So you’re looking to increase your search engine rankings, but you want to make sure that you’re still providing good content? That’s great. Those two things go hand in hand, and that’s truer now that it has ever been. Whether you write your own blog or have a custom writing or copywriting company that does it for you, it’s important to understand the things that really matter with SEO (and I’ll give you a hint: It isn’t just about keywords).
So here’s the thing: If you do your own writing, bookmark this article and refer to it before you send any more live copy out into the wild. If you pay copywriters to get the job done, add these points to your company’s content style guide and be certain they’re being followed at every point in your content creation.
1. Headlines Matter
We know that this is important from a content standpoint – the headline is what determines whether people will keep reading, after all – but what does it have to do with SEO?
Good rankings aren’t just based on the quality of the content. They are also contingent on how much time people spend on your pages and the number of pages they look at. A low bounce rate (read: a low number of people glancing at one page and clicking off your site) coupled with a longer duration of time spent on your page can go a long way toward getting those rankings.
You can even increase your rankings by creating split post blog articles (AKA paginated articles) that have unique segments requiring the user to click through to the next page. Write good segment headlines, and people will keep reading. When people keep reading, it decreases bounce. When you decrease bounce, it improves your rankings. Win, win, won.
2. Images Are a Big Deal
Images provide your content with a degree of diversity that is essential for rankings based on backlinks. One clever SEO strategy employed by the top bloggers is to create unique images, particularly infographics, and invite other bloggers to use them on their sites in exchange for a backlink. Credit where credit is due – it’s only polite.
3. Know When to No-Follow
This is a lesser-known but still very important aspect of SEO. It used to be that the more links there were out there back to your pages, the better your site ranked. Lots of companies actually paid copywriters to post to forums to create backlinks to their sites, and, for the most part, it worked.
The problem was that so many sites were approaching SEO from this angle that a lot of garbage content was ranking high in the search engines based almost solely on these kinds of links. This is why it’s important to be selective about the number of backlinks you use to seed your content and where they come from. If you’re getting lots of backlinks from sites that Google deems untrustworthy, you’ll ruin any hard work you’ve already done in SEO.
This is why it’s a good idea to limit your follow links and use your no-follow tags liberally. How do you do it? All you have to do is add the no-follow command to the AHREF tag in HTML, like so:
<a href=”http://www.website.com/” rel=”nofollow”>Link Text</a>
“But wait, don’t I want other sites to link back to me?” Yes, but you want the right sites to do it. Save your follow links for websites and blogs that already have good rankings themselves and which also align well with your brand message. One backlink from a trusted site is worth way more than the time and effort it takes to seed forums with links, and, like I mentioned, you’ll probably do your site more harm than good if you opt for the latter.
Oh, just one more note about links: never, ever buy backlinks. That’s the kiss of death. You’ve been warned.
4. Linking Out is a Great Idea
Creating links within your content always helps your SEO rankings but linking to authority sites and those that are trusted resources within their niche helps a lot. It may take a bit more work to find the right content to link to, but your rankings will improve faster if you go for quality over convenience. There may be a dozen easier places to find a link, but quite often the smaller blogs are mimicking what they’re finding on the big ones, so do some investigating and choose the best sources when linking out.
5. Longer Is Better
I’ve mentioned this before, so I won’t spend too much time on it here. Bottom line: You will always get better rankings when you opt for long-form copy. If you’re paying copywriters and want to keep your costs low, ask yourself this: How much does it really cost if it takes years to get the rankings you want?
Building good SEO is an ongoing process, and it can take a lot of time getting your site off the ground. Don’t stall the process by going the cheap route with your copy. Remember that in most cases, it will cost you the same to commission a 2,000-word article as it would to order four 500-word pieces, and that long-form article will likely boost your ratings faster. Same amount of money spent, less time to get to the top. You tell me which makes more sense…
So there you have it: Five highly effective ways to kick your SEO into high gear. Have a look at your existing copy and make an honest assessment of what needs changing, then take the appropriate action: Either refocus how you create your content or call in the pros and let us apply these secrets for you. Either way, you’ll have entered the fast lane in the development of your site’s SEO.