In my previous post(Improving SEO with keyword research using Google Keyword Planner) we understood how to find the right keywordds, in this section, we’ll look more at going after the keywords that you’ve researched.
Sadly, a lot of people misunderstand the whole essence of keyword research and placement.
Even before Google rolled out their first Google Panda update in February 2011, the best search marketers knew that quality, valuable, and useful content should target a particular group of people.
Optimize for informational keywords and improve your search ranking by writing resourceful and detailed content while supplementing it with descriptive meta description and title tags.
This process attracts raving fans, gets your content shared on social media platforms, and garners relevant and high-authority links naturally.
If you want to write resourceful and detailed content, follow the guide below:
Use data-driven articles: According to ConversionXL, data-driven approach can increase your traffic,. Back up facts with accurate data so that people will see your content as authoritative and share it on social media, expanding your organic reach.
Other examples of data-driven content include:
The Science of Productivity [Video]
5 Things You’re Measuring Incorrectly with Digital Analytics and What To Do About It
7 Proven Strategies To Increase Your Blog’s Traffic By 206%
5 Things You’re Measuring Incorrectly with Digital Analytics and What To Do About It
7 Proven Strategies To Increase Your Blog’s Traffic By 206%
The resources below will help you to backup your content with accurate data:
Hubspot’s Ultimate List of Marketing Statistics
Freelance Statistics: The Freelance Economy in Numbers
38 Content Marketing Stats That Every Marketer Needs to Know
Marketing: 96 Amazing Social Media Statistics and Facts
Freelance Statistics: The Freelance Economy in Numbers
38 Content Marketing Stats That Every Marketer Needs to Know
Marketing: 96 Amazing Social Media Statistics and Facts
Techniques to try include experimenting and writing case studies for your audience or expanding on what others have done.
You can even micro-target content. For example, if a blogger experiments with niche marketing, take it a step further and try niche marketing with an aged domain name, then write it up.
Use storytelling: Stories can captivate your audience, evoke emotions, and improve your conversion rate.
Alibaba’s China story, which centered on their passion for trading, helped them grow into a multi-billion-dollar ecommerce company.
Here’s how to tell a story that captivates your audience:
Begin with something unique: Harvard Business School recommends that you start with a unique message that resonates with your audience. Ideally, this should connect with your audience’s questions or pain points.
Infuse your own experiences: It’s called a story for a good reason. Use your own experiences (whether good or bad) as part of the message. No fakery allowed!
Jon Morrow used this on-page SEO content technique to grow his blog to 1,740 loyal subscribers in just seven days. Here’s the post that helped him connect with his audience: How To Quit Your Job, Move To Paradise and Get Paid To Change The World.
Add a call-to-action (CTA): Every story must have an ending. Once you capture your reader’s’ attention, they will expect you to let them in on the solution. After all, your story is supposed to solve a problem, not nurture it.
Use a call-to-action link or button to lead people to your funnel and convert them. MatchOffice increased its conversion rate by 14.79% by changing its CTA copy.
Unbounce provides some more examples of actionable CTA buttons to replace your generic ones:
Write shareable headlines: Google has made a lot of changes to search rankings, but one element remains crucial: the headline.
If you write a shareable headline for your post, nothing can stop it from getting clicked, read, and shared by true fans.
Peep Laja of ConversionXL increased his conversion rate by changing the word “today” to “now” in a headline. It also helped him increase sales by 332%.
Headlines truly win the clicks.
Even if your web page is ranked at #1 in Google for page content, that doesn’t mean that you’ll get the most clicks.
On-page SEO gets you in the running but the title can convert impressions to clicks.
Let’s search for the term how to outsource. Note that the most clickable headline is in position #2.
The perfect example of a website that uses shareable headlines to boost conversion rate is Upworthy.
I’ve used Buzzsumo to analyze Upworthy’s headlines. Check out the amazing number of shares the first article has racked up.
If I wanted to craft a better headline for my own content, here’s what I’d do:
Add numbers: Upworthy’s post was shared over 1.6 million times on Facebook because it has a definite number. If the headline was “Americans are Completely Wrong About This Mind-Blowing Fact,” I’m sure that the total number of social media shares would be lower.
Here are some more examples. When I wrote this post, these headlines were ranked in the Google top 10 for their respective keywords. But, a simple tweak would result in a higher click-through rate.
Original headline:
SEO Basics For Optimizing Your Site
Let’s add some numbers:
- 6 SEO Basic Tips For Optimizing Your Site
- 12 SEO Basics You Need To Optimize Your Site
Original headline:
- Freelance Writing Tips For Stay-at-Home Moms
- Freelance Writing Jobs To Make Money
Let’s add some numbers
- 5 Freelance Writing Tips To Help Stay at Home Moms Make Money
- 10 Freelance Writing Jobs You Can Make Money From
Invoke curiosity: Curiosity will cause people to click your headline, but do it with caution and make sure that you deliver on the promise of your headline with quality content.
For example, if your title is:
Top 7 Body Building Secrets You Didn’t Know
Then make sure that you reveal the ‘7’ secrets, and ideally, what you reveal needs to be new or unique.
Here are a couple more examples of shareable headlines that invoke curiosity:
- Suggestions For When That Perfect Domain Name or Twitter Username is Taken
- Can I See Some ID is a Totally Reasonable Question, Except in 1 Situation
Create a multimedia experience: While regular blogging is important, don’t settle there.
Hone in on your keywords to learn the questions that brought your visitors to your site to begin with. Then use diverse types of content to answer those questions, like:
- Videos
- Guides
- Ebooks
- Infographics
- Webinars
- Demos
- Checklists
- Email series
- Animated GIFs
- Comics
- Podcasts
For a comprehensive list, see HubSpot’s 20 types of lead generation content, as well as 14 types of experimental content that you should try out.
Abolish duplicate content: Use tools like Copyscape, SiteLiner, and Screaming Frog to make sure you’re not repeating yourself.
While the occasional duplicate content won’t destroy your rankings, you’ll be doing yourself a favor by showing Google that each piece of content is original, relevant, and useful.
Once you have great on-page SEO content that includes informational and commercial keywords and tells a story that appeals to your audience, it’s time to build links the right way to improve Google rankings.
No comments:
Post a Comment