These days almost every business has a website. Trying to stand out in the online market place with so much competition takes effort and a good SEO strategy. A key component of that strategy is website content. Well written, relevant content will drive traffic to your site, engage visitors in the subject area and keep them coming back. The more traffic to your site, the higher it will rank on the search engines which, in turn, will drive even more traffic to your site.
Create a relevant, topical blog posts with engaging and persuasive content
The first stage is to research the kinds of subjects that might interest those people you’re trying to attract to your site. This comes down to knowing your market and might involve issues affecting your industry or the ‘pain points’ experienced by your customers.
Start your research by looking at relevant discussion forums or by surveying your market. You could also research the blog subjects your high performing competitors have on their sites, but take care not to copy any of their content or you could be infringing their copyright. More about copyright later.
Take a look at Google Trends for a list of the most searched for terms over the past year. You can drill down by topic, industry or geographic region and gain an insight in to a range of issues that are top of people’s minds, relevant to your industry or product.
Use images and videos in your blog posts
Using images and videos are rated highly by Google providing you have good descriptive tags. Tags enable anyone with access issues such as the blind to read a description of the picture. Even if it’s just a picture at the top of the blog.
Add links to other websites and internal links
Google considers links to other websites to be in the interest of the reader. It’s a way of enhancing a reader’s understanding of a topic and so will help you rank. Internal links will enable a reader to read up further on a subject written about in an earlier blog or find relevant information on another page of your website. It can also help the search engine bots index your other pages.
Use keywords and don’t over stuff
Choosing and including the right keywords is important if you want to rank when someone searches for them. Its worth spending the time to find the right keywords, starting with the Google search box. Other search engines could be researched also but in the UK and worldwide Google holds over 90% of the market share. In the US this figure is just below the 90% mark, so if Google lists a keyword as popular, you need to take note.
You will need to include your keyword a certain number of times depending on the length of your blog, but not too many. Including a keyword too many times is called keyword stuffing and can get you downgraded on Google. The rule of thumb is to include your keywords 1-2 times per 100 words.
Don’t infringe anyone else’s copyright
Don’t copy the content of other websites. It may be you are writing content on a similar subject, but your content should be original. Even copying small passages is plagiarism and could land you in hot water. If you want to quote or reference the content on other websites, credit your source. A simple link to the website should be enough in most cases. If you want to copy larger sections, ask the website owner for permission first.
What should you do if you believe your copyright has been infringed.
If you believe your copyright has been infringed the first step should always be to contact the website displaying your content. Copyright infringement is a serious offence and can carry anything from a fine to a prison sentence. The infringement may be accidental if the offender didn’t write the piece and was under the impression it was original content.
It may be you want your written material taken down immediately or you are happy to allow the use of your written material with proper acknowledgement and a backlink to your site. Backlinks are vital for the ranking of your site on Google and it will drive traffic from the offending website back to yours. If the owner of the offending website refuses to remove the content, credit you or possibly challenges your claim as the writer you have the option of taking legal action.
I would explain to the offending website owner you intend to proceed down a legal route before starting the action, which may be costly. Also be sure you have the evidence to back up your claim. This would involve evidence of the date you wrote the written material. Consider contacting the website’s hosting service or the domain registrar first. If you can present the evidence they may be able to take the website with your copyrighted material down for you.
And finally…
Content isn’t just blogs. But blogs are a vital part of website content. A blog enables your website to address issues that are relevant to your market and contains all the elements, such as links and keywords, needed for search engine optimisation. If you do your research and produce good copy, a regular blog could help you climb the search engine rankings.