Content creation is one of the most important aspects of any business. We have worked with many different businesses in various industries, and each business has asked us the same question.
Here is that million dollar question:
How do we produce high-quality content that people want to read on a consistent basis without it taking up all of our time?
Over the years we have found that it really isn't that difficult to produce high-quality content that people want to read -- you just have to figure out what your ideal people are looking to read and give them that.
We are going to go over some tips and guidelines on how to create high-quality content and how to really optimize your content marketing strategy to have good content without spending hours each day creating it.
First, let's start where most people go wrong.
Formatting
Creating content that is easy for someone to read is one of the most valuable pieces to incorporate into content.
For example, if you go to read a blog about a topic and the blog is one big mass of text. It doesn't have many breaks in the text or pictures. This could appear overwhelming and unappealing for someone to read and more than likely the reader wouldn't read the entire article or find what they were looking for.
When this happens to a reader, the chances of them returning to your website or blog is extremely low.
When formatting blogs, eBooks, infographics or any other content make sure to incorporate these tips below:
Add High-Quality Photos To Help Break Up Text
When creating any content, especially long-form content, it is important to add high-quality images every couple of paragraphs or when you feel like your wording is getting long. There are a couple of reasons why you should add images to content.
Did you know that 90% of the information that's transmitted to the brain is visuals, which are processed 60,000 times faster in the brain than text?
People absorb content in various ways -- some people understand the content better when they see visual images. The more ways you can show your content, the more likely your readers will understand and absorb the content or post.
The images in your content could be a diagram, chart, infographic, or a funny image that relates to the post.
Images make it easy to read and understand content, all while enhancing the readers' experience.
Also, using high-quality images in your content can help make your content shareable, especially on social media. It's always easier to share images, like infographics, than big blocks of text.
Here's an example where we added an image to help break up the wording in our blog post:
In the image below, we used a basic image saying influencer marketing. Every image you add to your content doesn't have to give facts or have overwhelming amounts of statistics or text, they can be simple high-quality images used to break up the text.
The images in your content could also be a call-to-action (CTA). We add CTA's to our blogs and newsletters every time we create content. This is a great way to break up text and also give your readers an opportunity to buy or become more involved in your business.
When adding CTA's to your posts, it is important to understand where your people are in the buyers journey. If you have tracking set up correctly, you will know exactly what you should offer or show your audience depending on where they are in the buyers journey.
Here's an example of a CTA:
The CTA we added above, provides our readers with an option to learn more about influencer marketing.
When adding a CTA to content, make sure the CTA you add is directly related to that particular blog, newsletter, eBook, etc.
Incorporate Line Breaks & Bullet Points
When trying to create engaging content for your readers, it is imperative that you have line breaks. Line breaks make it super easy for readers to go through content quickly.
Bullet points also help create readability and help get your points across quickly. Smaller portions of text are also easier for readers to digest and understand.
However, when using bullet points, make sure to keep them short and sweet. If you write long, complex bullet points that will defeat the purpose of writing bullet points. Bullet points and line break are meant to keep your readers moving through your copy and are a great way to give step-by-step instructions.
Bullet points are like mini-headlines, so keep them catchy, short and simple. Line breaks and bullet points help break up content into digestible chunks, so your readers are satisfied.
Include Headings Throughout Content
When creating high-quality content, headings help readers quickly scan and understand what your content is about. Headings are also a form of navigation for your content.
5 times as many people read your headline as they read the body copy.
Your headlines should be magnetic, drawing the reader in so they can’t resist reading your content.
If used correctly your headings can list your most valuable content.
These headings and/or subtitles include:
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Heading 1
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Heading 2
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Heading 3
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Heading 4
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Heading 5
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Heading 6
Headings also help search engines detect your posts' main topics -- which is super important when you are trying to get higher rankings in the search engine.
When using headings, try to use short-tail keywords and long-tail keywords to describe the next topic of your writing. Google looks for the most popular keywords, and if your content uses those keywords consistently, you are more likely to rank higher for that specific topic in the search engines.
Now, how do you know what are the best short and long-tail keywords to use?
Know What Your Target Audience Desires
When writing content for your business or brand, it's critical to know exactly what your ideal audience is searching for and know what they are interested in reading. The way to get people to read your content is not to create content that you think they want to read.
Until you have done some extensive research about your target audience, there is absolutely no point in creating content. Here are a few ideas and tools to help figure out what your target audience wants and needs.
Use Google To See What People Are Searching For
Here's and example of how Google can help you see what people are searching for. When you type a phrase or question into the search engine, it will provide you a drop down selection of the most searched questions.
The options Google lists are great ideas for fresh content and to see what people are most interested in reading. This is a great place to start if you aren't ready to pay for the top premium tools.
Here is another free way to see what people are typing into the search engines.
Once you type a phrase or question into the search engine, you will see a page of top results. At the bottom of that page, you will see searches that Google thinks are related to your content.
If you are unsure of what new topics to write about, this is a great place to start. You can also research and find data about your industry or niche by using Google.
If you search your industry, the search suggestions can give you ideas of what your target people are searching. These could be great content pieces to send to your people throughout the buyers journey.
Premium Tools For Research
If you want to dive in and use premium tools, we like to use ahrefs and MarketMuse.
These are also great tools to help repurpose old content.
Ahrefs
Ahrefs is the newest entry into the link research tool space. They use their own bot and their own index (which they state is based on information from a trillion website connections).
They also have alerts that will keep you notified of new & lost backlinks, web mentions, and keywords rankings.
Here is a general idea of what their website does:
Site Explorer
This tool you may easily analyze your site's backlinks profile and the sites of your competitors; this tool will come in handy if you want to explore most profitable keywords for organic and paid search.
Keywords Explorer
This tool will help you get relevant keyword ideas and traffic estimations.
The keywords explorer is extremely valuable. In the image below, you can see our top 5 blog posts that contain the top 5 organic keywords in the search engines.
For the long-tail keyword, "How much do Facebook ads cost," we rank #7 out of 2,780,000,000 Google results. To get those rankings we used ahrefs to help us find what short-tail keywords and long-tail keywords people were searching for in the search engines and incorporate those keywords into our blogs, infographics, posts, etc.
MarketMuse
Another platform we use for our content marketing strategy is MarketMuse.
MarketMuse uses AI to accelerate content planning, creation, and optimization. We are a team of content and AI veterans using machine learning to enable our clients to gain authority in their topical domain.
One of our favorite reasons to use MarketMuse is to use the platform to help guide us on what terms and keywords to add to our content.
For example, you can search specific topics in MarketMuse, and it will give you a list of terms to incorporate into your writing and even give you the number of times you should use those terms in your writing.
It will also give you a list of the top blogs or articles that rank highest in the search engines.
How cool is that?!
I put part of this blog into MarketMuse and added the screenshot below.
In the image above, the green highlighted terms are the suggested keywords that MarketMuse wanted you to add to your content (green means you successfully added them to your content). The more of those keywords you can add to your content the higher content score you will have.
This post has a content score of 23, but the target score is a 52.
By incorporating the related topics that are listed, the higher your content score will be and the better chance you have to rank higher in the search engines.
Create Engaging Content
Now that you have an idea of how to create great content, it's important to understand how your target audience will go through the buyers journey AND understand where they are in the buyers journey.
To learn more about the buyers journey, click to read "Understanding the Buyers Journey."
As you probably know, there is no such thing as too much content. Nobody wants to write blogs or create infographics and eBooks for no apparent reason.
The goal is to create content with a purpose.
So what does that mean? To create content with a purpose means to show a person a piece of content at the right time in the buyers journey. You also want to create content that will help nurture your target audience to encourage them to buy your product or service.
This may mean you have to create more content for specific times throughout the sales process. Let's say a person views your website for the first time and reads one of your blogs, but they don't take any action. Now is a great time to send them a similar article, eBook or infographic.
Here's another example, if someone visits your sales page but doesn't buy -- you could send them an email with a call-to-action to help give them that extra push to buy your product or services. Now, this doesn't mean be pushy, but it's a chance to give them a little more content or reasoning for why they should buy your product or service.
The Conclusion
No matter what type of content you create, make sure you create each piece with a purpose. It is always great to sit down at the beginning of every month and create a killer content marketing strategy -- list what topics you want to cover, how many blogs, infographics, eBooks, etc, you want to create for the month.
Set goals for your business and then knock those goals out of the park. If you follow the tips in this blog, you will see better results, see an increase in organic traffic going to your website, and notice more people engaging in your content.
It is important to share content across every platform -- this means to share your great content on social media, your website, and send out newsletters and emails every week. Be consistent, create good shit and watch your business really succeed.
If you would like to increase your impact or better your business we encourage you to check out DM Impact! It's our mentor and training community where you will work closely with our team to grow your audience using Digital Marketing!
