Content is crucial for multiple reasons then. Content is what Google uses to index and understand your site. Content is what brings people to your website and gives them a reason to stay there. And content is what will allow you to build loyal fans that stick with you.
Another reason that great content and repeat traffic are important is that they have a snowball effect.
When you start up your blog and write your first blog post, you will find that you probably get about ten views. This is depressing. It might be tempting to give up!
(Don’t worry: when your site does well, you will automatically get more viewers to that page. PLUS you can always re-share old content down the line.)
But the point is that of those ten people, three will come back. Now ten more people will discover your next post, and that means you have 13. Maybe one of those people will share your content to their Facebook page and you’ll get 20?
Next time you get 30, which gets boosted to 40. Meanwhile, SEO starts working its magic (only if your content is great and keeps people on your page), and that means that you’re going to have multiple “gateways” to your site where people are coming in. Over time, your site builds up momentum until it becomes unstoppable.
Great content is not only fantastic because it gives people a way to discover your site, it should also keep people ON your site. It should build trust (so they are more likely to buy), and it should be sharable which means that the content will bring in exponentially more visitors.
How to Write a Stunning SEO Article That Readers AND Google Will Love
If you’re setting out to write a stunning SEO article, then you may already have your wires somewhat crossed.
More specifically, setting out to write an ‘SEO article’ means you’re probably setting out with entirely the wrong objective. Writing an SEO article suggests that you are writing for Google first and for the visitor second. It probably means you’re going to try and lace your article with keyphrases and that you’re going to come up with a ‘clickbait’ title for Facebook.
But if you read Google’s guidelines carefully, that’s exactly what you’re not meant to do. Google’s advice is to write for the reader first and to forget about SEO entirely. Why? Because Google’s aim is to try and show its users the very highest quality content possible that is highly relevant to the topics they’re looking for. So if your content is high quality and focussed on a popular subject, then your goals will be aligned with Google’s and that means any future algorithm updates will benefit you rather than hinder you.
So that’s it? ‘Forget SEO’ is the best advice when it comes to writing great SEO articles?
Not quite. For starters, Google’s algorithm isn’t perfect. That means your content needs to look good in the right way so that Google will appraise it as so. And it also means that you can still get ahead by using your keyphrase in the right way.
The Perfect Length
One thing that will help you to write the perfect SEO article is to make sure your article is the right length. Ideally, it should be about 1,400-1,800 words. This is what a lot of research shows to be Google’s preferred length and it’s long enough that you can deliver some real high quality content to your reader. Less than that and you’ll be offering a truncated message rather than an in-depth overview of a subject matter. Google loves the latter and those types of articles perform very well.
How to Use Keywords
What’s more is that an 1,800 word article will allow you to include your keyphrase a few times without it looking obvious. If your article is 1,800 words, you can repeat your keyphrase five times and still be well under 1% density.
Another tip regarding your keywords is to write around the subject. Google isn’t just looking for a keyword ‘match’ any more – it now understands what those words mean and it wants to see you using other related language in your posts. That makes LSI optimization (latent semantic indexing) and long-tail keywords more important than ever.
Write naturally around the subject, use a good vocabulary and you should find that this happens naturally.
The Human Factor
Finally, remember that Google doesn’t care about you. All it cares about is your readers and whether it thinks they’ll enjoy your content.
And more and more, Google is now using human signals to decide this. Of particular import is how long people spend on your page and whether they click on your internal links. Are they reading your content and engaging with it?
Make sure that you aren’t driving your visitors away by keeping ads to a minimum, spacing out your content and using engaging language that will draw them in! The aim is to reduce your bounce rates which represent the number of people that leave your site almost immediately after visiting.
The most important way to reduce this metric is to make sure your content is engaging and interesting. That means it should have an emotional hook. If it is informational, it should provide information in a direct and engaging manner to really bring people in. If the content is entertaining, then it needs to be new and shocking/hilarious.
The worst kind of content you can make is content with these types of titles – How to get six pack abs, How to make money online, How to attract women.
Why? Because all these topics have been done to death. They attempt to speak to the biggest desires we all have, but they fall flat because they are generic. That’s why the best content should be written by someone who is a genuine expert and passionate about the topic. And that’s why YOU should have an extremely specific niche for your content.
Don’t try and compete with all the other sites in your niche – carve out your own little space by offering something new and truly exciting.
ALWAYS ask yourself: would you stop and click on that?
