Brands are prioritizing content more than ever. For The Drum’s Content Marketing in Focus, Connor Cohen (SEO & content executive at The Drum) explores why SEO is such a key component of content and how it can be incorporated into the content strategy of brand.
Content marketing has seen significant growth as brands produce creative content strategies that drive traffic, leads and conversions, while also growing their brand in different countries, through different channels, on different platforms.
One of the main pillars of building a content marketing strategy for the future, is search engine optimization (SEO). SEO is crucial to a content marketing strategy as it helps people find your content on search engines, increasing its visibility.
Here we look at why SEO is important, how to combine it with your content strategy, and our top five tips for creating a solid SEO strategy in 2023.
What is SEO and why is it important?
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SEO is the process of optimizing a website to improve its ranking on Google and increase the quantity and quality of traffic from search engines. This process is multifaceted: it involves multiple elements such as technical audits, link building, keyword research, content optimization and more.
The goal of SEO is to improve the visibility of your site; therefore, it is most important for firms looking to increase the amount of traffic to their website or those who wish to position themselves as authoritative and trusted sources in their field or industry.
Why you should combine your content and SEO strategies
While SEO itself is an important distribution channel, it also plays a crucial role in improving the visibility of content on other channels. Here’s how some key elements of SEO can be incorporated into your overall content strategy:
Keyword research
Before you create content, you need to know how a user will find your content. Keyword research is critical to understanding what terms your target audience is searching for and how often they are searching for them.
Combining your SEO and content strategies can give you a list of keywords that you know your target audience is using to find similar content. You can then include the keywords from your research as hashtags on social media, in your video content descriptions, or in the copy of your long-form blog posts.
Search intent
Along with understanding which keywords are being used, incorporating SEO into your content strategy also allows you to determine the intent behind the keywords.
By understanding the user’s search intent, you can position your content to be the most relevant.
For example, for informative content such as blog posts, finding the most relevant keywords with the correct search intent can give you an advantage over less optimized content, since Google’s goal is to present the user with the most relevant result for the query.
Content format & structure
Creating content in an optimized format and structure is another reason you should incorporate SEO into your content strategy.
SEO not only gives you an idea of which content format is likely to yield the best results, eg, guide, review, video, etc., but also gives you a structural guideline to help you provide the best content experience and the -best possibility. of your content is showing.
5 key tips to creating a successful SEO content strategy in 2023
With 90% of marketers leveraging a content marketing plan, brands are finally starting to prioritize content marketing and spend more on content creation across a variety of channels and platforms . With more competition, brands will need to optimize their content to gain the greatest possible visibility. This is why SEO optimization is essential.
Here are five tips that brands should consider when creating their SEO content strategy and aim to get more eyes on their brand.
1. Create video content
There are a number of reasons why video rules content marketing and how it has become one of the most effective forms of content to engage your audience. Short form video is extremely effective on social media platforms and is one of the main ways people are consuming content. This is the reason why short form video has the best ROI compared to all other media formats and why social media platforms are focusing on the medium, investing heavily in it.
Consumers are using video platforms as both a source of education and entertainment, as well as search engines. Consequently, brands not only need to be creating video content that resonates with their target audience upon viewing but also need to prioritize SEO optimization to ensure their content is easily found amongst a sea of ‘ other videos.
2. Optimize for voice search
The introduction of Siri and other voice assistants has forced brands to adopt innovative strategies to take advantage of new opportunities. With 27% of the global online population using voice search on mobile and over 4 billion voice assistants in use on devices worldwide, brands that refuse to optimize their content for search with voice they are leaving a significant opportunity on the table.
There are several key aspects to voice search optimization, but one of the most important elements of SEO when optimizing for voice search is featured snippets; a search result displayed at the top of the search results page, specifically selected by Google as the best answer to the user’s query.
Optimizing for featured snippets is good SEO practice in general, but the increased importance of featured snippets for voice search means that brands that aren’t optimizing their content in this way are they lose an opportunity to make their content more visible in people’s homes and on the move.
3. Repurpose your content for different channels
Content reuse involves recycling content and transforming it for use on different channels. For example, turn a long video into short videos or snippets for social media channels. It is a creative way for brands to create new content and helps to reach different audiences who prefer different formats to consume media.
Other ideas for repurposing content include turning a blog post or article into a video or social media thread, transcribing podcasts into blog posts, turning presentations into infographics, etc. . Since there is an abundance of options, brands need to make sure they adapt the content. style for the channel they are looking to use.
Some best practices when reusing content include:
Prioritizing popular and evergreen content.
Time the release of repurposed content with trends, news, and events.
Use visuals to give your content the best chance of being shared.
4. Optimize your site and improve user experience (UX)
Creating a successful SEO content strategy is built on the fundamentals of SEO, so it is important to optimize your site.
Some of the most important SEO optimizations that brands should consider include:
Resulting from these optimizations are two main principles of SEO that ensure the user a good experience on your site and make the content as accessible as possible on mobile devices.
Mobile accounted for almost 60% of world traffic in the first half of 2022 and is expected to be more popular than desktop in the near future. With social media and entertainment becoming so mobile-focused, people are now consuming media on their mobile devices more than ever before. Therefore, as the use of mobile devices continues to grow, providing a seamless mobile experience will be crucial in 2023.
5. Keep up to date with Google’s algorithm updates
Google is constantly updating its algorithms to deliver the best results for a search query. Most of these updates are minor, but major updates can have a significant impact on SEO and content strategies.
Google’s ‘Helpful Content Update’, released in September 2022, is a prime example of this. Over the past few years, artificial intelligence (AI) content has been growing in popularity as it has allowed brands and writers to streamline the content development process. Google’s answer to this was the ‘Helpful Content Update’ designed to devalue automated content and prioritize content from people first.
We don’t know what algorithm updates Google has planned in the future, but make sure you stay up-to-date because it can help you understand why your content isn’t performing as you expected.
Key takeaways
Visit our Content Marketing in Focus hub for more content marketing news, insights and strategies.
What makes good SEO?
Write Unique and Relevant Meta Descriptions for Every Page One of the most important SEO tips that many people neglect is a well-crafted meta description. The meta description is the first section that people see when Google serves your page to search users.
What are the top 3 SEO strategies? 8 tips to build an effective SEO strategy in 2022
- Write for humans first and search engines second. …
- Use targeted keywords in all the right places. …
- Focus on user experience (UX)…
- Focus on building relevant links. …
- Content format for Featured Snippets. …
- Remove anything that slows down your site.
What are the 3 components of content strategy?
Industry experts will tell you that an effective content strategy must have three key elements to succeed: brand focus, user experience and content distribution.
What does a content strategy include? Content strategy focuses on the planning, creation, delivery and governance of content. Content not only includes the words on the page but also the images and multimedia that are used.
What are the three main purposes of content?
At the most basic levels, there are three goals or reasons for writing non-fiction content: to inform, to think, or to persuade (or sell). In modern times, the three are often combined – with factual explanations often laced with opinion – but, the three main reasons remain.
What is the main purpose of content?
The matrix shows the four main objectives of the content. The content should either entertain, educate, inspire or convince, depending on the stage of the funnel your buyers are in.
What is main purpose of Content marketing?
Content marketing is a marketing strategy used to attract, engage and retain an audience by creating and sharing relevant articles, videos, podcasts and other media. This approach establishes expertise, promotes brand awareness, and keeps your business in the forefront when it’s time to buy what you sell.
How many stages are there of SEO?
The 6 Stages of an SEO Content Strategy.
Is e-commerce marketing? What is e-commerce marketing? E-commerce marketing is the practice of using promotional tactics to drive traffic to your online store, convert that traffic into paying customers, and retain those customers after purchase.
What is e-commerce and how it is used in digital marketing?
Electronic commerce (e-commerce) is the buying and selling of goods and services, or the transmission of funds or data, over an electronic network, primarily the internet. These business transactions occur either as business to business (B2B), business to consumer (B2C), consumer to consumer or consumer to business.
What is the use of digital commerce?
Digital commerce allows customers to purchase goods and services through an interactive, self-service experience.
What is E business in digital marketing?
Electronic business (e-business) is the conduct of online business processes over the web, the internet, the extranet or a combination thereof.
What is e-marketing and e business?
E-commerce marketing is the act of driving awareness and action towards a business that sells its product or service electronically. E-commerce marketers can use social media, digital content, search engines, and email campaigns to attract visitors and facilitate online purchases.
What is e-business give one example?
Examples include online reverse auctions and airline ticket websites such as Priceline and Expedia. Consumer-to-consumer (C2C) model. Consumers are buyers and sellers through online marketplaces facilitated by third parties such as eBay.
What is meant by e-business?
E-Business (electronic business) is any process that a business organization carries out over a computer-mediated network. Business organizations include any for-profit, governmental or non-profit entity. Their processes include production, customer and internal or management focused business processes.
What is the difference between e-business and e Marketing?
| E-COMMERCE | E-BUSINESS |
|---|---|
| Limited transactions | Transactions are not limited |
| It involves the use of only one website | Multiple websites and CRMs, ERPs connecting different business processes are used |
| Compulsory use of the internet | The Internet, Intranet or Extranet are used |
What is E advertising in e-commerce?
E-commerce advertising is a method of creating top-of-funnel awareness of an online store to generate website traffic and new customer acquisition through paid placements on third-party platforms, or by targeting new prospects or retargeting those who have shown interest.
What is E advertising examples?
Social Media Channels Using free social media accounts, you can advertise your products and services with stories, videos and pictures. Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram are just a few of the options you have. You can also purchase Facebook advertising campaigns to reach larger audiences.
What is e advertising and e branding?
Published February 10, 2022. Follow. E-branding is everything that appeals to the reputation of the brand on the internet. So it is the policy of a brand to promote it to consumers online.
What is meant by e advertising?
Online advertising, also known as online marketing, Internet advertising, digital advertising or web advertising, is a form of marketing and advertising that uses the Internet to promote products and services to audiences and users. of the platform.
Why is SEO important for business?
SEO has great benefits for websites and can lead to exponential growth in the long run. Brands that invest in SEO can build credibility and trust with audiences, making it a central part of a digital marketing strategy.
What is SEO &; Why is it important? SEO stands for search engine optimization—the practice of increasing the quantity and quality of traffic to your website through organic search engine results. The ultimate goal of SEO for business is to generate organic traffic – searchers who click through to your website from a search engine results page (SERP).
How does SEO affects your business?
How does SEO impact businesses? Search engine optimization affects businesses by improving your ranking in relevant search results. With a high enough ranking, like on page one, your company can use SEO to bring qualified traffic to your site, which can lead to more leads, sales and revenue for your business.
How SEO affects your business?
Helps You Rank Better In Local Searches And almost 80% of local searches on mobile lead to conversions. Local SEO strategies can help you attract these searchers who are often ready to buy. The first step to get started with local SEO strategies is creating a Google My Business account.
Why does SEO matter for business?
A strong SEO strategy allows brands to place their website and their content high on the SERPs for relevant keywords so that they can attract the attention of prospective customers and bring them into their sales funnel.
How does SEO affect customers?
Good SEO Also Means Better User Experience Customers in the modern world want to find exact answers to their questions. An example of this is the results page on Google which acts more like an answering machine that answers questions directly on SERPs (search engine results pages) for users.