Monday 7 December 2015

Content is king

During a recent project I received a reminder that when it comes to SEO content is, and always will be, king.

There a numerous steps that one must take to achieve a great search ranking, some I discuss regularly are knowing your key words, optimizing your page titles and extensions and of course back links. All of these measures, though immensely valuable together are worthless without quality content.

An example I've found is that Google will outright ignore your page titles if they believe there to be little relevance to the page content. This is big, you're telling a search engine your content is about a specific topic but it's analysis says it's not. We can argue this point but it's never going to get us anywhere, if we want to rank in a search engine then we need to play by the search engines rules.

If you want to see how a search engine (in this case Google) views your content it's a very simple and often enlightening process. As with any SEO measures start out with knowing your key words - what words or phrases you want your site to rank for. Once you've got a clear idea on this log into webmaster tools and select your website. On the left hand menu there is an option entitled 'Google Index', click on that and you'll be presented with a sub menu, click on 'Content Keywords'.

This section will show you the Keywords on your site, ranked by significance. Often people will find their target Keywords aren't the top options.

What steps do you take?

1. Write quality content that includes your keywords regularly
2. See above

Quality content is content that actually serves a purpose, whether it describes your key words, tells you where to find services that relate to your keywords etc. Don't just type your keywords several times at the bottom of your page.

Another thing you have to do it keep language basic. I personally hate constantly reusing words in text, I prefer to use synonyms and other language to ensure variety - don't do this with your key words. This might take something away from the read-ability of your page but what you lose there you'll make up for in rankings. There's no point in having wonderfully crafted content if your target audience can't find it. If you do use synonyms then ensure that they are synonyms the search engine recognizes as being associated with your keywords.

The key thing to me to remember: although this might seem restrictive and you think search engines are technologically advanced, always remember that your website is essentially communicating with a robot before it communicates with your customer. Make sure the robot understands so that it give the opportunity to communicate with your customer.

Keep up the great content.

Shane
Direct Exposure Marketing
www.directexposuremarketing.com