Content-Based SEO

The-QUESTION-EVALUATION-AND-PLANNING-WORKSHEET is the cornerstone of your content planning.  Add content to this sheet to expand your plan.

In addition to Google, be sure to check out ANSWER SOCRATES and ANSWER THE PUBLIC. Look for common questions in your own inbox and talk to sales and customer service teams. 

GET THE WORKSHEET

POWER OF INTERNAL LINKS

1. Connect relevant pages helping users and search engines navigate a website
2. Establish information hierarchy telling visitors both human and robot about related content and identifying most important page on a topic
3. Spreads link equity and ranking power through the site. If one page has high authority, and you connect it to a new page or a related page, some of that authority flows through that connection. 
4. It improves the user experience, because it creates clear paths so visitors (and spiders) know what they are supposed to do next
5. May increase time on site. 
6. Drive visitors through our sales funnel

INTERNAL LINK TIPS

1. Create content so you have pages to link
2. Use anchor text wisely, with synonyms and various phrases in the hyperlink
3. Don’t over use links.  You don’t want your site to look like a Wikipedia page. Limit internal links to one or two per page. 
4. Link to rich pages with lots of content demonstrating your subject matter expertise. 
5. Make the links relevant.

BLOGGING AND SEO

SEO can be very technical as you focus on the the code and signals you send to search engines about your site. In this interview with Dr. Ty Belknap, you will hear how it doesn’t have to be.

He suggests, the single biggest thing you can do to improve your SEO is write, because search engines love words. He’s a big fan of words and argues that rich page content, 2,000 words or more is what will drive SEO.

That wall of text may look imposing, so break it up. The first two paragraphs are for your human readers, Make sure you have a call to action and a visible divider on the page. Then add the rest of the content the search engines want to see below the divider.

Looking for more blogging tips?  Check out these other conversations on the topic.  

It is easy to assume Google is smart as it conducts thousands of searches per second, But, at the end of the day it is a machine and can be confused by words with multiple meanings. 

You can help Google accurately index your pages using synonyms and related phrases to give context. 

ASSIGNMENT

• Review you questions list and related key words
• For your top questions, brainstorm a list of synonyms and related phrases which provide context to help Google properly  understand and index your content. 
• For each word find 5 synonyms or related phrases which provide the context Google will need to properly index your content.
• Update one of your blog posts, by adding phrases from your list. 

1) Research – Refer back to your list of questions.  Look for pages or posts which match the most common ones. This content is ripe for re-optimization.

2) Select a specific key word – While a good blog post may contain information to support several key words, you need to pick one. Use it in the title and meta description.  Since this is an existing post, you don’t want to change the URL. This will break any existing links to the page. If you are using a rich snippet tool, be sure to update that text as well. –

3) Add at least one new words to the post – Make sure you use the key word or phrase for which you want to rank in the new text.  Comment on something that has changed or provide additional examples to round out the post. –

4) Don’t forget the pictures – Remember that 25% of all search is image search. If the post didn’t have one originally, add a photo. Find a picture that improves the user experience by supporting what you are talking about.

Search engines will read the image label to decide what the picture is about so be sure to use the key word in the title and image description. Do this to all existing images as well.

5) Add links – This is a terrific opportunity to add links to some of your new FAQ’s or blog posts which answer specific questions. 

6) Add multimedia – If you have a podcast or a video on a related topic, add that to the post as well. This will enhance the user experience and keep visitors on the page longer. Google looks at the time a visitor spends on your page as a sign of engagement so multimedia will help increase that rank criteria.

7) Re-share – Once the post is updated, let people know  you have something new. Create a new social share graphic to give the content an updated feel. Then share, share, and share again on social media and in your newsletter.