Some of you are already familiar with my series, so if you are, go ahead and skip down to the “goals” section. If you aren’t, here’s the basic rundown; this is part three of a five-part series to explain the high-level basics of SEO, from start to finish, and in this piece we’ll cover ongoing content marketing. Previously, I covered how to build an SEO strategy and proper procedures for on-site optimization.
The Goals of Ongoing Content Marketing
Ongoing content marketing can apply to on-site or off-site content production, but for now, let’s just focus on ongoing on-site content—in short, your blog (though there are other forms of content you’ll want to consider). The main goals for ongoing content for SEO include:
Get more indexed pages in Google GOOGL +0.66%. Every new post you publish is going to serve as another indexed page in Google. This increases your virtual real estate, making you more likely to show up in search results for relevant queries.
Increase relevance for specific keywords and phrases. Ongoing content provides you with opportunities to optimize for new keywords and phrases, and solidify your relevance for your existing targets.
Increase domain and page authority. Good content attracts links, which pass authority and can increase both your domain and page authority (if you need a refresher on these concepts, check out this post).
Other benefits. Don’t forget that ongoing content has a host of other benefits—increasing conversions, improving retention, facilitating other marketing strategies—and I’m only focusing on the SEO benefits in this article. In practice, you’ll want to tweak your content strategy so it fits into all your other strategies simultaneously.
Best Practices
Now, let’s look at the main strategic considerations you’ll need to bear in mind when developing your content for SEO purposes. Books could be written about this subject, (and in fact, I have written an eBook on planning and launching a content marketing strategy), but what follows is a high-level 5-step overview of the content marketing process:
1. Choose your topic.
First, you need to be judicious when selecting your topics; this is one of the most important parts of the process. You need to choose topics that are relevant to your brand, but also specifically targeted to your niche audience—what do they want or need? If you don’t accomplish this, nobody will be searching for your post, and it won’t benefit you. Making matters even more complicated, you need to choose topics that your competitors haven’t covered sufficiently (so you’ll have an easier time ranking), and topics that can support your existing target keyword strategy.
SEO 101: Ongoing Content Marketing (Part 3 Of 5)
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