Content Creation tips for businesses

August 21, 2020

One of the most important aspects of a website is the content. It’s what gives the visitor information about your business, the products you offer, and provides them some sort of value. Without content it would be very difficult to get traffic to your website. Google likes a website that is updated, that puts out quality content, and that provides value to their visitors. So do your visitors, they don’t want a website from the early 2000’s that hasn’t been updated in years. They want fresh professional looking websites that will give them valuable goods, services, and content.

Know your audience

Knowing your audience is half the battle of content creation because you already know who you’re trying to appeal to. The rest is just finding interesting topics that will draw them in and provide some sort of value. Content is really important for websites and plays a big role in drawing people in. In the age of social media it’s often shared on different platforms, seen by millions, and sent to friends with similar interests. 

It’s not enough to just slap something together just to have something fresh on your website. There needs to be a purpose to it in order for you to engage with not only your audience but curious people who stumble across it. There is so much content out there on the web, so it’s impossible to stand out if you’re not providing something meaningful. 

Make it scannable

Content that is easily digestible is key when it comes to appealing to an audience these days. There is so much information out there in the world that sometimes it can be overwhelming. You want to learn new things but at the same time can’t the writer just cut to the chase instead of drawing things out paragraph after long winded paragraph?

 
Your audience feels the same. They are interested in the topic you have supplied but they want to get in and out. This doesn’t mean that you can’t have varied lengths to the type of content you put out, it just means you need to be conscious of your audience. Don’t have sentences that seem to go on forever, and don’t have giant paragraph blocks that seem scary to tackle.

 
Instead break up your paragraphs and provide space so that your words and audience have room to breathe. This will make it look less daunting and easier to scan through. 

Layer content

 
Layering content is a great way to not only improve SEO but also get’s visitors who are already looking at your content to look at similar content you’ve published previously. This interlinking is a great way to get visitors to go down a rabbit hole and find new value in what you can provide to them.

 
Google really likes it when people take their time browsing your website. Hyperlinking phrases and keywords that are relevant to other content you have is a great way to keep visitors browsing for longer. As long as these links are relevant and not overused it can greatly help boost your websites SEO. Too many links can become daunting and look sloppy, so it’s key to limit how many you are using to the length of your content.

Don’t overstuff with keywords

 
It may seem like a smart idea to stuff content with as many keywords and buzzwords as you can. But this actually can have the opposite effect as what you were intending. Instead of bringing lots of traffic to your website, you could be flagged by Google’s crawling for overstuffing and be less likely to pop up in searches.

Instead of trying to fill up flashy keywords just write naturally and use the ones that are relevant to your topic. Randomly throwing them into your content isn’t going to do you any favors when the algorithm crawling your website is smart enough to understand the meaning of words. 

 
For example the topic if this blog is content creation, it’s not SEO content creation. If I were to throw “SEO content creation” and not have a reason for it to be there that would be stuffing. It serves no purpose to the main topic that I am discussing and does not provide value to the consumer. Now if one of my tips on good content creation happened to line up with how to make it SEO friendly, that would be a good way to include it.

Use different forms of media when applicable

 
Depending on your business there are a lot of different ways you can put out content. While the most common is a blog or news section, videos are extremely popular. Most businesses tend to ignore a lot of types of media because it doesn’t fit their idea of what they should be putting out. But there are many ways that businesses can take advantage of media, especially social media.

 
We are visual creatures, videos and images capture our attention in a way text can’t. Whether it’s a picture on your blog, or a video. Media is a great way to break up the monotony of a page and offer something more. Videos can be used by businesses for a variety of things. Tutorials, giving a tour, showing off a product. And we all know a picture is worth a thousand words, so just by adding some to a blog can elevate how it feels to the visitor.

Don’t plagiarize

 
This has been a basic rule we’ve learned since we were kids. But people still feel like they can take shortcuts when publishing online despite the fact that finding the original takes a simple search. Not only does plagiarism look bad when a visitor notices it, but search engines will also take notice of it. 

Because Google crawls websites they are able to recognize duplicated content and penalize you. Your rank and integrity can take a major hit because you just wanted to throw out some easy content without thinking of the consequences. It’s not even enough to modify the content slightly because they will be able to recognize the original.

 
Basically no matter where you are in life plagiarism is not worth the consequences. In the time it would take you to take someone’s content and make it different enough to pass by Google’s detection you could have made your own original piece. 

Keep things simple

 
A lot of the times we over complicate things because when things seem easy it feels off. We feel uncomfortable having things be short and simple because it feels like we didn’t put in enough effort. Content can be simple or it can be complicated and take time to understand. But one of the key factors in being successful in creating content is knowing your audience. Most audiences do not want complicated and difficult to understand.

 
They want something that is short, sweet, and to the point so they can get on with what they were doing. This is why short tutorial videos on YouTube are so popular. You get all the information you need in a short amount of time so you can do what you need to do. Instead of trying to read a complicated manual on how to do it online. If I had to chose between an easily digestible 15 minute video or a 15 page manual I would chose the video every time hands down.

So when creating content it’s important to remember that the simpler it is to understand the happier your readers are going to be. 

Optimize for action 

 
As businesses we have a purpose in creating content. We aren’t doing it because it makes us happy or we want to. We put out content to boost SEO, to get organic traffic, to get the attention of potential customers. But what happens after they are on your website looking at your content, what’s next? Calls to action.

Addess something that the customer has a need for and draw them in. Whether that is to make a purchase, sign up for emails, newsletters, or call to make an appointment. You’ve already done so much to get them onto your website, so you can’t forget that the main goal of them being there is for conversions.

The most important piece of advice regarding content creation you should take away is being consistent. Keep your website up to date and keep providing valuable content to your visitors. Not only will it help you gain loyal followers, but it will also improve your SEO.