You probably have encountered a lot of advice on what SEO friendly content is and what it’s not. With myriad SEO practitioners out there, there can be a mix of approaches. What is the one standard that works?
To answer this question, let us tell you what SEO friendly content IS NOT. You might find yourself scratching your head if not hitting it against the wall for the “mistakes” you’ve done in the past. Or, thanking us for helping you avoid these mistakes now. You’re welcome! Read on and find out.
WHAT IT’S NOT: SEO Content Is Programmed To Attract Search Spiders
One of the biggest mistakes people make is to actually pay a hefty sum of money to SEO agencies who say that because of the “technical aspect” of SEO writing, it commands a higher payment than other types of content writing.
This is SO not the case.
While it’s true that SEO writing commands a relatively higher payment, this is not because of the technical aspect of the article. On the contrary, it is because you have to be a great copywriter first then be good SEO writer next. This means you write copy that sells, and on top of that, make the article search-friendly.
See how other SEO “experts” got it completely reverse?
The technical aspect being referred to is the keyword density and placement. It simply says you have to use a search keyword in your articles, and this keyword is what people enter into Google to find you.
WHAT IT IS: When you commission a writer to work on an article around a particular keyword, the writer must write a topic about it, and not write about the keyword per se. For example, the keyword is “limousine service booking”. If the writer approaches the article based on the keyword, then she would end up thinking of how to make the keyword “limousine service booking” fit into any intelligible piece of article. This makes things very unnatural.
What should be done instead is to think of an idea, a theme, or an angle. For example, you can think of traveling, or luxurious ways to get around (the limousine is a luxury car after all).
In the case of our client, we wrote an article about traveling with young children and why limousine service booking takes 90% of the stress away!
Writing an article that is informative and relevant is the way to go. Think about it, people read these articles. They are primarily intended for human consumption instead of merely to attract crawlers to the site.
WHAT IT’S NOT: SEO Content Needs To Address A General Audience
This may sound harmless and partly true. Come to think of it, you really don’t know who is going to read your article in the worldwide web, right?
Not quite! Writing your article this way diminishes the potential it has to convert your web visitors into customers.
WHAT WORKS: The best SEO content is written with a conversational tone, and by visualizing an actual human being reading it. Therefore, you have to address an audience, feel their pain, and offer to solve their problem with the product or service you’re offering. What I just mentioned are qualities of great copywriting. On top of these, you then have to make your article meet Google guidelines for keyword use.
Make your article talk to the people who are reading it. Besides, content pieces that were written without an audience in mind will likely end up not read and therefore U-S-E-L-E-S-S!
So how does one write SEO friendly content? Check the guidelines below:
- Write it naturally. Write it like you would write a great article that will get read and loved by many! Write a powerful, attention-grabbing headline, fill up the body with factual information, and write an effective ending that leaves a lasting impact to your audience!
- Write relevant topics. You can get flagged by Google for twisting things around! When your article title says Cats In Japan, make sure you write about cats in Japan. Some marketers do flip marketing and write the keywords of their competitors so they can divert their competitors’ traffic to their site (for instance, I really am selling dog shampoo but my article title is cats in Japan just so I funnel the traffic for this keyword to my website). Google will flag your site for irrelevant content.
- Use anchor texts. Instead of “click here” you can maximize the effect of the link by using a keyword and linking it. For instance, I will write “Using the right dog shampoo is crucial to your dog’s health.” You got it – “dog shampoo” can be made into an anchor text. Ordinarily, other content writers would write, “For more information on dog shampoo click here” and put the link on “here.” Do people enter the word “here” on Google to find dog shampoo? Go figure.
- Use bullets! Cutting up chunks of information into bite sizes makes it easier for readers to digest it and for crawlers to index the keywords. So don’t write one whole page of information. Bite-size it! This will increase your conversion as well. Go ahead, give it a try.
- Write quality content. This is the criterion that will set you apart from the rest. This is also what Google puts a premium on. Write well researched content. Conduct interviews to obtain information from authoritative sources. In fact, this should make the job easier for the writer because she does not need to invent good stories, most of the time; good stories are all around us waiting to be found!
In summary, did this article sound like an SEO article purposefully to rank for the keyword “SEO friendly content”? Or did it sound natural to you? You be the judge!
