When you need a lot of content for your site and you need it done right, these three options usually come to mind:
You can do it yourself.
You can hire a writer.
You can hire a freelance SEO writing service.
Freelance SEO Writing: Finding the Best Option for You
The problem with the first option, though, is that even if you are the best writer in the world, if you are running a business, you just don’t have time to consistently write that much and still make it quality.
However, you notice that I didn’t list ‘don’t worry about creating content’ as an option. If there is anything that we can all agree on in the world of marketing, it is that you need an online presence, and you need great content on that site. Brafton created an awesome infographic illustrating this.
This means your best option is often going to be paying someone else to do the writing for you.
Hiring a Writer
When you hire a writer, you can take on a fulltime employee, use an individual freelancer, or contract through a freelance SEO writing service.
With the first two options, you take a risk of hiring someone without as many credentials as you can find through full services. Not only that, but they may not have as full of a range as a freelance service.
With a service, you have a wide range of experience, knowledgeable writers who can specialize in whatever type of writing you want done.
When you are looking for a service, though, you do not want to just go with the first one you run across.
Five Things You Should Look for in Your Best-Fit Freelance SEO Writing Service
When you are looking for a freelance service, make sure they meet at least these five important qualities.
1. They can adapt your necessary voice to fit your audience.
Great writers come up with an interesting, unique voice that really resonates with their readers. However, great freelance SEO writing services – or writer – actually adapts yours. Your voice becomes theirs.
When hiring a freelance writer, you need to find one that, instead of having their own voice, has an easily adaptable voice.
They should be writing for your audience in the tone that you would use to talk to your clients. In order to ensure they have this capability, ask for a diverse portfolio.
If a portfolio contains amazing pieces, but they are all of one style, then you cannot be assured that they are adaptably or not.
A freelance SEO writing service is usually good at ensuring this because they can choose one of their varied writers who best fit your need. While a single author can have many voices, think about how many voices you can choose from when you have many authors who each have many voices.
2. They keep up to date with all of the latest writing trends.
The current content marketing structure is likely to look a lot different than the content marketing world of even next year. That is why good writing is not enough.
When you look for a writer or service, make sure they keep up with the growing trends. There are many ways they can show you they do this.
They can become certified.
They can take trainings.
They can demonstrate their knowledge and prowess through their own research. However, if this is the way they learn, you might need to periodically check to make sure they are staying up to date.
Services are usually good at doing this because they often require their writers to update their training as new issues arise. Therefore, when you use a service, you can be more assured that they are familiar with all new and emerging trends – it is after all their business – as well as know that it is likely easier to get proof of this knowledge.
3. They are talented writers.
This one should go without saying, but I am mentioning it anyway. You have to make sure you hire a freelance SEO writing provider that actually knows how to write.
While this alone does not make a good freelance writer, it is the most important. No matter how well rounded they are, a freelancer without writing talent is not a freelancer you want to use.
Here, it might not matter as much if you use a freelance SEO writing service or an individual. However, at least with a service, if you do not like the writer who is assigned to your project, you have the freedom to request someone else.
4. They are talented writers in the area that you need them to be talented in.
Just as important as hiring a talented writer is hiring a writer that is skilled in the areas that you need them to be. Creative writing versus professional or technical writing versus copywriting versus niche writing and on and on all are vastly different.
If you need a professional writer, it is probably not a great idea to use a fully creative writer – even if that creative writer is an incredible creative writer.
You can determine if a writer is good and if they are good at what you need them to be able to do in a lot of ways.
Ask for referrals.
Check their portfolio or website.
Read reviews and testimonials.
Ask for a test article in order to see their merits.
While you can find an individual that meets your needs, just remember that here to a service might be a good idea. They have all good writers, but they have writers of varied natures. This way, you are more likely to get the writer you need.
5. They are all-encompassing.
Writing services are good at offering you a wide variety of services. When you use one, they do all the work for you.
Look for a service that works with you start to finish.
They consult with you and brainstorm what you need.
They create an editorial calendar.
They can even do keyword research for good SEO content from the ground up.
They write and post the content.
They do the social media for the content.
Final Thoughts on Freelance SEO Writing Services
Using a freelance service can save you time and make you money, which makes it well worth the price you pay the service. However, if you don’t get the right service, you will be paying for service without reaping any of the potential benefits.
If you are in the market for a freelance SEO writing service, check out our online Content Shop.
Whether it comes in the form of fashion, food, fitness, or content, original content (useful, unique, engaging) is important to consumers everywhere.
And 2015 has been a buzz of news about moves on the parts of major content platforms when it comes to providing original content.
Buffer is joining the ranks of Google, Facebook, and YouTube, providing clients with great, new content hot and fresh daily (just like your favorite baked goods).
These companies are focusing on reducing the amount of filler in their content and making things significantly more substantial (who wants an apple turnover that’s just apple jam?).
The Latest In Original Content Happenings: Bye-Bye, Buffer Suggestions
Since the content world is ever expanding, that means there will always be some new newsworthy things to share with you.
The latest on the content front is that Buffer is making a change to their content and will slowly be getting rid of their Suggestions panel.
The Buffer Suggestions panel was a great way for people to come up with content ideas based off of a few suggestions added to the panel. It wasn’t necessarily to give exact topics, but more so a pool of inspiration.
This might seem like something Buffer really should keep around, so what is their aim in getting rid of it?
Why is Buffer Retiring Its Suggestions Panel?
In their announcement linked above, Buffer states that the choice was to help bring about more natural and authentic content and shares.
As they point out, the Suggestions panel promoted sharing content over consuming content.
When it came to sharing content, a lot of people were sharing the suggestions instead of other content, which made Buffer feel like they were missing the mark.
While you won’t have to say adios just yet, it will be phased out until it no longer exists.
Never fear; there are plenty of other ways to gain inspiration and come up with excellent content ideas without the Suggestions feature.
Original Content is the Way of Content in 2015
Buffer isn’t the only one focusing on original content over generated, bland content that would get shared instead of consumed.
Who are some of the others making changes when it comes to content?
1. Facebook is Implementing a New Newsfeed and Long-Form Content Platform
Facebook is making changes to make people’s newsfeeds fit what the user wants to see. This is an often-discussed part of Facebook, and giving the users more power is important to the company.
The new newsfeed means that there is every chance that users aren’t going to see your advertisements, and if they do, they’ll just skip right over.
This is why creating excellent original content is vital to Facebook because it will be shared more. However, it won’t just be shared but it will also be consumed, which is what we all want for our content.
In addition to the newsfeed changes, Facebook is also redoing notes and creating a powerful native long-form content platform similar to Medium.
This gives you the ability to put your excellent original content directly on Facebook, making it easier for your clients to access.
Is this even beneficial? Well, Facebook’s native videos might just be the best example.
According to Brent Csutoras from Search Engine Journal, native videos reach 2 times the number of users as a 3rd party video, which brings in quite a bit more traffic for businesses.
Image Credit: Search Engine Journal
This means that the new long-form content platform is probably going to be just as successful. And both of these show just how important original content is.
2. Upworthy is Leaving Aggregated Content in the Dust
Upworthy is known for the random bits of content they’d find, throw out at will to users, and watch as the viral numbers spiked higher and higher.
They were the epitome of the viral world, and something many aspired to be like and for good reason.
It is looking out for the dreaded filler content, which isn’t something that really provides value to readers and users. Google wants all searchers to find great content, and that means doing away with ranking filler.
4. YouTube is Seeking to Launch an Original Content Effort by the Year’s End
Another website that is looking to remove filler content and push people to create original pieces is YouTube.
They’ve announced that they are working on an original content effort that they want to release by the end of the year. This is going to encompass a wide range of video and business types so if you’re on the channel, it’s time to focus on great original content.
All of these great websites are making wonderful changes. And, all you need to do is focus on making great and original content for your users and clients.
6 Ways You Can Create Original Content
“You keep talking about the importance of original content, but how do I create it?”
Great question; I’m glad you asked! Let’s take a look at a few tips to help you on the way to great content your clients will love.
1. Plan Your Content and Create an Editorial Calendar
Making sure you have a great pool of unique ideas can get overwhelming if you’re coming up with it on the spot.
Instead, make sure you create and plan out an editorial calendar to help keep you in the game, giving your clients excellent content.
Having a plan in place will help you create consistently great content and keep you from feeling bogged down when things start getting hectic.
2. Create Your Own Podcast Content
You can’t just focus on written content anymore. People love variety, and they love having access to various types of content.
One of the best and hottest ways to get out original content is to create a podcast. Creating a podcast isn’t all that difficult, and according to Carol Tice, guest blogger at ProBlogger, it can be an immense benefit to your marketing strategy.
3. Invite People to Become Guest Bloggers or Content Creators
Let’s face it; sometimes you simply cannot come up with great original ideas. You’ve watched all the Netflix shows, stared at your screen for hours, and nothing. Your brain betrays you.
What’s a business to do?
Hire a guest blogger. They can provide excellent new content for your blog, without you overly stressing about what you should write about next.
In fact, you can even hire professional copywriters to take over your blog, helping you create expert content that is 100% original.
4. Repurpose Old Content to Get More Traction
You already have a great wealth of information when it comes to creating original content and you can easily repurpose it.
At first, it might seem like “repurposing” goes against “original” but that isn’t so. In fact, you can get great original content in multiple formats, and get tons of mileage out of your posts.
Wordstream gives some excellent example of how to repurpose. You can turn your content into webinars, podcasts, videos, eBooks, and more.
Look at all that great new content.
5. Host an Interview On Your Blog or YouTube Channel
Interviews are awesome because they give you the chance to share new information from industry insiders and look excellent at the same time.
You can post a text interview on your blog, host one on a podcast, or even have a video interview.
Simply find the people you want to interview and reach out to them. You can also interview your employees, giving a great insight into the company.
6. Run a Case Study and Feature It
Case studies are excellent because they help you show how well your business is doing or looking into something specific within your industry.
When you run a case study, you’ve just created great original content that your clients will love to see.
Don’t Lose the Content Game – Create Original Content
It’s time we put more thought and investment to the type of content we produce. We all need to be ahead of the game when it comes to establishing our online presence.
And creating original content is the best place to start.
You launch a blog and create great content and then you wait anxiously, obsessively checking your blog stats and waiting to see a drastic boom in readers.
This process can get tiresome.
Your scenario could vary: maybe you’re dreaming of overnight fame or a life as a professional blogger. Maybe you just want someone, anyone really, to read the post you just spent four hours writing.
Whatever your reasoning may be, you’re not alone if your blog traffic is less than what you hoped it would be.
Many bloggers who start new sites expect a boom and get a trickle of traffic instead and, if you’re not careful, this drastic difference between expectation and reality can easily cause bloggers to become frustrated and disillusioned.
Most new bloggers struggle with this issue and, fortunately, there are many effective ways to boost your blog’s traffic.
Read on to learn more.
What Really Brings In Blog Traffic?
Blogs exist for different reasons, including but not limited to conveyance of information, building of community, encouragement of conversations and production of revenue. If your blog is getting a good deal of traffic, it’s a safe bet that your site is meeting the needs of the readers you’re targeting.
The 3 Pillars of Blog Traffic
People who read blogs often want the following things:
1. Interest
If you want people to visit your blog, you have to provide them with something interesting, thought provoking, helpful or exciting. Nobody is going to keep coming back to a site that features dull, dry, poorly written posts. Because of this, interest is one of the primary driving factors in creating blog traffic. It doesn’t matter at all who your target readers are as long as you seek to provide them with interesting content they can relate to.
2. Value
Does your content provide something of value to your readers? If not, this may be one of the reasons you’re not getting much blog traffic. Value can mean a variety of things depending upon who your readers are and what they want, but one of the easiest ways to increase blog traffic is to provide value in your content. How-to articles are valuable, VIP updates are valuable, coupons and promotions are valuable and high-quality, niche-related content is valuable. Readers who get something from a blog are far more likely to keep reading and to tell their friends about the page.
3. Consistency
Would you continue to visit a page that featured the same, boring post for six weeks? Most likely, the answer is “no” and you can bet your readers feel the same way. One of the best ways to boost your readership is to maintain a consistent web presence. Aim to add a new blog post at least once a week and consider sending out automated emails to your subscriber list when you do. Striving for fresh content is a great way to keep readers interested and expand your fan base quickly.
Ready? Get your pencils sharpened…
And Here Are 7 Key Steps to Boosting Your Blog Traffic
1) Create Great Content: Audit What You Have, & Ask Yourself Is it Great?
Although running a successful blog is about much more than simply writing well, crafting great content is by far the most effective way to expand your reader base and garner more blog traffic.
Crafting great content means using proper grammar, writing well and knowing who your audience is, but it also requires a mind for strategy. Being strategic in your blog-building efforts means that you’re seeking to meet a specific need for readers. Blogs are used by readers primarily for education and entertainment purposes and, either way, it’s important to give readers what they want.
If your blog is an educational platform, check out websites like Quora to see what readers like yours are curious about and then write posts that answer their questions. If your blog is an entertainment blog, watch the social and political climate for current events worth writing about or seek to provide humorous, relatable commentary about your niche-topic, like Brittany Gibbons does on her smash-hit parenting blog, Brittany Herself. By being hilarious and empathetic, Gibbons creates content people want to share and, as such, she’s made a name for herself in the blogging world.
Also, auditing what you have is a really good way your blog has what it takes to bring in traffic. It might be time to delete some fluff that may be too low quality, and could even be pushing people away.
While it’s great to have a high-quality blog, a blog that isn’t shared across social media is going to have a very difficult time gaining readers simply because it’s not hanging out the same place the readers are. Although people do many different things online, 28% of most people’s daily online time is spent on social networking sites, which means you better get thee to Facebook.
In order to better promote your content across social media platforms, it’s wise to take simple steps such as adding a “share” button to your blog, doing some analytics research in order to share content when your audience is most active online or adding an image to a blog post and sharing it on Twitter.
Additionally, it is important to be active on a few different social media sites, such as Facebook, Google+ and Twitter. This allows your readers to find you on their favorite social media site and interact with your content in the way that is easiest for them. Additionally, once you’ve begun to garner shares on social media sites, it’s important to keep up with and participate in the conversation in order to further increase your presence and reach. You can do this by commenting on other blogger’s comments, answering questions on Quora, joining niche-related forums, asking for comments or emails from readers and taking surveys.
3) Pay Attention to Your Design
Even if you have the best blog content is the world, nobody is going to read it if they can’t navigate your site. For this reason, it’s important to pay attention to blog design and ensure that your site is laid out in a way that offers a user-friendly experience.
Readers should be able to locate content quickly and easily (installing a search bar is a great way to facilitate this) and navigate their way around your page without stress. For individual blog posts, links should be a different color than the rest of the text and headlines should be offset using bolding and header fonts while big blocks of text should be broken into lists or small sub header sections.
The secret to building a beautiful blog site is that the template should be clean and simple, the layout should be uncluttered and easy to navigate, the home page should be one column and the overall feel should be unique and warm.
4) Optimize Your Blog for SEO
If you want to drive more traffic to your blog, this is one of the most important steps. Unfortunately, it’s also the step that most bloggers skip because it seems too difficult. Trust us, though, it’s not and skipping out on SEO only hinders your blog.
Currently, Google processes 3.5 billion search inquiries every day and that number is only rising. This immense amount of traffic can be a serious advantage to bloggers who properly optimize their blog content. Although SEO may seem scary on the surface, there are plenty of great guides to optimizing your content for SEO.
According to SEO-giant, Moz, “20% of the effort and tactics to make your content optimized for search engines will yield 80% of the value possible.” That said, go forth and don’t be afraid of SEO. Proper utilization can have a profound effect on the success of your blog.
5) Be Really Cool About Your Images
Images are a highly shareable form of visual content. Visual graphics, be they images, infographics or memes, resonate with the human brain much quicker than text-based content, evoking quicker response time and a greater connection. That said, blogs that feature images are much more likely to garner shares and attention than those that do not.
To increase the readership of your blog, begin including high-quality images in your posts. Be cool about it – don’t be the average joe.
This will instantly boost your blog’s shareability.
There are plenty of great images available through stock image sites like istockphoto.com and pairing this with the awesome Canva can get you some really amazing imagery for your blog.
6) Use Links
Everyone appreciates links – including but not limited to search engines, readers and other bloggers. When you’re writing a post, make an effort to include links back to your other blog posts as well as to external sources that have a high domain authority ranking.
These links work in several different ways: first of all, they make your text more visually interesting and help readers interact with and learn more about unfamiliar concepts or external sources. Secondly, links provide a shout-out to other high-quality blog sites, which builds kinship and provides you with valuable contacts for further blogging endeavors.
Other site owners can see your links to their sites via Google Alerts or a simple look at their blog site’s top referrers. When your links are high quality and you’re using great anchor text, links are a great way to earn points in the blogging community and inspire other bloggers to link to your site, as well, which provides both sites with more readers and a larger reach.
7) Embrace Guest Blogging
When it comes to increasing your blog’s traffic, guest blogging is a tactic that can’t be overlooked. Writing guest posts for other sites and accepting guest posts onto your site is a great way to build community, provide value to a new set of followers and build relationships with fellow bloggers.
When you’re just starting out, it can be tough to position yourself for guest blogs but, many times, it is as simple as reaching out to a blogger you admire and pitching a guest post. The worst that can happen is that the blogger will say no and, if this happens to be the case, don’t get discouraged.
Leverage your friends, family and personal connection for guest blogs and keep offering your writing skills to blogs you admire. At some point, you’ll land a few guest blogging opportunities and your traffic will most likely increase.
Building Blog Traffic: It’s Possible and You Can Do it!
Building blog traffic can seem like a difficult task but, truly, it comes down to a few simple skills that anyone can master. By ensuring you’re offering great content that is interesting, valuable and consistent, optimizing your blog content for social sharing and SEO, providing a great layout, adding images to your post, utilizing high-quality links and making an effort to give and receive guest blogging, you can be sure that your blog will see an uptick in traffic.
Although it may be a slow progression, it pays to avoid becoming discouraged. Blogging is not a get-rich-quick scheme and, as long as you’re creating great, reader-focused content, you’ll achieve blogging success.
Do you know just how powerful the Amazon Kindle e-book marketplace is today? How do you get started when it comes to being published in this powerful arena? Learn amazing stats about the Amazon Kindle world and how you can get started publishing a great Kindle e-book in our infographic. Full transcript below. Don’t forget – if you found this useful, we love shares, comments, and spreading the love! Transcript
Why & How To Publish a Book on Amazon Kindle (Infographic)
Did You Know? Crazy Stats About The Popularity of Kindle eBooks
30% of American adults read an eBook last year.
Over 50% of American adults own a Kindle.
5% of the books sold in the U.S. are Kindle eBooks.
Kindle is the most popular e-reader, beating both the iPad and the Nook.
Amazon has a 65% share in the eBook industry.
At least one quarter of the top 100 Kindle eBooks available on Amazon are published by Indie authors.
3% of Amazon’s 90 million unique users spend time shopping for a Kindle each month.
The Kindle Fire monopolizes a 14% share of the global tablet market.
Kindle is Amazon’s top selling product.
Users who subscribe to Kindle Unlimited spend more on books than those who do not.
The State of Amazon eBook Publishing
Let’s take a specific look at how Amazon dominates the eBook market.
Amazon is the largest paid search engine in the world.
Between 2008-2013, the number of indie published books went up 437%.
Women write twice as many indie best-selling eBooks than men.
Amazon now pays writer per page their readers turn.
Only 16% of Amazon’s best selling eBooks were published by large publishing houses.
Indie authors account for 40% of the income being paid to e-book authors.
31% of the books in Amazon’s Kindle store are self-published.
Non-fiction readers pay more for books than fiction readers.
4 Top Benefits of Publishing A Kindle eBook on Amazon
Traditional publishers offer a 15-20% royalty on net revenues. Amazon Kindle publishing offers a 35-70% royalty.
In the Kindle store, the shelf life of a book is forever. Put that in contrast to a shelf life of 30-60 days in a traditional store.
The Kindle store features more than 810,000 books.
Amazon does some of the promotion for you: the site will automatically refer your book to people searching for books in similar genres.
6 Major Tips For How To Publish a Book on Amazon Kindle
Invest in Kindle-ready, high-quality formatting. If you don’t know how to do this yourself, hire a professional or use a program like Calibre.
Don’t undersell (or oversell) yourself. The best-selling books on Kindle are priced from $2.99-$3.99.
Consider your genre. Self-published authors consistently outsell big publishing house authors in sci-fi/fantasy/mystery/thriller and romance genres.
Pay attention to word count. Bestselling eBooks typically weigh in at 100,000 words or higher.
Invest in a great cover. Even though this is an eBook, the cover is still one of the most important things customers are impressed by when deciding to purchase your eBook. Sites like 99 Designs or Crowdspring are great crowd-sourcing cover options. No matter what you chose, make sure you wind up with a .JPEG file of at least 200 pixels and a height/weight ratio of 1.6.
Promote Your eBook! Sites like AddictedToeBooks.com, AuthorMarketingClub.com and BooksOnTheKnob.org all offer free promotional platforms to help you get your book to the top.
What if you could take one great idea and turn it into dozens of even better blogs?
You actually can—with a process called serialization.
Content serialization, once a tool in the belt of novel-writers worldwide, has become a popular blogging tactic today that can help writers dig deeper and provide an astounding amount of value to their readers.
Content serialization is more than just drawing out an idea; it’s a particularly effective way to become an expert in your niche, draw more readers, promote your site and gain visibility.
What is Content Serialization?
Content serialization is essentially one large idea broken down into installments for easier readability and a higher level of mastery. “Content marketing”, for example, is a large topic. It would be impossible to cover everything that content marketing is and offers in one blog post and, as such, it’s an ideal topic for serialization.
A serialized run of blog posts with a focus on content marketing might look something like “12 Weeks to Outstanding Content Marketing” and would offer periodic blog posts diving deeper into progressively more challenging areas of the topic.
Serialization offers bloggers a way to get out of the habit of thinking of their content marketing strategy in terms of individual posts, which can inhibit creativity and contribute to poor content and very little site cohesion. Good short-term serialization can help content marketers shake up their strategy and dig deeper into topics their audience wants to know more about.
Why Serialize Content?
In the days of olde, bibliophiles used to hang out on shipping docks, anxiously awaiting the next serialized installment of a favorite book to arrive. Things have modernized since then, but serialization still has the power to create anticipation and keep people coming back for more.
By serializing content that is of interest to readers, content marketers can easily reap the following benefits:
More Readers: Like we said, serialization promotes anticipation and people will soon be looking out for the next post in the series. Additionally, since each post builds off of the post before it, serialization is an amazingly effective internal linking strategy that drives users to other portions of the blog.
More Creativity: Serializing your content forces you to dig into the cracks, so to speak, and can help your writing become much more creative. Additionally, since serialization requires you to plan each post ahead of time and come up with a considerable amount of content, it is likely that the process will also drive you to employ social media formats, such as video, podcasts or infographics, that you do not typically use. For this reason, serialization is a great way for bloggers that are “stuck” to get the creative juices flowing.
Increased Productivity: Since you’ll have to come up with regular and substantial posts, you’ll be forced to make the best possible use of each day’s writing time. This, in turn, promotes better writing and more effective communication.
Mastery of Knowledge: By far the most valuable benefit of serialization is that it allows bloggers to become niche experts. By digging into the nooks and crannies of a subject, writers can learn new things and disseminate information effectively without overloading their audience or saturating a single post with so much information that it’s virtually useless. Additionally, serialization allows you to build your online authority.
More Conversions: Serialized content provides value for people interested in learning more about a topic. When you provide value to readers, they reward you with increased interaction, subscriptions and purchases. Because of this, serialized content often results in increased conversions for your site. Regardless of what your site’s goal is – be it subscriptions, purchases, or shares – serialized content can definitely help you get there.
In addition to the above benefits, serialization can be a great option for bloggers who have not yet developed a content marketing strategy and are looking for ways to provide regular, high-quality content to their readers.
Choosing Which Content to Serialize
As a general rule, the content you serialized should be made up of your most high-potential topics. In other words, serialized topics should be those too broad, involved, detailed or important to be covered in a single post.
The genesis topic for serialized posts should be of great interest to your readers and broad enough to explore for a number of weeks without writing duplicate content or creating filler. Before you choose to serialize a topic, ask yourself these questions:
Will this information provide value to my readers?
Can I explore this topic in a unique way?
Could I write a book about this?
If the answer is “yes” to all of those questions, it’s likely that you’ve got a good candidate for serialization.
Keep in mind that it is not enough, however, to simply choose a topic that you find interesting. The topic also needs to serve a purpose and will be most successful if it meets an unmet need, offers a solution and is easy to structure.
As with any type of marketing, finding a gap in the market is one of the most important factors for success. If you choose to serialize a topic that’s been serialized hundreds of times before, it’s going to be difficult to be truly competitive in that market. Therefore, it’s important to choose a topic that addresses old questions in a new way or approaches a question that many people have an nobody is answering. By meeting an unmet need and providing unique solutions, you can ensure your content will stand out from the crowd.
How to Serialize Content
By far the easiest way to serialize content is to create a series of blog posts that spans no more than 12 weeks. This is enough time to adequately explore a topic but not so much that your readers begin to get bored. Regardless of what your topic is, the general structure of your serialized content should resemble the following:
Week 1 (First Post)
Week 1 will be the touch-point for your readers. That said, your first blog post should act like a value proposition. The post should introduce the series, explain its purpose to readers and help them understand exactly how it can help them, solve their problems, answer their questions or provide value in their lives.
To do this, your post needs to clearly outline what the weekly posts will cover. To make your outline compelling, write interesting headlines for each week that provide information about the problem or challenge being faced and how that individual post helps readers navigate around it.
Weeks 2-11 (Body Posts)
These posts should follow the outline you put forth in your initial post. Each post should adhere to a general length of your choosing and should offer a mixture of text and visuals or other media. In order to make each post as valuable as possible, be sure that you’re utilizing great blog-writing tactics like breaking up large bodies of text, utilizing headers and sub headers, incorporating images and writing magnetic titles.
Week 12 (Final Post in Series)
The final blog post in your series is almost as important as your first post. The final post should conclude the series by offering one final solution, nugget of information or hack, summarizing the information presented so far and outlining the importance of each week’s post.
The blog should end with a compelling call-to-action that directs readers toward whatever you want them to do, be it subscribing to your email list, purchasing your book or sharing your content. Additionally, the call-to-action could be used to launch a new product or promote an upcoming series.
By now, it’s likely that you will have gained considerably more readers and that those readers will be hungry for more of your content. Because of this, the end of a series is the ideal place to present a new product or ask your readers for subscriptions.
Content Serialization Success: The 4 Pillars
The entire point of content serialization is to provide in-depth, consistent value to readers and, when it’s done correctly, serialization can be an amazingly effective tactic for increasing a blog’s reach and catering to readers. In order for serialization to succeed, however, it must adhere to these 4 pillars:
Consistency: Serialization is nothing but a few haphazard blog posts if you don’t maintain a schedule. At the beginning of your series, choose one day a week when you’ll post your new installment. Be sure to tell your readers which day this is, as this will keep you accountable and also give your readers something to look forward to. The importance of having a regular blogging schedule cannot be oversold when it comes to serialization. Feel free to write additional posts during the week, but keep your series posts consistent and predictable.
Discovery: In order to be valuable, your serialized content needs to help your readers discover a new topic. When you bring a genuine excitement to your serialized content, that will translate to your readers and you’ll soon find yourself with a healthy following. Use your series to dig deeper into an interesting topic and disseminate that information to your readers. They’ll appreciate it, we promise.
Quality: Part of the purpose of running a series is to encourage bloggers to plan and develop a content marketing schedule. If you’re postponing your series post until the last minute and then writing sloppy content, you can bet it’s going to fail. Your readers should be able to expect a high-quality, informative post each week. When you deliver consistent quality, your series will be successful.
Accessibility: Regardless of who your target audience is, it’s important that each post you write is accessible to them. Don’t get too technical for beginners or too simple for people who already have some knowledge of the topic. Instead, ensure that your content is tailored to your readers and that each post in the series provides real, tangible value to your target audience.
The Case for Serialization
Serialization, when done well, is one of the best ways to boost your content marketing strategy and draw new readers to your site. Content serialization allows you to take one great idea or expansive topic and transform it into months of high-quality, original, shareable, authoritative posts, which is great for you and even better for your readers.
