by Richard Rowell, Write W.A.V.E. Media Staff
In recent years, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) has been experiencing a slow, but steady transition from focusing on simply optimizing website for search to the actual user experience. It's a good trend, honestly, because search engine rankings are certainly not everything. What good is a search engine ranking if people click to your site and don't bother to read your content?
Of course, you're not only looking to get visitors to read content. You're hopefully looking to convert some into subscribers. This is why it's so important to have the very best searcher experience possible.
Understanding How Your Audience Finds You
The best way to know how to get visitors to your sites is by understanding the many different ways that potential readers and subscribers will find you. These days, you have social media accounting for a great deal of website referral traffic. This is why it has become so paramount to have those social outposts on Facebook and Twitter (at the very least) to get your message out there. By seeing what sort of people regularly follow your blog on Facebook and Twitter, you get more of an idea of what sort of content they are looking for.
The Importance of Having Your Own Domain
Also, preferably, while it's okay to have your blog on a free platform, it's better to put it on your own domain. Many web-hosts allow people to install Wordpress for free on their own websites. There’s also Weebly who offers free to extremely reasonably priced web hosting with one of the best do-it-yourself website builders out there. Then all you have to do is post content regularly – at the very least once per week. But it’s not just about writing and sharing content that people want. You want to make sure that your incoming search traffic – and social media traffic – is really getting what they’re looking for.
What is Relevant Content?
So what do you post to your blog? You need to make your site more relevant in the eyes (or rather, to the spiders) of search engines. But you also need to make it more relevant in the eyes of those who may end up clicking on your website link in the search engine results pages.
The first part is easy: Do you answer their questions and/or do you fulfill their needs? Here's the part that isn't quite so easy: how do you make them feel? It's a proven fact that if you make people feel better by easing their concerns or solving a nagging problem that they may have, they're a lot more likely to remember you for that. Emotional value is everything for human beings. Since 99% of your readers will likely be human beings, that’s who you have to write for.
Keyword Strategies are Important, But They Aren't Everything
Obviously, keyword strategies are still incredibly important. But you have to constantly build content on your website not only surrounding these keywords, but establishing presence of authority around them. You need to become a trustworthy personality who is knowledgeable about your site’s subjects. This is known as becoming a "thought leader."
You may not think of yourself a thought leader in your chosen field, but you may be surprised how much you can be once you start answering the questions that you may get every day on your blog. It may sound simple, but if there's a need, and you fulfill that need, you might just find that a blog post a day keeps the searchers coming your way. Even if you can't blog every day, it's important to at least remain consistent, and keep an open dialogue with your audience.
Consistency of Content is Key, But It's OK to Switch Things Up
Also, while it’s important to be consistent in the type of content that you post, if your strategy isn’t working, be sure to switch things up. You don’t want to look like a robot – even when things are working, switch things up for variety. People love surprises. Even a successful website will introduce a guest blogger or take a very new direction for a day or two just to offer some new perspective. Recycling old content by taking a completely different angle does this well. It’s fine to repurpose and recycle content, and people will appreciate your innovativeness often without really realizing it.
The purpose of any blog is to provide information, advice and assistance to those people who are interesting in what you have to share. Every blog should strive to eventually build a community. You want people from all walks of life and many different fields and industries who can share common interests and experiences around your content.
Building this community makes it clear to searchers and social media surfers that you are doing your best to offer a great user experience. Content creation doesn't always have to be cut and dry, and most of the time, you simply can't be. You've got to be there for people. It's the only way to win the minds (and hopefully the hearts) of your potential fans.
Of course, you're not only looking to get visitors to read content. You're hopefully looking to convert some into subscribers. This is why it's so important to have the very best searcher experience possible.
Understanding How Your Audience Finds You
The best way to know how to get visitors to your sites is by understanding the many different ways that potential readers and subscribers will find you. These days, you have social media accounting for a great deal of website referral traffic. This is why it has become so paramount to have those social outposts on Facebook and Twitter (at the very least) to get your message out there. By seeing what sort of people regularly follow your blog on Facebook and Twitter, you get more of an idea of what sort of content they are looking for.
The Importance of Having Your Own Domain
Also, preferably, while it's okay to have your blog on a free platform, it's better to put it on your own domain. Many web-hosts allow people to install Wordpress for free on their own websites. There’s also Weebly who offers free to extremely reasonably priced web hosting with one of the best do-it-yourself website builders out there. Then all you have to do is post content regularly – at the very least once per week. But it’s not just about writing and sharing content that people want. You want to make sure that your incoming search traffic – and social media traffic – is really getting what they’re looking for.
What is Relevant Content?
So what do you post to your blog? You need to make your site more relevant in the eyes (or rather, to the spiders) of search engines. But you also need to make it more relevant in the eyes of those who may end up clicking on your website link in the search engine results pages.
The first part is easy: Do you answer their questions and/or do you fulfill their needs? Here's the part that isn't quite so easy: how do you make them feel? It's a proven fact that if you make people feel better by easing their concerns or solving a nagging problem that they may have, they're a lot more likely to remember you for that. Emotional value is everything for human beings. Since 99% of your readers will likely be human beings, that’s who you have to write for.
Keyword Strategies are Important, But They Aren't Everything
Obviously, keyword strategies are still incredibly important. But you have to constantly build content on your website not only surrounding these keywords, but establishing presence of authority around them. You need to become a trustworthy personality who is knowledgeable about your site’s subjects. This is known as becoming a "thought leader."
You may not think of yourself a thought leader in your chosen field, but you may be surprised how much you can be once you start answering the questions that you may get every day on your blog. It may sound simple, but if there's a need, and you fulfill that need, you might just find that a blog post a day keeps the searchers coming your way. Even if you can't blog every day, it's important to at least remain consistent, and keep an open dialogue with your audience.
Consistency of Content is Key, But It's OK to Switch Things Up
Also, while it’s important to be consistent in the type of content that you post, if your strategy isn’t working, be sure to switch things up. You don’t want to look like a robot – even when things are working, switch things up for variety. People love surprises. Even a successful website will introduce a guest blogger or take a very new direction for a day or two just to offer some new perspective. Recycling old content by taking a completely different angle does this well. It’s fine to repurpose and recycle content, and people will appreciate your innovativeness often without really realizing it.
The purpose of any blog is to provide information, advice and assistance to those people who are interesting in what you have to share. Every blog should strive to eventually build a community. You want people from all walks of life and many different fields and industries who can share common interests and experiences around your content.
Building this community makes it clear to searchers and social media surfers that you are doing your best to offer a great user experience. Content creation doesn't always have to be cut and dry, and most of the time, you simply can't be. You've got to be there for people. It's the only way to win the minds (and hopefully the hearts) of your potential fans.
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