Although blog and content creation is one of the top three media strategies for marketing professionals, very few businesses actually create compelling content that drives traffic and generates leads.
Creating consistently valuable content that reaches goals can be difficult. We understand that as a small business, you often don’t have the bandwidth to have a full-time marketing team on staff. That’s why Vervology creates digital solutions to common small business marketing dilemmas, such as creating on-brand and valuable content to boost your SEO and visibility on the web.
Here are 10 things to consider when creating blog content that reaches goals and keeps your audience coming back:
An Eye-Catching Headline
The words in a headline could make or break the traffic on any given blog post. As a matter of fact, content traffic can vary by 500% depending on the headline.
Studies show that instructional and informational headlines with action verbs included will garner both the most clicks and will keep people there longer.
Very often, people search on the internet to find out “how to do something,” and if your content can answer their inquiry, they are more likely to spend more time clicking through the rest of your website to find more information.
Goal-Oriented Lead
Once your audience loves your headline and clicks your article’s link, they generally only read the first bit of copy to see if they will continue reading or not. This is where they determine the value of your content – in the first few paragraphs.
Consider this section your elevator pitch. What goals are you trying to capture with this specific blog post? Make sure that is clear in the beginning.
After reading a few lines, the consumer should know what the piece will be about and what kind of information they will gain from reading it.
Written for Your Specific Audience
Depending on how narrow your niche and industry may be will determine the scope of your audience. Perhaps you are segmenting your audience even further to only people who perform a certain action at a specific time or are interested in just one facet of your company.
For example, if you are an outdoor company who makes retail items for hiking, backpacking, and car camping, perhaps you are writing blog content that only focuses on lightweight items perfect for a backpacking trip or a short hike.
You’ll want to determine exactly who you are writing to and write your copy with your specific audience in mind.
Offers Value
At Vervology, we prioritize offering value over just getting clicks. Content that offers your audience value, whether it’s in the form of educational content, how-to videos, or an e-book with industry tips and tricks, you are much more likely to convert traffic to leads with valuable content on your website.
Offering value to your potential customers is an excellent way to build brand trust and customer loyalty.
Easy-to-Read Formatting
One thing that many content writers and small business owners forget is how to write for internet copy. Most people read blogs and articles from their mobile devices on a small screen. This means that long paragraphs are difficult to get through and will often result in the person leaving the page.
We recommend short and eye-catching subtitles to break up large bits of content, and the rule of thumb is to have line breaks between every 3-5 lines of copy. Don’t be afraid to get creative!
SEO-Friendly
Creating content that is optimized with SEO-friendly keywords and best practices is crucial for garnering new traffic from Google and other search engines.
SEO-friendly content is usually evergreen and compliments an overall digital marketing strategy.
This content is valuable because it maintains its relevancy and will keep generating traffic to your website over time.
Call-to-Actions
Many marketers would agree that blog content is not complete without a call to action. This is the copy that tells your readers what you would like them to do after reading the article. A CTA helps create engagement with your post and provides the metrics for how you will measure goal success with this particular content.
Calls to action are generally at the end of the copy and include an actionable response to the article such as, “Contact us for more information on building the home of your dreams. Our experts are standing by ready to consult with you.”
Internal and External Links
Internal and external links are not only important for good SEO practices, but are important for providing your readers with source information. This helps boost your credibility as a brand from the audience’s standpoint. From the technical back-end, having a “web” of interconnected links is important to getting higher ranks on Google.
Media-Rich Copy
Although people do still read blog copy, many people are much more drawn to visual media in the form of infographics, videos, and photos.
It’s important to have a good balance of media mixed with valuable written information in your blog content. This will help you have higher success with keeping people on your page longer and a lower bounce rate.
Amplified by Other Channels
Boost your content’s reach by sharing it to social media, email marketing, in your email’s signature, and wherever you feel it can be relevant to your client base. This can help boost its reach in the search engines as well as give it an organic marketing boost as well.
If people find your content valuable and it continues to get shares, it could find its way onto the “trending” page of Google, which can skyrocket your traffic.
Hire an Expert
There is a lot to consider when creating blog content that will be useful for building your digital marketing strategy and getting your website ranked on search engines. That’s why it is much easier and less time consuming to hire experts in content creation to ghostwrite your content for you.
Leave it to the experts and schedule a consultation with our professional team at Vervology today.