Repurposing content is one of the hottest topics in the world of copywriting. Why? It’s something almost every brand is finding valuable. Not only does it save time, but it’s a fantastic means of reusing existing, already-awesome copy.
Now, we’ve talked about content repurposing before. In fact, we’ve handed you a handy how to guide and backed our stand that repurposing helps you get the most content mileage possible. But as I sat at my desk, racking my brain for a worthwhile-copywriting-in-action topic, I thought to myself, “Hold the phone! We haven’t really shown you how valuable and worthwhile content repurposing is.”
So guess what we’re going to talk about? Repurposing one of the oldest types of content around: Fairytales!
Once Upon A Time
There probably isn’t a person on the planet who hasn’t heard at least one fairytale. In fact, the tales we grew up with know no cultural bounds. They’re worldwide stories that teach lessons, morals, principles, all kinds of good stuff. And on October 23, 2011, a television series based entirely on repurposing traditional fairytales premiered. Simply called Once Upon a Time, this series is an incredible example of content repurposing in action.
Modernization
Once Upon a Time is a fantastic example of repurposing content through modernization. Now, we’ve talked about this concept before, but this series really drives home how you can take something old and make it new.
The characters live in the seaside town of Storybrooke, Maine. They live in a modern setting in which the wicked Queen from Snow White’s fairytale is the town Mayor. In season one, her right-hand man (the Huntsman tasked with killing Snow White) is the town Sherriff. As we work our way down the list of fairytale characters, they each take on modernized roles that connect back to their traditional identity:
The Evil Queen is Regina Mills, Mayor of Storybrooke
Snow White is Mary Margaret Blanchard, a school teacher
Prince Charming is David Nolan, a coma patient who awakes in search of his true love
Jiminy Cricket is Dr. Archie Hopper, a therapist
The Huntsman is Sheriff Graham Humbert
Pinocchio is August Wayne Booth, a writer of sorts whose destructive path leaves life altering consequences
Red Riding Hood is Ruby, a waitress at the local diner, Granny’s which is run by the grandmother from her fairytale
Belle is Lacy, a confused young woman who falls for the biggest “beast” in town
Perhaps the most epic character in the entire series is Rumpelstiltskin. In Storybrooke, he is Mr. Gold, the one powerful man in town that everyone is terrified of. He doubles as the Beast Belle falls for and the crocodile Captain Hook seeks to destroy.
When it comes to repurposing content, one of the most important things we can do is modernize it. Once Upon a Time proves that no content is too old for modernization. And when it’s done right, it reminds the audience of the traditional content while mesmerizing them with a fresh perspective.
Compelling Twists
If I had to pick the most surprising and compelling twist of the series, it came in season three when we were introduced to the infamous Peter Pan. Yes, I said infamous. Although we’ve always known Peter as the boy who never grew up, and we saw his getaway island as fantastic and magical, Once Upon a Time chose to take a completing different approach.
In an epic and slightly terrifying twist, Peter Pan becomes a villain! His shadow steels children from their beds, dragging them to Neverland. But instead of being a land where little boys never grow up, it’s a terrifying place where Pan searches tirelessly for one boy. Even Captain Hook fears the place. Peter is depicted as a villain, capable of ripping shadows away like ripping the hearts from chests.
This compelling twist is a fantastic example of a technique we can use to repurpose content. We can insert new, compelling twists that shake things up. A reasonable twist can leave people in shock and awe. In the case of Once Upon a Time, it made season three irresistible. In the case of your copywriting, it can make people hunger for what comes next because all they can do for now is guess.
Incredibly Human Characters
It could be said that the most successful content is also the most human. Let’s face it; we don’t like trying to connect with anything that is less than human. Once Upon a Time, although comprised of fictional fairytale creatures and characters, never shank away from the task of making the modernized and classic characters incredibly human. For example:
Emma Swan: Arguably the main character of the series, she is a completely new addition the storybook world. Daughter to Prince Charming and Snow White, she’s a character a lot of us can relate to because she is so human. She’s had her fair share of trouble. She’s made bad decisions that have come back to haunt her, and she’s bent on doing the right thing, no matter the cost. There’s hardly anything fictional about her, except for her roots.
Henry: As Emma’s son, he is a highly human character. He spent a good part of his life wondering why his birth mother gave him up for adoption. When given the opportunity, he takes off to find Emma. He finds her to convince her that she is the savoir of Storybrooke, but at the same time he just wants his mother—his real mother. As the series progresses, we connect with a kid from a broken home with one pretty crazy family. Sound familiar? A lot of us can relate personally!
Rumpelstiltskin: My favorite character in the series! Unlike his traditional fairytale, he takes on a whole new level of sheer darkness as “The Dark One.” As one of the most multifaceted characters in the entire series, he offers so much to relate to from feelings of numbing fear to overwhelming rage.
What’s the point? The point is that the most human we make our content, the more readily people will connect to it. I spit out the three above character profiles because these three characters left a strong impression on me. Your content has the ability to do the same.
Now, this is not to say that your content needs fictional characters. But there’s nothing wrong with a little storytelling. More to the point, there’s nothing wrong with telling your story. People love to connect with things they can relate to, and your story is one they will want to hear.
As your business continues to grow and change, take the time to tell stories. Let people in on the battles and challenges faced behind the scenes. Show them that running a business isn’t all glamour. It’s hard work, work you put in so that they can benefit from your business.
What Storytelling and Copywriting Need: Strong Emotional Connection
The key to great storytelling is emotion. The ingredient to shareworthy content is strong emotion. When you repurpose content, find new and exciting ways to make an emotional connection with your audience.
In Once Upon a Time, there are strong emotional connections ranging from unbreakable love to uncontainable anger. For example, in season three, two of the major villains (the Evil Queen and Captain Hook) are caught in a scene talking about happy endings. Despite their shown evilness and all of the reasons you’ve been given to hate them, you can’t help but feel sympathy when Captain Hook and the Queen contemplate whether or not they can ever have a happy ending.
New Idea Creation
Repurposing classic fairytales into modernized versions with unique twists and turns based on the new life breathed into the characters was a smashing success. So smashing, in fact, that Once Upon a Time birthed a spin-off series called Once Upon a Time in Wonderland. Although the new series followed in the same tone, it approaches its fairytale revamp in slightly different manner, allowing a certain amount of uniqueness. The writers have even woven in cross over episodes that return the audience to the parent series.
Repurposing content can very easily lead to new, improved ideas. With a little creativity, planning, and organization, you can incorporate new ideas in a unique way while still linking back to your original content.
Try It!
Derek Halpern, the man behind (and in front) of Social Triggers says it best, “You don’t have to create content, day in, and day out. You just have to work on getting the content you already have…in the hands of more people.” You can thoroughly accomplish this by repurposing your content and sharing it.
Are you ready for the hard-hitting question? Here it comes; brace yourself!
Have you repurposed any of your content yet? If yes, awesome job and keep it up. If not, what are you waiting for? The highly successful Once Upon a Time series is a shining example of just how repurposing can result in the most mileage and untold content success!
In 2005, audiences were greeted with an incredibly over-the-top show about supernatural happenings. This show, aptly named Supernatural wasn’t really one that had a lot of critical success in the beginning, but that soon changed. The show’s producers and show runners just wanted to make sure they made it to season 5, to wrap up the incredible “end of the world” story they started. However, they soon found out that fans were slowly attaching themselves to the show, and it grew from there.
Eventually, the show became a major success amongst loyal fans and found new fans via the ever-popular Netflix. But, how did Supernatural attract these fans? And how is the show still growing their fan base? I am going to take a look at this, as well as how much you can learn from this show to apply to your own copywriting campaigns!
They Are Involved In Social Media
One thing that this show does very well is utilizing social media to spread news about it, and engage with their fan base. Oftentimes, you see only a handful of show stars participating on social media, and many times they are secondary characters. This isn’t a bad thing, but by having the lead stars tweeting to fans and live tweeting the show, Supernatural has created an incredible presence on social media. Each night the show airs, Jared Padalecki (Sam Winchester), Mark Sheppard (Crowley), and Misha Collis (Castiel) will live tweet the entire show, engaging with fans and telling stories. They’ve had several incredible moments with social media promotion, as well as some interesting moments from fans, including the hilarious Mishapocalypse that took over Tumblr.
What can you learn from Supernatural’s spooky ability at utilizing social media? People really enjoy knowing that there is a person behind a social account. Many fans follow the show’s Twitter account, but many prefer the actors because they get a personalized view of the show. While you don’t have to live tweet your work day, you can utilize how the actors and show runners handle social media by being personal with your followers, opening up dialogue, and having fun. You can always keep it professional, but consider showing your personality and letting people connect with the person behind the Twitter handle.
The CW Knows How To Market It To Their Audience
Supernatural makes its home on the CW channel, and it is quite obvious that the channel knows how to market to their audience. The audience is different for each show such as Vampire Diaries or Supernatural, making it vital that they reach people where they are at in order to not lose interest. When it comes to Supernatural, they advertise the most on Tumblr where their loyal fan base spends a majority of their time. This is also a great opportunity for them to reach out to others who haven’t watched the show, yet spend their time on the social site. The CW knows that in order to reach and market to a Millennial crowd, they have to meet them where they are at and that, sadly, isn’t in the dusty pages of a newspaper.
The same is true for you; you need to know your audience and you absolutely need to market to them and where they are. You might not be marketing to Millennials, but you can still learn where your demographic spends the majority of their time. This includes social media, but also whether or not your audience is one that reads press releases, white papers or other sources of information you have available.
They Utilize The Familiar And Give It A Supernatural Twist
Something that many new and old fans enjoy about the show is that they take something familiar and add their own twist to it. For example, vampires and werewolves; they take the original folklore of these monsters, and then add a difference to them to make them adapt to the world of the Winchester brothers. No matter the story, the writers of Supernatural give it a great flair while also making sure to stay true to what audience’s find familiar.
How can this inspire your copywriting? You can simply make sure to keep your content familiar. This will be a great way to make sure your content doesn’t stink, as well as giving people something to engage with. This goes for blogs, web content, and social media. Be familiar to attract people to your posts, but add your own flair to it to make it unique to you. This will help make you more memorable to clients and can help you bring in more clients and revenue.
One way that you can make sure to stay familiar is to host a giveaway of one of your products. Giveaways are vastly popular right now, and people love winning things; I know that I love when I win a giveaway! You can make a giveaway purely you very easily, yet it is familiar enough to bring in current customers, as well as new clients. In fact, the giveaway might just be what converts your website visitors to buyers.
Cliffhangers and Copywriting: They Keep You Coming Back For More
The show is now in its tenth season. That’s right, tenth! How did they get so far when they only recently met success? They made fans desperate to know what happens next. They do this through the classic cliffhangers that end shows for the season, but they also utilize internal cliffhangers throughout the season. Will Sam go dark-side? When will Crowley come in with some crazy, yet genius idea? They make fans ask these questions regularly, which is why the fans keep coming back for more.
Guess what, you can use internal cliffhangers too! You can use them in your copywriting to make people desperate to read what is coming next. This is a great way to ensure that your readers will not only read a small portion of your blog, web content, or social post but that they will read the entirety of it. Utilizing internal cliffhangers will help you craft great storytelling pieces, as well as make your content relevant to readers. Take a leaf out of Supernatural’s book and attempt to utilize internal cliffhangers in your content.
Until Next Time
Supernatural is not only a show that you can enjoy on a dark, spooky October night; it is also a show filled with excellent copywriting inspiration. Do you plan to use anything you’ve learned from this show to craft excellent content in the future?
As little as two years ago, some of us said the infographic got hammered and it just wasn’t worthwhile anymore when it came to content marketing strategies. Is this true? Are infographics on the down and out, incapable of spicing up and improving our content marketing plans? Is it possible to still create quality infographics, or should we forget about them entirely and try something else?
According to a recent article by CopyBlogger (and we’re talking end of September kind of recent), research suggests that publishers who leverage infographics tend to grow in traffic by about 12 percent more than those who don’t. In fact, they went so far as to present the information in…can you guess it? That’s right! An infographic:
Photo credit CopyBlogger
Wow! It makes you think twice about infographics, now doesn’t it? Maybe these little visual packets aren’t so bad after all?
The What’s What of Infographics
According to Wikipedia, infographics are information graphics. They have a pretty rich history, dating back as far as 1626 when Christoph Scheiner published the Rosa Ursina sive Sol. The very first infographic debuted in this publication and illustrated the Sun’s rotation patterns so that non-scientific minds could easily grasp the concept.
Today, infographics are still visual representations of data or information. They’re a prime means of turning complex information into something almost anyone can quickly understand. Unlike 1626, today they are social media friendly. It’s not uncommon for these tidy pieces of content to go viral. They appeal to our visual senses, which often make them initially more powerful than our standard text based content.
Yet, these handy marketing tools have flaws. You’d think that a content type dating back to the 1600s would be perfected by now! Then again, how many of us saw the Internet coming? And in all honesty, how many of us can accurately predict just how Google will react to the content types we choose?
The Downfall of Infographics
The biggest downfall to information graphics is the fact that Google can’t index the content contained within them. The same issue applies to any image we choose to use. Crawlers are not (yet) sophisticated enough to capture the words on images and index them.
As is the case with every type of content out there, it’s entirely possible to produce low quality. If you’re not careful, you can create awful infographics. According to CopyBlogger, Google’s Matt Cutts had some pointed observations about bad infographics:
When it comes to topics, they can get off topic.
It’s not uncommon for the facts contained within them to be of poor quality.
The link (or links) associated with infographics often go to sites that are completely unrelated.
The link (or links) embedded in the infographics are sometimes undetectable by viewers.
Cutts wrapped up his observations by concluding that in the future, infographic-type links just might be discounted or devalued by Google. So, the point is you have two outcomes when it comes to infographics:
Nail it! Produce a high quality, well researched, gorgeously presented, relevantly linked information graphic. It won’t be indexed by crawlers, but it will be a one hit wonder that can be repeated with new products that increase traffic and boom your business.
Fail It. Produce low quality infographics void of confirmed facts and relevant links that are eye catching but otherwise worthless. They won’t be indexed by crawlers, but they won’t be one hit wonders either. Low quality = get hammered (no, not with alcohol) and you’ll be in danger of infographic type links getting devalued.
But there’s something else to think about, too. Are you infecting the Web with an unwanted virus?
Second-Degree Duplication
Do you have a case of second-degree duplicate content? It’s a plague that just doesn’t seem to let up, as discussed by Eric Enge and Matt Cutts. What are we talking about? Second-degree duplicate content is when a user goes to pages that all contain the same information. Even though they aren’t identical and thus identified as duplicates, they’re so similar that the user frowns and clicks the back button because the information they’re after just isn’t there.
The problem with this scenario is that no additional value is being brought to the reader. No, the content isn’t duplicated, but it’s not bringing anything new to the table either! How does this relate to our discussion of infographics? Well, if you’re not careful, your infographics will simply rehash information and cause second-degree duplication, the kind that isn’t technically duplicated, but doesn’t offer anything of value either.
Repurposing Content Doesn’t Mean Rehash the Same Old Same Old
Infographics have taken off in the content industry as a means of repurposing older content into a new form of media capable of drawing a diverse (and fresh) audience. We’ve talked about turning long-winded copy into a handy infographic as a tactic for making your content go viral. But there’s an element that you have to consider if you expect infographics to be a worthwhile content marketing investment: Fresh perspective.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with repurposing content via an infographic, but you must offer somethingof value. This means you must offer something new. Otherwise, your repurposed content will be little more than a fancy case of second-degree duplication, and it could very well fail.
Infographics as an Asset
At the start of 2014, we ran a series of blogs tagged 2014 Success, and success number five was all about why you should create infographics. We even provided a brief how to that handed our readers 10 popular ways of using infographics. The truth is this content type is a worthwhile investment IF you do it right. So without further ado, here’s your short guide to creating assets in infographics:
Focus on Relevancy: It’s the key to every type of content. If it’s not relevant, don’t use it. It’s really that simple! Google is not a fan of irrelevant links or content. Period. (I want to add in an exclamation point because this point just cannot be over emphasized!) It doesn’t matter what we’re talking about content wise. If a link is irrelevant or a stretch, it’s just not going to do good things for your content or your website, and in the end, it contributes to low quality. So don’t go linking to irrelevant websites just for link value. You’re aiming a gun at your foot, and it’s only a matter of time before it goes off.
Fact Quality Matters: You can present facts within a layout that is to die for, but it will be for nothing if those facts are flimsy. Audiences know what infographics are, and they know that these content mediums are supposed to contain facts. If they realize the facts you’ve chosen are unverified and ultimately inaccurate, you’ll lose readership instantly. And what’s worse, you’ll lose credibility, authority, and trust. Ultimately, you will risk alienating your audience, which includes paying customers. Customer loyalty could quickly become a thing of the past. Fact quality really does matter, even when the text isn’t crawled and indexed.
Hunt for Sources: It’s easy to get so carried away with the visual aspect of an infographic that we forget to pay attention to our fact quality, but the same applies to hunting for sources. Before you even begin creating an infographic, you should be hunting for sources to reference or link to, and they must be relevant. If you’re repurposing content, it’s not a bad idea to build in a link to that original piece of copy. It’s also helpful to build links to sources that back up the claims your graphic is making. And don’t forget to make those links visible. If your audience doesn’t see them, they’ll never know to click.
Repurpose That High Value Content: So, it’s not going to happen overnight. Let’s just state that up front. Infographics are one of the most amazing ways of repurposing your high value content into an audience frenzy that contains a little something new. But you’re not going to create 10 of these overnight. They’re going to take time, just like that high value content takes time to create.
Infographics are an asset, but they’re also a workhorse. They have few limitations outside of staying away from thin or poorly prepared content. We thought the value of these assets was degrading, but the truth is it was a dip in quality that sent us reeling. Is it really surprising? Bad quality causes bad things! High quality causes good things.
Dedicate yourself to awesome quality. It’s the key to everything. I know, it almost sounds too good to be true, but don’t let this simple statement fool you. Awesome quality isn’t easy. You can’t snap your fingers and make it magically appear. It’s going to take work, hard work. But you can do it. And as a result, you’ll find that infographics are truly a worthwhile investment for content marketing.
I covered Google’s crack down on spam with Panda 4.0 back in May, and now the search titan has struck again with yet another update (the 27th, to be exact) to its algorithm, just when we were all finally adjusting to the last. Luckily, it’s not a massive change, but it still packs a punch. So once again, it’s time to pivot strategies and tweak practices to stay on (or get on) Google’s good side.
However, in order to pivot correctly, we first need to know exactly what has changed. The last thing anybody wants to do is reel into a wall at full speed, and as is the case with any of Google’s algorithm updates, any wrong adjustments could be devastating to your overall ranking.
What’s New in the Latest Google Panda Update?
As is so often Google’s modus operandi, they’re not telling us a whole lot about the exact changes to the algorithm, but the SEO expert is giving us some details as to what the intent of the update includes. The update was unleashed onto the World Wide Web last Wednesday. And according to Search Engine Land, the latest roll out has been dubbed “Panda 4.1” because the update is small and doesn’t warrant a boost to a full-fledged 5.0.
In the announcement that was posted on the Google+ page of Google World Trends Analysts in the UK, Pierre Far observed that the feedback provided by both user and webmaster sources led to the discovery of more signals to assist Panda in identifying thin, low quality content more readily. As a result, we’re going to see a lot more high quality, small- to mid-sized websites ranking higher.
So while it’s not a huge update, it is important—especially to those of us focusing our resources on high quality content production. Thin content will be penalized even more than before, seriously affecting search engine rankings. The update is designed to be more precise at catching poor content than the previous updates, and it puts even more emphasis on quality.
The update will also allow sites that were previously hit by penalties under Panda 4.0 to have a chance at redemption; Assuming, of course, that they made the proper changes to allow for it. Just because your site was penalized under 4.0 does not mean that all of your penalties will be cleared and you’ll be given a clean slate. The guidelines are still strict, and the penalties are still harsh.
The Possible Impact to Your Website
Panda 4.1 is intended to give a boost to smaller sites that have high to medium quality content. It’s basically a Goliath trying to help out the David’s of the Wild West we call the Internet. Pierre Far also stated that Google believes only 3 to 5 percent of search queries in the SERPs will be affected.
However, the Panda update did have some unintended casualties. For example, according to Search Metrics, some sites, such as MedTerms.com (a medical terminology website), have been caught in the crossfire. Below is a graph showing the SEO visibility of MedTerms.com from June 22, 2014, to September 28, 2014:
Photo Credit medterms.com
As you can see, they took a -40 percent hit in SEO visibility between September 21, 2014 and September 28, 2014. And they aren’t the only victim:
OnHealth.com took a -57 percent hit
HubPages.com took a -46 percent hit
It’s entirely possible that there were other reasons for various sites losing a percentage of their SEO visibility. For example, redirects or a changed URL could be to blame for the drops. Correlation is not necessarily causation, but it seems to have a strong link right now.
Although it’s still early goings, it seems as if lyric sites, game sites, and some medical content sites are on the losing end of the algorithm update. The early winners seem to be news sites, content heavy sites, and the download portal realm. Search Metrics goes on to spotlight some sites that have witnessed huge increases in their SEO visibility since the update went live:
GeekWire.com saw a 144 percent increase
ThePirateBay.se saw a 162 percent increase
Spoonful.com saw a 218 percent increase
Conclusion: The Content Throne Is Even More Prominent
It’s pretty obvious that the new Panda update is taking quality a step further as it aims to help smaller websites. The algorithm is growing ever more apt at spotting and rewarding high quality websites while penalizing those that don’t make the grade. Dare we say that the throne where content sits as king has just gotten a bit more prominent?
The update has leveled the playing field, in a sense, and it’s now possible for little brother to play with the big boys, meaning that if you’re a small site that delivers high quality content, your door to the big leagues in rankings is wide open. While the update doesn’t add a whole lot of new terminologies or methods, it is designed to continue removing redundant, irrelevant content and spam from Google indexes.
4.1 re-asserts the fact that quality content is, was, and forever shall be the king of the SEO world. If your content is subpar, then there isn’t a single algorithm update that will save your site from poor ranking. You can use every trick in the book in an attempt to guide a horse (the audience) to water (your website), but it will be for not without quality content. It’s the content that keeps people coming back for more and ultimately results in epic SERP ranking right alongside conversion.
Google Panda: The Final Verdict
Google’s 27th Panda update just goes to show that quality content is a staple of SEO. As a copywriting expert, we know that a great deal of time and energy goes into brainstorming, creating, and publishing high quality copy. It’s time and energy that will never be wasted because Google’s algorithms keep getting smarter at spotting and rewarding awesome content. Audience focused, well written, and engaging copy IS the future. Investing in it will be incredibly beneficial both today and tomorrow.
Citations and internal links are nothing new in the world of content or search engine optimization (SEO), but they are certainly starting to draw a lot more love and attention from SEO gurus and content marketers across the Net. Back at the beginning of the year, we published our top 10 SEO predictions for 2014, and prediction No.5 was all about link building. It’s interesting to see how link building has quickly evolved from a super important need for external links to a want for internal ones.
Link building is a well-researched strategy with industry experts like Moz and KISSmetrics backing it fervently. But with so much controversy resting on whether or not linking was dead at the outset of the year (it wasn’t), there wasn’t much talk about the specific kinds of link building that should be leveraged.
So, here we are speeding toward the final quarter of the year, and we’re already seeing noteworthy attention shifting to both citations and internal link building (using high quality, natural resources) as the next big thing in SEO content.
The Scoop on Citations
In the world of SEO, two types of citations are leveraged to boost optimization in an effort to promote more favorable search engine rankings. You have citations and co-citations.
Now, we all know what citations are, or at least we hope we all do! We see citations everywhere in content. They’re used when we borrow direct quotes, images, media, etc. Citations are all about giving credit where credit is due. Not only do they make the difference between proper credit versus plagiarism, but they are also send out signals of credibility and even authority. Here’s a good example of a standard online citation:
According to KISSmetrics, a “co-citation is when one website or band is mentioned (not linked) by two different sources.” Therefore, unlike the more classic citation we just displayed, we would mention KISSmetrics, avoid a direct quote, and not provide a link. Both types of citations serve as probable SEO boosts, and here’s why:
Backlinks Send Signals: When we cite a source and provide a link back that source, it can work in our favor. Think of it as a give and take relationship. You give a link back with a citation, the source takes it. In like manner, the source gives a link back to your content as able. This sort of backlinking sends a signal to Google, telling the search algorithms that your content must be worth taking not of since other websites are linking back to you.
Citations Build Credibility: The main reason we incorporate citations in our content is to build credibility. I could tell you all day long that you need to eat more vegetables because it’s healthy, but chances are you won’t take me too seriously. Now, if I give you hard evidence proving that eating more vegetables is crucial to staying healthy and you can check up on my research by visiting and checking my sources, you’ll suddenly take what I say a lot more seriously. This is how credibility is built. Opinions are great, but everyone has at least one. People want credibility and authority, two qualities citations rapidly build.
Citations Build Authority: What is an authority? When it comes to content, every industry on the planet is populated with experts who are considered authorities on the subject matter they specialize in. In the online arena, our businesses and brands have the unique opportunity to establish themselves as experts, authorities within our given industries. One means used to strive toward this establishment is citations. Cites are not merely a means of avoiding illegal copying or plagiarism. They are a means of proving our dedication to fact over opinion, truth over fiction.
Citations have been around since our high school days. Most of us didn’t get a true taste of them until college, and the manner in which we cite online is often far less formal than academic standards. However, there are still some forms of online content that benefit from a return to the more formal format of academic citations. Yet again, such formality can serve to increase credibility and build authority.
Regardless, this basic ingredient to quality writing is quickly gaining attention as a new trend in SEO. Citations are a means of drawing some favorable attention from the search engine gods, attention that can ultimately increase your ranking. If you aren’t actively leveraging citations in your content, it’s time to start.
Internal Linking Is In
Regardless of your current SEO expertise, it’s beneficial to brush up on the basics of internal linking before we briefly identify how it will impact SEO. According to Neil Patel in his KISSmetrics article about internal linking, this type of link building has three main purposes:
First, it aids in website navigation.
Second, it defines both the architecture and hierarchy of the website.
Third, it distributes two important qualities throughout the site: Page authority and ranking power.
Internal links were a Moz search ranking factor for local search, and now they appear to be gaining value. Internal links have all sorts of benefits, but they are starting to house SEO value.
According to Search Engine People, Google’s iron fist has tightened around link building techniques, and, as a result, on-site optimization (internal linking) has taken off.
Unlike the incorporation of external links, internal links are almost always natural, thus making them more positive to favorable SEO versus external linking. You can still link to websites outside of your own, but there’s a great deal to take into consideration nowadays. If your link profile becomes over-optimized with non-brand keywords and anchor-text pointing readers to deep landing pages, chances are Google isn’t going to be happy.
On the other hand, internal links are a strong means of building a sturdy link profile without much risk of over or improper optimization. Here’s how internal links can boost your SEO strategy:
Create a Juicy Menu: The navigation menu of your website is the perfect location to house a number of juicy text links. These links appear on every last page of your website, which means they can carry a large amount of SEO value. How exactly does it work? One of the most common anchor text links found in almost every site menu is “Blog.” If every page within your website links to your blog homepage, a strong signal will be sent out to Google that when a user searches for your brand name with the keyword “blog,” the search result page should serve up your blog homepage as the top result.
Link like Things: Your business likely provides products or services. You should endeavor to link products to products and services to services. The idea is for all of your products or services to link together with relevant anchor text. When your anchor text contains the right keywords, these naturally occurring internal links can carry a great deal of SEO value.
Leverage Sidebar Links: Most often displayed as contextual links, sidebar links lead both users and search engines inside your website. All of your anchor text should be keyword rich and super relevant to both your website and the pages they represent.
Don’t Forget Footers: Footer links or navigation is one of the most overlooked powerhouses for internal SEO. Not only are they perfect for mobile viewers who make it to the bottom of page and want to navigate elsewhere without scrolling all the way back up, but they also provide users and search engines with a footprint of your website known as a sitemap. You can separate your links into categories for added value.
Today’s SEO
2014 has marked an exciting year in search engine optimization. Looking back at all of the algorithm updates and changes in trending SEO tactics, a single theme stands out above all else. The top websites on the SERPs are natural. They aren’t stuffed with keywords, loaded with low quality content in favor of SEO boosters, or packed full of hundreds upon hundreds of links to websites around the Internet.
The top websites on the SERPs are primarily sites that invest in high quality content and focus on creating a website that caters to their audience. The basic, common sense approach is reaping the best results. Therefore, if we invest our time into building an organized and well-structured website populated with high quality content, we will be investing in better search engine ranking both now and in the future.
Citations and Internal Linking In A Nutshell
What’s the big deal about citations and internal linking? Both of these SEO tactics are designed to build page and site authority. The authority of our content and our website will greatly affect how it ranks as Google continues to push for high quality, relevant, and informative websites to top the SERPs. These SEO tactics are quickly becoming crucial players to implement, and implement well, versus overlook. Are you leveraging citations and internal links in the best way possible?