What Does It Take to Execute an Effective Content Plan?
When the time comes to update your website and implement principles of SEO in order to increase your business’s reach, finding a starting place can be a daunting task. While SEO (search engine optimization) is relatively straightforward in concept, proper SEO success can prove to be somewhat tricky. Following these core SEO principles will improve your digital marketing strategy.
Target Audience Identification
One of the most critical aspects of your SEO strategy should be identifying who your target audience is. Without knowing who your business is clearly trying to target, every other aspect of your strategy is then open to possible misinterpretation. When implementing your SEO content strategy, it is essential to minimize misunderstandings, and this can be done by accurately identifying your customer base.
A big part of your SEO strategy should be looking at your existing customers and their data, then using that information to understand who your ideal audience is. The content on your business’s website should be aimed specifically at your target audience.
Your Ideal Customer
A significant reason that most businesses have content on their website is to attract customers that may not yet be aware or educated about the company. While content also helps with customer retention, many focus on using their content to bring new people into the mix. When you have content on your website that is designed to target your ideal customer, you connect with users who align with your brand identity. This, in turn, makes sales of your product or service more likely.
The Importance of Brand Identity
Take note of what words you use when describing your business. Do customers use the same words, or is your brand’s identity lacking clarity? It is valuable to have an accurate and up-to-date understanding of your business’s brand identity as you implement new SEO strategies on your website. As the first priority of a website is typically attracting customers, having site content that falls in line with your brand voice and identity is valuable.
Aligning the tone and voice with your content improves brand identity. Making this part of your content strategy can improve sales. Potential customers go from simply browsing your website to patrons spending money with your business.
Understanding Your Current Content
As online advertising continues to become more and more saturated, your target audience now has many more options to choose from when searching for products and services. Consumers have more information in front of them and more companies to research than ever before. This oversaturation on the web makes it that much more valuable to use principles of SEO for your online content.
Content editing is not always an easy task. So, keep in mind the aspects of your existing content that you want to keep and the other aspects that would be smart to re-work. New works must possess a voice consistent with your brand when creating new online content from scratch.
Utilization of Keyword Research
Keyword research is a vital piece of the SEO puzzle. After your target audience and ideal customers have been identified, it’s time to recognize what phrases and keywords will attract customers to your website. When starting keyword research, the first thing to keep in mind is the products and/or services that your business provides. These products/services will act as a starting point for your research. From there, utilize keyword research tools that will aid you in understanding how potential customers are searching for offerings online.
3 Major Aspects of Keyword Research
- Search Intent – Is the potential customer searching this keyword for research purposes or with the intent to purchase? As the goal of your web content is to generate sales with new customers, purchase intent is a crucial aspect of SEO principles that your keywords should be targeted towards.
- Volume – Using keywords in your content that are unlikely to have a high search volume will typically hinder desired results. By directing attention to keywords that <em>do</em> have higher search volumes, your site has a better chance of being noticed by potential customers.
- Difficulty – Keyword difficulty is essential in many cases, as potential customers may not be using keywords that are high in difficulty. When looking at possible keywords, keep in mind how common the words are and recognize that the more common the word, the more likely a site with very high domain authority is already using it in their SEO strategy.
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Creating Fully Optimized Content
The content creation process is a time for relationship development with potential clients and customers. In most cases, the first time that a potential customer interacts with your business at any level is through website content interaction. Because this “first meeting” is so likely to happen online, there is value in having cohesive content available to aid users no matter how far along they are in their search. Fully optimized site content will increase traffic for your business as long as your targeted keywords are consistently being searched.
Long-form content is less in demand as the web is already so saturated. When updating your site with SEO principles, focus on sharing your information in concise ways that still engage the searcher. Content diversification is helpful in this process. Examples of diverse content with a consistent voice would be text, photos, videos, drop-downs, PDFs, and interactive aspects.
Always remember to keep SEO principles at the forefront. In order for a potential customer to find a piece of content naturally, that content should follow the ranking algorithm of Google or any other search engine you would like your site to rank on. Use your keywords to the fullest potential, but be sure that the content remains logical and not unnecessarily wordy. Always use your main keywords in the “Three Kings” of your content page: the Title Tag, H1 (heading), and your site URL.
Monitoring Results and Keeping Information Recent
As the development and creation of content containing principles of SEO require significant amounts of both time and resources, it is imperative to track how successful your changes will be. Be sure to set clear key performance indicators for each website page that you implement SEO strategies on. These KPIs can be clicks, site traffic, conversations, or more.
Conversion rate optimization is a great tool to use when tracking the performance of multiple elements implemented within your content. Using this data to improve your site continuously is a best practice for the maximization of performance. Also, remember to keep your website up to date as other things about your business change, whether it relates to principles of SEO or not.
Let Helium SEO Help with Your SEO Content Strategy
An entire SEO content strategy can be a lot to handle on your own. Google’s algorithm is constantly changing, search engine optimization is more complex than people think, and SEO professionals can save you time. These are only a few of the reasons why it’s invaluable to hire an SEO consulting company.
If you’re looking to elevate your digital presence, the Helium SEO team can help you out. Get in touch with us to learn more.
FAQs
How do I create a content strategy in SEO?
A content strategy for proper search engine optimization starts with identifying your target audience and what keywords they’re searching for. From there, you create content that corresponds with your brand identity, aligns with Google’s ranking algorithm, and makes sense for potential customers. Once you have content on your website, you then should thoroughly and frequently track results.
Is content strategy part of SEO?
Any good SEO strategy revolves around a great content strategy. Search engine optimization isn’t simply about keyword stuffing or finding a lot of backlinks. Quality and AI-powered content will take your website to the next level in terms of SEO rankings and conversion rates.
What is included in a content strategy?
Content strategy includes planning, identifying, creating, implementing, and tracking all content a website has. As technology continues to evolve, a thorough content strategy becomes increasingly more important.
