The catch with web-site content is that is must be fresh and original to be most effective. If it’s not, the
content can do more harm than good. As you’ve already seen, content is the one element that can keep
customers coming back to your site time and again. When customers return often, your site ranking
improves, because the traffic registers the site with search crawlers as a valid and in-demand site.
When your content stinks, though, your site is headed in the opposite direction. If you have content
on your site that’s not professional, the search engine crawler will register this, and your ranking may
drop lower and lower and you could possibly be delisted altogether.
How do you know if your content stinks or not? It’s mostly a game of finding the right combination
of content types and consistent updates. But before you can even get to determining the right type of
content, you need to create a content strategy.
Your content strategy is the plan by which you’ll infuse your site with the right types of content at the
right times. It starts with determining how to reach your target audience. By now your target audience
should be engraved on your forehead, but how you reach that audience is something entirely
different. If your audience is teens, the language and method with which you’ll reach them will be
different than if your audience is senior adults or stay-at-home moms, or even full-time professionals.
Next you need to determine what type of content you plan to include on your site to meet all the
needs that have been defined by the preceding questions. There are several different types of content,
and each type has its own implications:
Licensed Content: Licensed content is what you might buy from a content broker. For
example, if you’re looking for a quick way to populate your site with articles, you might
turn to a company like FreeSticky.com that offers many different articles you can use.
The problem with this type of content is that it’s often repeated all over the Internet. You’re
not the only one who will need to populate your site, and others will likely use some of
the same services you do. Being used often doesn’t make the content less valuable, but it’s
not going to rank as well with search engines because of the duplication.
Original Content: There are several types of original content. There’s the content you
write and share with others for free. This is a good way to get links back to your site. You
can use the content for a limited amount of time exclusively on your own site and then
allow others to use it for nothing more than a link back to your site. This incoming link
adds credibility to your site.
Another type of original content is that which is distributed freely by visitors to your
site. This original content can take the form of comments on your site or forum message
boards. This type of original content is an excellent addition to your SEO efforts, because
it tends to be focused on a specific subject.
Some original content is exclusive to your site. This is content that you create, and the
only place it appears is your web site. This is the most valuable type of content for your
site, and it’s the type search engine crawlers like the best. Think of it as giving the crawler
some variety in its diet. It gets tired of the same thing day in and day out, just like we do.
The more original and exclusive content you can provide for a crawler, the better you’ll
rank in search results. It also doesn’t hurt if that content has an appropriate number of
keywords in it.
Dynamic Content: Dynamic content can be licensed or original. Blogs are the perfect
example of dynamic content.