproduce the content, even with a credit.
Observe the golden rule. Do unto others as you would have done to you. It’s solid advice for anyone, anywhere, any time. You wouldn’t want your content from words to images stolen. Don’t steal others. Instead, do everything in your power to promote a piracy free Cyber Sea.
The best way to avoid the Pirate’s wrath is to avoid copyright infringement. Google is continuously improving their algorithms. We’ve seen the results in updates to Panda and Penguin. Spammy, low quality websites are being steadily weeded out of search results. As a stauncher stand on Internet piracy is taken, we can expect to see future updates to the algorithm. Keep your nose clean of copyright infringement; avoid distributing media and content without permission and credit, and you should be clear to keep sailing the cyber seas.
Have you experienced big ranking changes? So have we. Apparently, one of the biggest updates to Google Penguin in over one year happened just a few weeks ago. (The last major update to Penguin was just over a full year ago, on October 3, 2013.)Dubbed Penguin 3.0, this new one was a worldwide update, not just a local hit. It was a refresh or update of the original Penguin. This means that the sites affected negatively wrongly by the last Penguin were freed of their penalties, if they had taken the recommended Google steps for recovery. (Not sure about this? See my section detailing Google recovery towards the end.)
Express Writers Dominates The SERPS
We were stopped dead in our tracks when we had 400 unique visitors in one day during a recent weekend, on Saturday. Then, four contact requests occurred Sunday evening. That never happens on a weekend! We took a deeper look and saw that our overall ranking had increased majorly. We already had several dozen keywords dominating search: but today, we have rankings like we have never had before.
We’re ranking in the top 3 results of Google for 37 keywords
We have 88 keywords in the first page of Google
We have 136 keywords in the first 2 pages
Here are the stats in screenshots, from our SEO tool of choice, SEMRush.
What happened during the weekend of October 18:
We are outranking some of our major competitors with keywords in the first results of Google.
We increased in rankings on a few keywords: and we held strong on keywords where some of our competitors lost more than 50 positions. This is awesome news for our company! We are staffing and hiring more team members this week due to the workload increase.
What Were The Biggest Recent Google Updates?
I know, there’s been a ton, and it’s hard to keep up. Here’s a brief recap of the recent Google change history, so you can see just how many major changes Google has gone through in the past few months:
Google Pirate update rolled out October 21. This affected torrent sites aka “pirating.”
Our Content Blueprint: A Blog Every Other Day Keeps The Doctor Away
Here’s our content schedule. I’m going to tell you EXACTLY what we do. This is a blueprint for anyone’s success, tailored to your level of services and amount of “news”, hot topics, and relevant pieces you can publish in a week or month. Remember, quality is most important. Never, ever force content. If you simply can’t get out a 3000 word blog three times a week without repeating yourself every week, drop down to once a week or twice at 1,000 words/blog. Change it up and find what works for you. The best days to publish are weekdays in the morning.
We publish 1,000-3,000 word blogs on our site three days a week with links to other quality sites, and visuals (screenshots/images). We post each blog to all our social media networks.
I publish one original blog a week (not too much more than 800 words) on my LinkedIn profile.
We post on social media multiple times every day, tweeting our industry peers, sharing industry content, and our own blogs multiple times. We also publish custom-made visuals with hashtags (like these).
We publish (on our blog) infographics about three times a year.
Our content blueprint is exclusive to Express Writers. I haven’t copied this strategy. As a copywriting company, centering on web-based content, we can say one thing: we know how to write content. And if content is the #1 thing that Google wants these days, well—we’re just going to keep being winners! And we want you to be too. What Can We Do For You From This List?We can write all your blog content, publish it with a monthly schedule, and coming up we’ll have revamped social media plans that INCLUDE custom visuals! We can also write and publish press releases on PRWeb and write/create infographics for you. Disclaimer: If you want guest blogs, we don’t find or do any network management. You have to get on your guest blog platform of choice; we only write your content. But, it will be stellar enough to uphold your reputation on an awesome guest blog site. Now, moving back to the Google update changes…
Were You Hit? If You Haven’t Already, Here Are The Google Steps For Recovering
If you’re experiencing a hit in rankings, then you probably haven’t done the necessary steps to recover from the Google Penguin penalties. Here’s a brief how-to.
Penguin focuses on penalizing anyone abusing links. Read the Google webmaster guidelines and find out if you’re violating any of them.
On the Google Penalty Recover site, scroll down to Troubleshooting and follow the directions for manual action recovery.
Have A Deeper Problem? Look At Panda And Fix Your Content (Now)
If you have a steady decline that goes past a sudden de-ranking from Penguin, time to take a look at Panda. Google is actually calling Panda a Quality Algorithm instead of a penalty. Panda was a site-wide penalty that affects all rankings for organic keywords, which will hit you if your site is featuring low quality content. Your entire site gets a lower quality score because of the problematic content, making it nearly impossible to rank at all till you fix the problem.
I hope this blog and real-life case study helps you. If you have any questions for me or if you think I’ve left out any information, let me know in the comments!
Photo credits SEMRush.com (Screenshots taken 11-5-14)
Did you know that the average consumer is bombarded by over 5,000 advertising messages each day? According to Moz, the daily device user “wields more computing power in their hand than NASA” leveraged to land Neil Armstrong on the moon. What’s more, people make split second decisions about your website—literally split second, as in 1/20 of a second. In an age of now, how do you ensure split seconds count in your favor? Ever heard of humanizing your content? Let’s look at how you can use that in your favor.
Humanize Your Content with the Power of You
You, me, we’re all human. And as humans, we have a few fundamentals in common. We love, hate, and procrastinate. We’re drawn to stories. We root for the underdog. Most of us even envision better and strive to achieve it. Does your content reflect the power of you? Is it humanized? Humanizing your content is more important now than ever. In this era of social media and constant contact, you don’t want to portray your brand as a cold, faceless corporate robot. You want your brand to be the warm, smiling face that welcomes people with open arms. You want to hand readers something authentic and genuine, something they can connect to—something human. Humanizing your content is not a one-size-fits-all plan due to the fact that every brand is different. What works for Audi or Volkswagen isn’t going to work for Kraft and Heinz. While they’re relatively comparable in size, the auto giants aren’t going to appeal to your family’s traditional cooking or macaroni and cheese nostalgia to sell the latest Audi R8 model. So just how can you humanize your content to appeal to your readers? What’s the secret? Would you believe me if I said there are five?
Secret #1: Connect on an Emotional Level
It’s nearly impossible to fake being genuine or authentic. Consumers—people in general—are too smart for that. And if you get caught faking it, the backlash could be devastating. For example, imagine the backlash if Dawn was involved in dumping oil or an oil spill Their carefully crafted image of genuine environmental concern, while also showing the power of their dish soap, displayed in videos of cleaning oil covered animals would be decimated. The point is, if consumers realize that your reputation is just a cash grab technique, you will suddenly have a lot to answer for in the court of public opinion. There are several ways to connect to your readers on an emotional level. A great example comes from the brand Always. They recently held a campaign that helped people see their mission to “champion girl’s confidence.” #LikeaGirl became a very successful campaign because it was genuine, and Always succeeded in making their brand seem secondary to the cause. They presented an Always advertisement with Always branding, but the message and the cause of #LikeaGirl remained the primary focus. The gender equality premise created an emotional connection that almost anyone could relate to and understand. You too can use the personality of your brand, your customers, and even your employees to create a genuine, emotional connection. The key is not to do something purely for marketing reasons. It has to be a part of your brand’s culture. For example, it will seem more genuine if you’re making a video of your entire company doing the electric slide if your brand’s personality is already established as a “fun” brand. It’s easier and more genuine for a brand like PlayStation to do a video of their employees having a video game tournament or Nerf war in the office versus a Fortune 500 company like JP Morgan Chase.
Secret #2: Listen to Your Customers and Respond with Action
Social media has given customers more access to your brand than ever before. And while it’s one thing to have an account customers can interact with, it’s something else entirely to show them that you’re listening to them. People love to voice their opinions, especially when they know it will be taken seriously. Showing your customers that you can listen to what they have to say and incorporate it into your brand’s ultimate goal, or your product, is huge. It helps gain their respect and their loyalty. But it’s not just interaction that matters. Allowing your customers to be your market research source is a great way to humanize your content. Your customers get to interact with your brand on a personal level, and they get to see their ideas recognized and possibly implemented. People are more likely to return to your brand, as well as recommend it, when you listen to what they have to say.
Secret #3: Let Your Hair Down
Everyone has a sense of humor. Humor is associated with people, not brands. But what if your brand had a sense of humor about itself? If you’re in a so-called “boring industry” having a sense of brand humor is a good way to distinguish yourself. You don’t have to write copy with a joke in every sentence to have a sense of humor. Posting pictures of your employees doing things naturally is good, too. Hubspot, for example, has a rotating stable of employee pictures on their login screen.
Photo credit HubSpot
Poking fun at yourself is a good way to let your brand’s hair down. We all make mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes are just plain humorous. And let’s face it; mistakes are how we learn. It’s human nature! Don’t be afraid of connecting with your audience by letting your hair down. Share your successes while discussing the obstacles, challenges, and mistakes that got you to where you sit today. Nothing humanizes your content and draws readers in more than that ultimate honesty, that power of your true story. Don’t sit on it! Share it.
Secret #4: Just Be Human
I know. It sounds simplistic, but it’s something a lot of brands tend to forget. In order to humanize your content the best thing to do is just be human. There is a time to be formal and all business, and then there is a time to intermingle it all with good old-fashioned normality (whatever your version of it is). Show your personality. Take off the marketer’s or CEO’s hat and use your name, not your title. Interact with your customers as if they were your friends. Don’t always talk business with your customers. Not everything that you tweet has to lead to a landing page, a blog, or anything outwardly associated with your brand. It can be pure engagement, and the act of striking up a conversation with the people who matter—your customers. Tweet something you know your followers will like. The more you get to know them and their personalities, the easier it will be to create humanizing content. Sign your emails or social media exchanges with your name to let customers know that they are talking to a human, not the faceless CEO of a multinational corporation. Be friendly and treat your customers like friends or even family.
Secret #5: Follow Through With Your Promises
Above all else, make sure that you deliver on all your promises. Nothing is worse than someone who welches on their promises. You will singlehandedly lose the trust and respect of your customers if you try to renege. Even if you can’t complete every promise immediately, showing that you are at least working towards completing it is good. According to Moz, there are over 150 million blogs currently on the Internet, and over 500 million tweets go out per day. The choices for people who want content that matches them are virtually endless.
Humanization Is the Future
We’ve practically grown up watching movies and reading books about robotics taking over the world. In today’s technological abundance, we automate a great number of our daily tasks. It saves time. It even saves money. But humanization is the way of the future. High quality content is quickly becoming the new face of SEO. And one element of high quality is humanization. It’s that human connection that reaches out across cyberspace and touches readers, drawing them into our content, no matter its form. Humanizing your content is easy, and it offers a high reward of increased appeal and therefore an ever-expanding audience. The consequences of having poor content can devastate your brand. It’s not enough to have just an online presence these days. If you’re not interacting with your consumers, making them feel welcome, and humanizing your brand to appeal to them, you’re already behind the competition. The secrets we’ve covered are more guidelines than rules, and you should creatively adjust them according to your content and your brand. But there is one last secret to firmly entrench in your audience, and it amounts to two simple words: be genuine. Nothing will humanize your content more than staying true to yourself. And if you’re seeking some ideas, read up on four brands that nail copywriting. Their example just might inspire you. Photo credit: alphaspirit / iStock
PubCon is the top social media and optimization conference: it’s supported by the top businesses, speakers, exhibitors, and sponsors involved in social media, Internet marketing, search engines, and digital advertising agencies. (Yes, one day I’ll make it to one.) This awesome event always offers an in depth look at the future of technology, as envisioned by the top-speakers, in cutting edge sessions. Moreover, at PubCon Vegas 2014, a noteworthy speaker made it widely known that content marketing and SEO are irrevocably joined at the hip.
At the recent PubCon in Las Vegas, Carolyn Shelby spoke about how content marketing and SEO are inextricably linked. Shelby is the Director of SEO and SEM for Tribune Publishing. She also works for six Tribune newspapers, plus the LA Times and the Chicago Tribune. She has been in the industry since 1994, and she has been professionally designing and developing websites for nonprofits and a diverse variety of businesses since 1995. She consults, she speaks, and she isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty with hard online work. Her specialty is rehabbing underperforming and outdated websites. In addition, her appearance at PubCon sheds some new light on SEO as content marketing.
What are SEO and Content Marketing?
As you know, SEO is the acronym for search engine optimization. SEO is the process of affecting the visibility of a specific website or web page in a SERP’s “natural” or un-paid (“organic”) search results. Lee Odden, an industry expert from the Content Marketing Institute, recently described SEO as “a customer focused content marketing program.” He went on to say that it’s like a “sandwich” in which “SEO is the mayonnaise.” Although the mayo touches just about everything and enhances the sandwich’s flavor, it’s not exactly appetizing on its own.
Content marketing is marketing that involves the creation and sharing of media content in order to draw in and retain customers. You might liken it to the bread of Odden’s sandwich. Good quality bread can really make a sandwich and complement its contents. While the bread may be scrumptious all on its own, it’s usually the contents of the sandwich that lead us to eating it.
Why You Need SEO in Content Marketing
If SEO is like mayo and content marketing is like bread, then obviously both are important. In her segment at PubCon, Carolyn Shelby listed the following reasons for why you need SEO in your content marketing:
It helps identify the goals for your marketing, and it creates a performance benchmark
It helps you select your themes and topics through good old-fashioned keyword research
It assists you in writing that unbelievably amazing, on topic content
It allows you to decide where to distribute and promote your content for the best visibility to your target audience
It gives you the capability to run reports that show your ROI
However, these aren’t the only reasons you need SEO and content marketing as a combo. Regardless of what people say, SEO and content marketing aren’t duking it out to see which species survives to the next step of cyber evolution. We’re not looking at survival of the fittest or a corporate takeover. We’re staring at a merger.
The people who go around pushing “Content Marketing vs. SEO” are chomping at the bit to pit them against each other like a couple of prizefighters. Not only do they want you to pick a side, but they also need you to do so. Do I have your attention?
SEO versus Content Marketing
The apparent implication comes across that, in order to be wise with your digital marketing budget, you have no choice but to choose between hiring only one type of specialist over the other. In this case, it’s the SEO guru over the content marketing king. Maybe you have a $3,000 budget dedicated to marketing to allocate as seen best fit per month. The dilemma then becomes, do you put your eggs into the content marketing or SEO basket?
The only way this makes any kind of sense is if the intended SEO in question is of the black-hat variety. Black-hat SEOs were indeed a booming, albeit questionable, business practice for years. Today, their methods are entirely unethical, ineffective, and downright dangerous to your SEO strategies. Search engines don’t take too kindly to websites caught running a black-hat SEO tactic and they penalize those found guilty of doing so accordingly. It can be disastrous.
The truth is white-hat SEO practices are tried and true methods of increasing visibility and ultimately readership, thus leading to conversion. One of the most talked about white-hat SEO methods is creating and publishing high quality content. Guess what? We just stepped into the domain of a seasoned content marketer. There is no choice between SEO and content marketing. They work together. In fact, awesome content is quickly turning into the ultimate SEO tool!
SEO as Content Marketing: Two Sides of a New Coin
Savvy online marketing professionals should come to the conclusion that content marketing and SEO are the two key contributors in an enterprise-focused marketing strategy. If your website is lacking in one or both of these areas, it has to be brought up to par.
SEO experts shouldn’t be living in fear of the extinction of the craft they’ve worked so hard to build. Their roles will continue to be vital for a brand’s marketing strategy because they know better than anyone that effective, ethical SEO can’t happen without the necessary content to optimize. And where the content gurus know the ins and outs of epic content—like citations and internal linking going SEO viral—the SEOs know how to get search engines to see that content.
We all strive to create high quality content with the intention of supporting our marketing objectives. If done properly, an integral part of our execution strategies will be focused on creating optimizations that will increase the probability of our content being discovered on search engine result pages.
As it stands, claiming that SEO and content marketing are two separate marketing tactics with no interaction is akin to saying that headlines and copy are mortal enemies. However, as Google continues to perfect the search users’ experience, content is taking on new meaning. One might even go as far as saying, as Shelby did at PubCon, that SEO is becoming the new content marketing. Content marketing is huge!
Baskets Be Gone
Remember how we talked about the content marketing and SEO baskets? One of the greatest struggles is that of a majority of people attempting to distinguish between various tactics by putting them into separate baskets. In truth, as SEO becomes the new content marketing, we are effectively merging the two baskets to create one—a better one. Ideally, instead of seeing each one as an individual entity, they should be seen as an aspect of one strategic, overarching process.
Our SEO can literally hand us vital information about our target audience. The performance of our SEO can indicate which content is working and which is not. Shelby pointed out that the Tribune Content Agency actually leverages their SEO as an influencer and informer on behalf of their overall content strategy. That strategy encompasses everything from topic selection to the actual content creation and its placement.
Content is King…
…but it needs SEO to reign supreme. The fundamental element in marketing is and always has been content. As we move forward, content should continue to serve as the basic foundation of your online marketing strategy. Google wants high quality content, and their every algorithm update supports that desire. But it’s not just the wishes of the almighty SEO setter. It’s the wants of audiences around the globe. They want relevancy, but they want awesome content, too.
Content is king, but it should be populated with vital information expertly tailored to speak the language of your intended audience. At the same time, it must adequately and accurately address the problems and desires that are at the forefront of your audience’s mind. It must offer value; otherwise, it is worthless. Content must be able to answer whatever questions your audience has, alleviate their fears, and encourage them to action.
Here’s the thing: the accomplishment of your content marketing goals, according to Shelby, hinges on your SEO. You can’t have one without the other. Regardless of whether your content marketing goal is to build brand awareness, beef up your site’s content inventory, generate that fuzzy feeling, or offer up some link bait, it’s all for not without at least some SEO.
So, before you go separating your 2015 budgets and contemplating which is more important, stop! SEO becoming the new content marketing is happening. To choose one over the other is to choose a disadvantage. Regardless of whether you’re taking the plunge to outsourcing your content creation and/or SEO or not, you have a mission. Be sure to make room for both content marketing and SEO. It’s the only way you can have your cake and eat it too!
and we held strong on keywords where some of our competitors lost more than 50 positions. 
This is awesome news for our company! We are staffing and hiring more team members this week due to the workload increase. 
