Introduction to Creating Effective Content
Creating effective content is crucial for achieving business goals, and it’s hard to communicate in a way that meets the audience’s needs. Google’s John Mueller and Martin Splitt discussed the problem of how to approach content for achieving business goals, the wisdom of setting expectations, and observed that it may not matter whether a site is optimized if the content is already achieving its intended results.
Getting the Content Right
Anyone can write, but it’s hard to communicate in a way that meets the audience’s needs. One thing SEOs often get wrong is content, which remains the most important ranking factor in modern search engines. A common mistake is publishing entire sentences that waste time. This happens when writers are trying to meet an arbitrary word count and providing context for the high volume keywords they want to rank for.
Martin Splitt started the discussion by asking how to go about writing content and shared his own experience writing content and getting it wrong because he was writing for himself and not for what the audience needs to read. Splitt shared that writing is easy to do, but difficult to do well, and that having a technical writer on the team can be a tremendous help. He also emphasized the importance of answering the fundamental questions that need to be answered before starting to write.
Understanding Your Audience
To create effective content, it’s essential to understand your audience and what they are looking for. Mueller and Splitt suggested asking existing customers what they were looking for and how they found the website. This can be as simple as asking questions like "How did you find me?", "What were you looking for?", "Where were you looking?", and "What brought you here?". This approach can help build a collection of different searches that people have done and can inform the content creation process.
Setting Reasonable Expectations
When it comes to optimizing for keyword phrases, it’s essential to set reasonable expectations. Mueller and Splitt emphasized that it’s not always about the difficulty of the phrases, but also about how relevant they are to the website. They suggested trying out different keyword phrases and seeing what comes up, and being brutally honest about how reasonable it is for the website to show up for those phrases.
The Importance of Performance Over Optimization
Mueller also downplayed the importance of whether a site is search optimized or not, saying that what’s important is if the site is performing as well as intended. If the site is already doing well and the business owner is happy, then it doesn’t matter if it’s properly optimized or not. This approach emphasizes the importance of focusing on the business goals and outcomes rather than just the optimization process.
Conclusion
Creating effective content is crucial for achieving business goals, and it requires understanding the audience, setting reasonable expectations, and focusing on performance over optimization. By following these principles and being mindful of the common mistakes that SEOs make, businesses can create content that meets the needs of their audience and helps them achieve their goals. Whether it’s through asking customers what they’re looking for or being brutally honest about keyword phrases, the key is to stay focused on the business outcomes and create content that drives results.