SEO for Web Content

Good web content makes the Googlebot your friend!

What you are reading right now is the web content of this page I've created. Content simply means written text. Because the bots or spiders a search engine deploys are looking eagerly for unique web content to index, in order to be able to offer useful pages to searchers, the practice of writing search-engine-friendly web content has become a bit of an art form. By unique, I mean that the content isn't simply cut and pasted from some other source you found on the Internet. Don't do this! Not only will it not help your search engine rankings, but it can also bite you back in the instance that someone else will copy your content, and the Googlebot, trying to understand which document is the true authoritative source, may pick the thief's page over yours! Additionally, it would be a bad choice to employ the old-school 'black hat' SEO technique of artificially stuffing your content full of keywords that have nothing to do with your website in hopes of getting someone to click on your listing in the search engines. For example, if I decided to use the words 'million dollar give-away' in this document 72 times in hopes that I would ensnare traffic to my site, I'd be doing something that is frowned upon by the search engines, and really will not help me to sell whatever product or service I am actually offering on-line. Rather, to optimize the content of your individual web pages, you want to be very specific, and very thorough. You are also striving to come up with text that has a fresh angle no one has ever thought of before.

This becomes a bit of a challenge, particularly in the e-commerce world. After all, if you are one of the world's leading experts on Native American Arrowheads found in the Sonoran Desert, chances are, your article about this is going to be fairly unique and stands a great chance of ranking at the top for this subject. If, however, you are selling handmade candles, you will realize that so are millions of other people. There are, in fact, 4,970,000 web pages currently indexed in Google for the search term 'handmade candles'. Yikes! But, believe it or not, this number is not an unbeatable one, if you get into the habit of creating content about your candles which is truly unique and newsworthy.

From an organic standpoint, the reason one writes is to offer something to others to read. By making your site a place where there are interesting articles to read, you are hoping that visitors will decide that your site is a smart, informative place to be. The second reason stems off of this. If you write content that is truly exciting, people may voluntarily link their own website to it, thus providing you with highly valuable inbound links that will signal to the search engines that you have published a very popular page that is worthy of being ranked well. The third reason for writing rich content is that the search engines are looking for it, avidly! Google, in particular, is believed to give preference to educational sites over commercial ones. Yet, this doesn't mean you have to shut down your handmade birdhouse website and open up a school devoted to the study of bird calls. Rather, you need to set yourself the goal to make your birdhouse web site both a place to buy birdhouses AND an educational resource.

Unfortunately, the word has gotten out that search engines think much of web content and this has lead to millions of pages being created that have no value other than listing keywords on a page. Once upon a time, this technique was used to manipulate search engines into ranking worthless pages highly. Don't waste your time on this. The search engines have gotten too smart, and I'm glad. I'd like to see Google, Yahoo! and MSN weed out as much junk as possible so that when I search for something, the results they return to me are truly relevant to what I'm searching for. When I want to know if a red bump that just appeared on my knee is poison oak, a tick bite or prickly heat, I do not want to end up on a website selling diet pills. I want to find an authoritative source that will help me diagnose that little red bump on my knee! And, that's what this is all about in a nutshell.

Each search engine has it's own 'algorithm' (equation) for determining which pages are most relevant to a given search inquiry. So, if I type in 'red bump, tick bite', the search engine wants to pull up something for me that closely matches what I'm looking for. And this is the mindset that an SEO professional (and anyone trying to optimize their web site) needs to get into when it comes to writing content. What are people going to be searching for, related to my subject, and how can I write something that is unique and truly of value to them? The keywords tool mentioned earlier can be a big help in this, as can visiting blogs and chatrooms to find out what people are talking about. And, if you are lucky enough to predict a trend about the next big thing related to your business, and you write a great article about, guess who Google will pull up when people start searching for that new, exciting buzz-word topic? You! At least, this is what you're shooting for.

Because, as we mentioned, one of the key benefits you can reap from writing good content is having people voluntarily link to your page, you should be trying to think about what you could write that would get folks stirred up and interested. The following are some examples of things that often result in those valuable inbound links:

If you are fortunate enough to have contact with big names in your industry, you might ask them for an interview and offer the transcript of it on your website (with their permission, of course). For instance, if you are in the technology field, and can interview Bill Gates, chances are, everyone is going to want to read your article and link to it, and tell their friends about it. Obviously, this is a bit of a far-fetched example for most people, but nearly all fields have their known experts. Do you know any of them? Or, could you manage to contact an expert, and simply get a few quotes from them? Think hard!

Depending upon the field you are in, reviewing and critiquing new products or services which are making big headlines can bring folks to your site. They may either agree or disagree with your opinions, but if they come in the door, that's traffic won for your site.

For hobbyists, home and garden sites and a number of other industries, truly helpful how-to guides can win links and traffic. The popularity of the subject will, of course, greatly determine how much traffic you get.

If these are on a big enough scale, and you have collected a considerable amount of data, providing accurate, newsworthy statistics can win you links and traffic.

Believe it or not, jokes are one of the most likely things to get linked to and be passed around by people. Keep it clean...you don't want your web site to look seedy; you wish to present a professional appearance. Humorous editorials about popular subjects in your industry can also have this same traffic-getting effect.

Whether you are offering free crafting patterns, free tools that do mortgage payment calculations or free gifts to the 100th buyer of your handmade windchimes, history that far precedes the dawn of the Internet shows that offering free stuff is a great way to get people in the door. Don't be gimmicky with this. No flashing stuff or popping stuff that's going to distract from the business aspect of your site. But a judicious use of a free product or service offer can get you loads of traffic and many valuable inbound links.

So, where should all this great web content go on my small business web site?

In a word, EVERYWHERE! Turn your product pages into interesting mini-articles about each of the items you are selling. Make your About Us page a document of changes happening in your company, and the directions you'll be branching out into in the future. Most importantly, don't ever stop writing new content. Even if you're products are all listed, the work isn't done. A web site should strive to add something new, at the very least, once a month. Once a week would be much better. Top web sites may add new content daily or even hourly. We have seen, time and again, that Google favors pages which are brand new and offer something fresh and interesting for people to read. You want your website to have a vibrant, lively atmosphere. Don't just let it sit there. Begin to develop a base of fascinating articles, or start a blog to create a sense of community for your business. A stagnant website is a dead website. Don't let this happen to your Internet presence. Brainstorm with colleagues, friends and family to find the angle that is going to make your web site truly unique.

I have found this approach to be so much more effective than the silly, spammy techniques so many people use to try to win rankings and traffic. I write because I think people will benefit from my expertise. Now, my area of expertise happens to be in the field of web design and SEO. Your area of expertise lies in whatever your business is about. For more information on this subject, you may wish to read my article, Why is Google Discontent with your Web Content? I'd also like to make a special point of reminding folks not to neglect their homepage. Your homepage is the most valuable page on your website. It is what the spiders and the public sees first. Make the most of it with content that is kept fresh and new and which features things about your company that will make people want to dig deeper into your site.

So, what we've now learned is that your web site is going to be deemed of higher value by the search engines and by the public if you are offering things to read as well as things to buy. We've also learned that if you come up with a truly terrific page of some kind, you may win valuable links from outside sources, thus greatly increasing your worth to the search engines. We've learned that the spiders are most impressed by unique content and that brand new content tends to get a boost in the search engine rankings. We've explored a few options for writing good, traffic-worthy content. Beyond this, your creativity and research of your market are going to be your best guides for coming up with web content that sets your small business apart in the competitive Internet marketplace. We are now ready to move on to the next step.

Next: Launching your new web site and playing in the Google Sandbox.

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