You may have heard the phrase “Content is King”; we used to use this phrase religiously when speaking to clients about SEO campaigns. But all that changed about a decade ago. Today, “Content is the pawn, results are King.”
Boom. #MindBlown. All these years, we’ve been focusing on the wrong thing. We thought, just keep writing, just keep writing. Content is king, right? Not anymore. Not in today’s world of SEO; search engines read more than just content, they can read a searcher's intent.
Yes, you heard us right. Search engines can read your mind!
OK, maybe that is a little far-fetched, but based on what a person searches (and what they’ve searched in the past), Google et al. can take that search term and match it with content that is most relevant. This leads us to the first key to ranking your website content.
1. Stop writing content for search engines, write for your customer
You need to think like your customer and create solution-oriented content that will help your customer solve their problem. Think about yourself for a minute: when you have a problem, a need or you are just simply looking for a new red pair of sneakers, where do you turn? I’m betting 85% of you thought Google has the answer.
If you searched, “I’m looking for a red pair of Nikes”, what would Google serve you with? To say the least, you’d have a few options. Thing is, you want a red pair of Nike Huaraches in Size 11. Would you still type in “a red pair of Nikes”? Probably not.
Let’s apply that logic to your customers. How would your customer search for the solutions you provide? More importantly, how can you discover those search results? Enter key number two.
2. Research. You need to research keywords and competitors
When we say research keywords, we do not mean single- or two-word keyword phrases. We are talking about long-tail keyword phrases. Let’s say you provide custom-tailored HD cameras for work-class ROVs. If you create content optimized for the keyword “HD Cameras”, how do you think your content will rank amongst the competition?
To answer that question, you need to identify if the search yields the results your customer is looking for. Chances are, it will not. Give it a try, search “HD Cameras”. You’ll see home security cameras, go pros, Sony handycams, and a plethora of options not related to your ideal customer.
Those results provoke another question. Can I compete with the companies in those search results? Most likely, a resounding no. This isn’t to be negative, it’s simply the truth. So, where’s the light at the end of this dark tunnel? Let’s get back to thinking like our customers. Would your ideal customer search for “HD Cameras” if they have a work-class ROV? Simple answer, no. Continue your research until you find search terms that meet your customer’s needs and build from there. For example, let’s try “HD Video System for Work-Class ROVs”. What were the results? See the difference?
Continue your research along these lines and keep track. This is a great way to identify potential keyword phrases that can be used to optimize your content and build an editorial calendar for your blog posts and social media efforts. I’m sure you are thinking, this sounds like a lot of work. Unfortunately, it is. However, there are tools out there to help you in this endeavor, some of which we use for our clientele. Here’s a list of some great options.
- Google Keyword Planner (Free)
- Ubersuggest (Limited Free & Paid)
- SEMrush (Limited Free & Paid)
- Keyword Explorer (Limited Free & Paid)
- KW Finder (Limited Free & Paid)
These tools can help you reduce the amount of time and effort it will take to find the “right” keywords for your content strategy. We’re going to insert a shameless plug here, there is another option; TSC Strategic. This is what we do. We help our clients reach their ideal customer and we have industry-related distribution channels to help expand that reach even further. OK, back to our regular scheduled programming.
Let’s move on to key number three.
3. Optimize your content for search & social media
This topic can easily get us into the weeds. Google uses more than 200 different factors when ranking a webpage. Some of the most important elements have nothing to do with the content at all, but that’s for another day.
Here are several key optimizations that should be implemented on every webpage. Take a look.
- Hero image - Main image. Must have if you want your content sharable on social media.
- Alt Tags - Short description of the image(s) used on the page. This includes your hero image. This helps with accessibility as well.
- H1 Tag - This is the title your reader will see on the website. Needs to grab attention.
- Page Title - This is the title that appears in search results. On Google, it’s the blue link. This title should have the keyword phrase you are trying to rank for.
- Meta Description - Short synopsis of the page, this should also include your main keyword phrase. The meta description is usually between 160 – 320 characters.
- H2, H3, H4 headers - These are key subheadings within your content to help the reader identify important sections. These should include relative keywords as well.
- Internal and external links - Relevant keyword phrases linked to other pages of important content on or off your website. Pro tip: When adding external links, be sure to add the rel=nofollow tag to your hyperlink.
- Keyword Tags - List of relative keywords. While Google claims to ignore the keyword tag, we still see a benefit against pages without keyword tags. Go figure.
The above list covers the key optimization elements. However, there are a few more that fall into the technical SEO realm. These are call snippets, schema data, and social media tags. These elements are added on the “code” side of the website. Sounds complicated, and yes, it can be, but most website CMS’s like Joomla or WordPress have tools that can be installed to automatically insert the necessary tags.
For Joomla powered websites, which is the primary CMS we use for corporate websites, we utilize a tool called Sh404sef. Sh404sef is the swiss-army knife of SEO management tools for Joomla. You can manage your URLs, page titles, meta tags, social media tags, redirects, and more.
For WordPress sites, there is an equally powerful tool called Yoast. One nice thing about Yoast, they have a free edition that will meet most of your needs. However, if you write a lot of content, and have the need to redirect old URLs it would be worth investing in Yoast premium.
Great information about ranking my website content, now what?
While this blog post brings to light 3 key elements for ranking your website content, unfortunately, this is no guarantee Google will rank your content on page 1. Google is for the searcher, always. Stay focused on writing helpful content for your customer, and always optimize that content to the best of your ability. SEO is a long-term strategy; you WILL NOT see instant results. Instant results would require a well-executed PPC (Pay-per-click) campaign.
Additionally, if you plan to hire a marketing agency to help you, stay far away from the ones that promise you page 1 results. That’s a clear red flag and they are most-likely engaging in tactics we refer to as Blackhat SEO, this method of hacking search results can get your site penalized and cost you days, weeks or months of your site not showing in search results.
We hope this blog post was helpful, we encourage you to check out some of the free tools we listed and start exploring. If you run into a roadblock, feel free to reach out for a free consultation. We are here to help!