• Tweet

• Tweet

You may have noticed that having a website means having content.  Content is (loosely speaking) the text and information that is available (either paid or unpaid) to visitors.

If you think of a website as a car, content would be the fuel that makes the engine run.  Without gas, a car typically doesn’t do much of anything.  The same thing happens without good, quality, unique content.

Thinks You May Want To Know About Creating Content

There are a few things you may want to know.  First, your content isn’t viewed just by human visitors.  In fact, your content will most likely be read first by a search engine spider before it is ever found in the search results for a visitor. You may want to know that you can “optimize” your content for search engines.

Search Engine Optimization (or SEO) means that your webpages are using words in a way that is considered “keyword focused.”  In other words, consider this page.  In the title of the page is the word “Content.”  In the title of this section are the words “Creating Content.”  And, within the paragraphs themselves, I use the same word or related words also.

Search engines are programmed to find keyword focused content or pages on websites.  If a webpage isn’t focused on a specific phrase or keyword, then the search engine will not know what your page is about and where to put it in their directory.

If someone searches for “creating content,” the search engine will provide the most likely pages that relate to the keywords searched.

Next, consider what type of content your visitors want to read.  Keeping content focused on one topic or subject will provide what is generally called a “niche.”  Consider a golfer if you will.

A golfer visits a website looking for a perfect golf club.  If the website starts talking about football, okay.  Maybe that could be considered a related topic if the website is for sport fans.  If it is related, the website most likely will sell golf clubs and football gear among many other sporting goods.

If the website is about golf and there are randomly unrelated pages talking about the most recent Super Bowl or the latest trend on Twitter, this will distract the visitor and most likely they will go somewhere else and find someone who “knows what they’re talking about.”

In other words, when you write content, make sure you are using examples and writing in a way that relates to your readers.  If you want to talk about football, talk about football and all things related to football.

No matter what content you write, make sure it is (1) related to your niche and (2) beneficial and interesting to your readers.

Finally, consider your passion.  If you aren’t interested in writing it, what makes you think that someone will be interested in reading it.  If you don’t enjoy reading it yourself, do you think a visitor will stay on that web page long enough to read the entire thing? You may have heard the “K.I.S.” theory.

Keep

It

Simple

The easier it is for your readers to get to the information they want, the more likely your visitor will stay long enough to read what you’ve got to say.

Recipe for Successfully Adding Content

Ingredients:

1) Niche

2) Interesting topics

3) Time

4) Keywords

Instructions:

1) Select a niche you have an interest about.  If you aren’t going to write at least 30 pages of information about that topic, it most likely won’t be a successful niche for you.

2) Pick a related topic in your niche that you think is interesting.  For example, on a golfing website, talking about why a 9 Iron is better than a driver is a wonderful topic.  Where would a 9 Iron be most useful? Let people know your opinion about the topic.  If you are an expert, feel free to refer to your credentials and expertise on the subject.

3) You’ll notice if you’ve read many of my articles that Time is often an ingredient.  Many times just creating content isn’t enough.  Most search engines won’t list a website until it has “been around” for a while.  If your website is for a one-time event that happens in 7 days, the search engine’s visitors won’t need the page after the event.  In fact, the page may not even be there in two weeks.  Search Engines want to refer visitors to pages that exist, not empty space.

4) Use the topic’s keywords in a way that is not only smooth and articulate for a human reader, but also is focused and targeted for a robotic visitor.  What search results do you want your content listed with?  If you are talking about golf, then make sure your words are about golf.

Here’s to your success! Let’s overcome challenges…one day at a time!

Have a great one,

Rachel