Have your heard the phrase… “Content is King”?
Of course you have! You especially hear the term in relation to content on your website or blog. Last week we gave you some creative ideas to add content to your blog. Today we are continuing our topic on content, quality content.
Why Quality Content?
- Quality content is a representation of you, your brand and your business. Your readers will rely on you and respect you more based on your content. Websites or blogs with spelling and grammar errors can be a big turn off to most readers.
- If your content is good, you will create loyal readers who will visit your site often and will also engage with comments. As your readers get to know, like and trust you they will buy and talk about the products and services you offer them as solutions to their problems.
- If you have content that is well written your site will rank higher in the search engines. Just as content is king, the king of online searches is without a doubt, Google! So if you want your site to be indexed by Google (which is extremely important if you want to make money in your business) you will want to follow the King’s guidelines for quality content. To see if your site is being indexed by Google, in your browser simply type: [site: yoursitename] for example, site:barbschallenge.com Watch this short video to see what Google has to say about content on your site…
Here are some other comments direct from Google…
Quality guidelines – basic principles
- Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines.
- Don’t deceive your users.
- Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you’d feel comfortable explaining what you’ve done to a website that competes with you, or to a Google employee. Another useful test is to ask, “Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn’t exist?”
- Think about what makes your website unique, valuable, or engaging. Make your website stand out from others in your field.
You can read more about these guidelines from Google at Google Support.
Some Content Cautions
Content Spinners…There are many auto content creators, auto bloggers, content spinners, etc available. If you purchase one of these, use it as a tool and add or change the copy that is produced to make sure it is not duplicate copy. Also, watch out for the length of many of these articles come up with 300-500 words. Postings of 1000-1500 words are actually more enjoyable for your reader and Google too, as they better know the topic you are talking about.
PLR Content…PLR (Private Label Rights) content is actually a fantastic way to get content for your site or creating your own product. With PLR you are given the rights to use the material as you wish. Unfortunately, many people can purchase the same PLR so it would be important to change it around to make it your own. You can get some excellent information on PLR from a blogger friend of mine, Steven Lucas.
Outsourced Copy…Outsourcing, or getting content written for you is a great way to save you time. You can to go places like Fiverr or elance and get good articles for a reasonable price. As a word of caution, these writers could use content spinners to write your articles, so be sure to check the articles they write. You can even ask them for a sample before you hire them!
If you use content spinners, PLR or outsourced copy be sure to check your content is quality, original content by running it against Copyscape.
Per Wikipedia… Copyscape is an online plagiarism detection service that checks whether similar text content appears elsewhere on the web. Given the URL or text of the original content, Copyscape returns a list of web pages that contain similar text to all or parts of this content. It also shows the matching text highlighted on the found web page. Copyscape banners can be placed on a web page to warn potential plagiarists not to steal content.
In conclusion…Write quality content that your readers and Google will like! Follow the guidelines and you are on your way to growing an online business!
What to do next…
- Sign up for our list here to receive updates and a free writing guide.
- Sign up for the 100 Day Challenge here to make the last quarter of 2015 your best year ever!
- Leave a comment below! We love to hear from you!
- Check out Sunday Motivation on Sunday and next week we start a new series on getting visitors to your new blog!
Barbara, great article and video about content and search engines. Thanks for providing the Google Support link as well. The explanation on the different content types was very valuable as a resource.
Roy Miller would like you to read…My newest Coup- How I Will Make My First Money Online
Hi Roy,
Thanks for stopping by. Glad you were able to use some of the resources! I like the changes you made to your site! Great idea for making money online in your recent article! Wish you continued success!
Your advice is well taken Barbara thanks!
I really enjoyed your video too BTW.
One thing I’ve noticed about successfully marketing online, far too
many marketers, especially newbies, they’re convinced that everything can be accomplished, simply by pushing a button or purchasing a piece of software etc.
They think every aspect of successful online marketing can be outsourced
one way or the other.
And it’s something about that four letter word, (work) that simply doesn’t appeal
to them!LOL!
Thanks for sharing some extremely helpful resources!
Mark would like you to read…Three Ways Some Internet Marketing Companies Actually Cannibalize Themselves!
Hi Mark, Thanks for your great comments…my apologies for not seeing them sooner! (My recent post talks about procrastination!) You are so right…there is no push button success when it comes to IM…despite all the products out there that sell exactly that! I enjoyed your article on Three Ways some IM Companies cannibalize themselves…so very true! Anyone getting into internet marketing should definitely read it!