So you hear that content is king when it comes to SEO and that is true but what signifies "good" and "bad" content? Well I guess the first the question you must ask yourself is what is it that you are trying to accomplish? Are you trying to just get ranked or are you trying to get visitors to your site that will convert to sales? We are going to look at "good" content that will translate into sales. So what makes good content?
- Speaks to your audience – Good content will speak to and engage your audience. When somebody comes to your site you want them to be engaged and ideally they will bookmark your page. There is a reason that people are coming to your page and you want to provide them with what they are looking for.
- Will solve problems – Good content will solve the problem or problems that lead the potential customer to your site. Nobody wants to go to a site to find out the content on the site is useless. You wouldn't want to go to a car dealership to find out that the only thing they sell are hotdogs. The only reason you are going to go to a car dealership is to buy a car. Your website content needs to work the same way. Whoever your target is, your content needs to be able to solve their problems.
- Provides information – Again much like solving problems you want your website to provide useful information. Visitors to your site will leave right away if they go to a site and it has nothing to do with what they are looking for. For example if I searched Google for Web Designers in Phoenix AZ the site I go to better be that of a web designer in Phoenix, AZ.
Now that you know what good content is lets look at the bad content. We will be looking at things you must avoid when writing content for your current or future website. Remember some of these may get you a higher ranking but if the customer just stops in and leaves it doesn't matter. You want customers that will be converted into a sale.
- Keyword stuffed content – Don't write keyword stuffed content as this is not appealing to the user. Again this may help you in your ranking with Google but at the end of the day when a user goes to a website that is written strictly for the search engines they will likely leave. Work on writing the content for your potential customers and go from there.
- Be real not fake – Don't fake content just to get search results. Again same thing may help your search results but will be harmful to the overall success of your website.
Now you know what good and bad content is. Remember to write for your potential clients as they will be the one paying the bills for you not the search engines. What good is it to have your business ranked on the first page of Google if it converts zero sales? Work on providing great content for your readers and the customers will come and the ones that do will be likely to purchase something.