SEO content is one of the most consistently effective ways to attract web traffic. In today’s increasingly competitive environment, however, writing SEO content that ranks in Google is hard to do.
In fact, about 7.5 million new blogs are posted every single day, which means standing out from the crowd is harder than ever.
How do you contend with extreme competition? It all comes down to your content.
Good SEO content writing drives traffic, but it also takes work. In this blog, we’ll break down the top factors behind Google SERP and give you 7 simple steps to achieving your content dreams.
Google’s Top Factors for Ranking Content
Google’s search result algorithm is incredibly complex with hundreds upon hundreds of factors that distinguish good content from mediocre or subpar webpages.
This complexity helps prevent exploitation—for instance, if SEO keyword density was the only factor, any blog could instantly rise to the number 1 listing by simply spamming the keyword more times than anybody else. The unfortunate side effect of this complexity is that it can be difficult to know what Google will choose to promote and why they choose to promote it.
SinceGoogle’s algorithm (and, just as importantly, its massive collection of data) is one of the world’s most valuable trade secrets, marketers don’t have direct access to how it works. However, the factors that Google seems to favor can be broken down into eight categories of factors. Here are some of the most important factors in 2024:
High-Quality Content. Google wants you to continue using their search engine, especially as Microsoft makes a renewed push for their AI-enabled search engine, Bing. They want to deliver high-quality, human-written, informative content that answers their users’ questions. Since your audience also wants to read useful, helpful information, one of the simplest ways to drive SEO traffic to your website is simply to write useful, helpful content.
Backlinks. Links to other websites gives your blog credibility—not just in the eyes of your readers, but in the eyes of the algorithm as well.
SEO Keyword Usage. While keyword density isn’t the only factor that drives placement, SEO keyword usage is one of the primary ways Google looks for relationships between queries and results.
Engagement. If audiences share your content on social media sites, engage in comment sections, and interact positively with your website, this can serve as a vote of confidence for the SERP algorithm. While this depends on audience action, it isn’t totally out of your hands, either—your SEO content can encourage engagement, thereby boosting your SERP.
Other factors that aren’t related to the quality of your content itself, such as the technical performance of your website or your UX design, can also play into Google’s results placement algorithm.
The 7-Step SEO Content Writing Checklist
Armed with some knowledge of Google’s algorithm, here are some practical steps to writing good SEO content for your website:
1.Study Other SEO Content Examples
One of the best and simplest ways to improve SERP is to simply do a Google search for the keywords you want to be ranked for and read the top results. See what other content does right, and incorporate those strategies into your own content.
It’s important to understand, however, that this doesn’t mean simply copying their words. Derivative, repetitive content doesn’t perform well on Google, and outright plagiarism can be unethical and even illegal. However, studying the results can net you valuable insights.
This deceptively simple process is one of the easiest ways to boost your SEO content’s performance.
2.Conduct Industry-Specific Keyword Research
As you consider the type of audience you wish to attract, you should familiarize yourself with the language they use. What are the concerns of the industry you’re targeting? What types of questions are they hoping to answer? What industry-specific language do they use?
If your SEO content uses the same language as your target audience, it’s more likely to return as a top result from their searches.
3.Analyze Your Competition
Andy Warhol once said a version of the phrase, “Good artists copy, great artists steal.” Before him, Pablo Picasso said the same thing. Before him, Oscar Wilde.
While you should never steal another website’s words (not only because it’s unethical but also because it would rank poorly), you should steal inspiration. What do you like about your competitors’ websites? Do they incorporate humor in an engaging way? Do they provide targeted answers to their audience’s questions? What topics do they write about?
By analyzing your competition, you can hone your own ideas of what type of SEO content you want to write.
4.Consider Outsourcing with SEO Content Writing Services
If Google’s algorithm was simple, writing great SEO content would be simple too.
In reality, writing high-quality, helpful, informative content takes time. Outsourcing your content to SEO content writing services likeExpress Writers can give you back time in the day while increasing your organic web traffic. We make dreams come to life by turning our clients’ visions into realities.
Outsourcing your SEO content writing can save you time and money, increase your results placement, and—maybe most importantly—help you avoid the headache of writing and researching SEO blogs yourself.
5.Pay Attention to Formatting While Writing
Formatting is important because it’s part of the way web crawlers parse information on the screen. That’s why SEO keyword placement (e.g. where keywords appear within your copy) is so important—keywords in titles and headings have greater weight for SERP than keywords in the body of your article.
However, that’s not the only reason formatting should matter to you—formatting is also important for your audience. The average reader only spends53 seconds on a website. That means you’re in a race against time to capture your audience’s attention and imagination. Good headings help to orient your audience and contextualize what they’re reading.
6.Take Time to Edit and Polish Your Work Before Publishing
Part of quality writing means writing that’s free of grammatical and spelling errors. It’s always worth a few extra minutes to edit and polish SEO content before you publish it.
Modern tools like Grammarly can quickly spot errors and suggest solutions. Paid versions of their tools can even detect the way your writing might be coming off to audiences, helping you adjust your tone on the fly.
Proofreading is an important step in the content writing process—your audience will thank you.
7.Dive Into Your Analytics to Track Results
In this guide, we’ve recommended researching keywords by searching for them and reading the top results, and researching your competitors by reading their content to see what you like about their approach. Now, it’s time to analyze your own results.
By analyzing traffic to different pages on your website, you can identify what types of content perform well and which are failing to capture an audience. Look for commonalities like the type of content, formatting, specific keywords, general topics, etc. If you’re writing for a highly seasonal industry, consider which types of content perform best at different times.
Analyzing your results provides invaluable insight into what works and what doesn’t, how you can adjust in the future, and how you can expect your content to perform.
Want to Rank at the Top of Google?
The top organic result on Google getsover a quarter of the clicks. By contrast, over 96% of all content doesn’t get any traffic from Google. In other words, SERP is functionally a winner-take-all system where the top results capture a huge fraction of all traffic and the vast majority of pages receive no traffic at all.
The stakes are high—that’s why you shouldn’t leave it up to chance.
In our free ebook, we share six factors you need to know before you begin writing. In addition, we provide real-world examples of how high-quality, valuable content produces results.
Good writing starts with a good SEO blog outline, but in the age of search engine optimization, “good” can mean a lot of different things.
Should your outline be optimized for top search engine results placement? For maximum reader engagement? For clarity and economy of language?
In the attention ecosystem, a good SEO blog outline requires all of the above. Your outline should be tailored to the search terms you want to be ranked for, but it also has to support your specific goals and speak to your specific audience. All of this can feel like a juggling act, but don’t worry—in this guide, we make writing a high-performing SEO blog outline achievable in just 3 easy steps.
Step 1: Select High-Quality Keywords
Before you can start writing your perfect SEO blog outline, you have to first identify what you’re writing about.
There are two kinds of keywords you should be aware of: focus keywords and secondary keywords.
Focus Keywords
Focus keywords are the primary words or phrases you target for search engine results placement (SERP). High-quality focus keywords should be specific enough to accurately describe your content, but broad enough that related web searches still return your page.
For example, “SEO” is too broad to be a helpful focus keyword for this blog post. A web search for “SEO” will return too many results on too many overlapping topics. However, a keyword like “SEO blog outline” is more specific to the content of this blog—that means users who search for “SEO blog outline” are more likely to be looking for articles like this one.
A best practice for focus keywords is to include them in the title and at least one major heading within your blog.
Secondary Keywords
As the name suggests, secondary keywords are less central to your SEO blog outline. They may describe the broad ideas and subjects of your blog or highlight niche topics within your content.
While you don’t necessarily have to include secondary keywords in your blog outline itself, they should be present in the content of your blog. Secondary keywords don’t have to be as targeted as your focus keyword—think of them as additional context for your focus keywords. For example, “writing” is too broad for a focus keyword, but in tandem with the focus keyword “SEO blog outline,” “writing” can add additional context that improves SERP for your blog.
Step 2: Know Yourself and Know Your Audience
Think about the way teachers communicate with their students: it’s different from the way they communicate with parents, isn’t it?
It’s likely that the way you communicate with loved ones is different than the way you communicate with colleagues or bosses. The way you might talk to a potential client is different from the way you might talk to a competitor.
Communication is always in service of a goal—whether that be to order your morning coffee, run an efficient meeting, or convert a new lead.
When it comes to SEO blog writing, understanding your goal is pivotal. However, motivation isn’t the only component—you must also consider your audience. Just like you might adjust your communication style based on the situation, you might also adjust your style based on the person you’re talking to.
Blogs are typically audience-oriented. Blogs change minds, break down barriers, and encourage change, but blog posts themselves are not just productive monologues, they’re a kind of secret dialogue between a writer and their audience.
Knowing your own goals and identifying the audience you wish to speak to is the vital first step in writing an SEO blog outline. As easy as that is to say, “knowing” and “identifying” are ambiguous concepts in practice. Here’s what this looks like in action:
Tone
As you write the body of your blog, you’ll quickly realize that there are a thousand and one different creative decisions you can make. Should you take a conversational style? Should you incorporate jokes? What about emojis? It’s helpful to think about tone in several dimensions:
Formal vs Conversational. Factors may include your target audience’s age and the context they’ll be reading your blog in. In a corporate finance blog, a formal tone could convey expertise and certainty. However, a blog geared towards personal finance for beginners might benefit from a more conversational tone that feels engaging and personable—even if the factual content of the blog is exactly the same.
Humorous vs Informational. Humorous writing is engaging and can be enjoyable for readers, but not every topic or audience lends itself to humor. In the wrong context, humor can make a writer appear unserious, especially if the joke obfuscates something more important in your writing. An informational approach can feel more “dry” to readers, which can work against you if you’re trying to create a memorable connection with a reader, but can be a benefit when your goal is purely to convey information.
Enthusiastic vs Factual. Finally, enthusiastic writing can increase the readers’ motivation to take action, while a more reserved presentation of facts has greater educational value. Enthusiasm is contagious and can inspire confidence in your readers, but it takes a balance between enthusiastic presentation and factual grounding to find the right tone for any blog.
Authority
As you think about your target audience, what level of experience do they have with the topic? Are you writing to seasoned experts who already understand the foundational concepts of your writing? Or are you writing to newcomers who need a thorough explanation of the background of your topic?
In practice, the distinction is never that black and white—your audience will most likely be somewhere in between the two extremes. For this blog, for example, I’m assuming most readers are familiar with the concept of search engine optimization.
Your target audience’s level of authority on the topic should guide the way you structure your article, what topics deserve their own headings, and which ones can safely rest on the cutting room floor.
Motivation
Finally, consider the action you’re hoping your readers will take after reading your blog. Some blogs simply want to create a positive experience for readers—perhaps to increase brand loyalty or awareness. Others seek to add value to their readers’ lives through conveying important information. Still others are hoping to convert readers to make a purchase.
Your motivation plays a large role in how you structure your SEO blog outline.
The Problem, Solution, Proof formula works well to efficiently break down barriers and change readers’ minds, while informational blogs like this one benefit from sequential organization.
Vincent Van Gogh frequently painted over his existing paintings, iterating on them to create great works of art. Similarly, Da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa over an existing sketch. The greatest works of art weren’t executed in a single stroke of genius—they’re the result of revision and iteration.
In your SEO blog outline, iteration is pivotal. You should plan to iterate on not only the wording of your headings, but also on the content and structure of the blog itself.
Some practical ways you can iterate on your outline are to experiment with adding and removing subheadings, reordering sections of your piece, or simply trying out different wordings. The secret to creative iteration is experimentation, and it’s in the outlining stage of your blog that you have the most agility and freedom to experiment without consequence.
Once you’ve written the body of your blog, major restructuring has an exponentially higher time-cost. This is why revision and iteration are a part of the outlining phase of SEO blog development, because it’s your best opportunity to let your creative juices fly.
Work With the Best
Writing a SEO blog outline is doable, but it isn’t easy. It takes time, experience, and skill. Express Writers writes high-performing blogs for every industry, taking the guesswork and legwork out of your content strategy.
At Express Writers, you often hear us mention “done-for-you” content marketing in our blogs, and on our website, and we even boast about it in some social media posts.
But what does done-for-you content marketing entail?
For those who have wondered what DFY content is, how it works, and the benefits of seeking providers who can do it for you, look no further than this mini guide.
Today, we will talk about done-for-you marketing and how you can get more out of your content while spending less time and money than you would going the traditional route (i.e., doing it yourself).
Isn’t All Content Ordered Considered Done-for-You Content Marketing?
Yes, and no.
It depends on the service you are ordering and where you are ordering it.
Some companies offer done-for-you content bundles, like Express Writers, while others offer DFY content, but it includes nothing more than writing content. It doesn’t necessarily include the expertise, research, and quality assurances you need to satisfy Google’s E-E-A-T and improve your website’s authority.
Genuine DFY content is written by a subject matter expert in your niche – not a freelance writer who dabbles in that industry. Basically, your writer is a mirror of you – only they are saving you the time and effort of writing a blog yourself using the information you provide and leaning on their own experience and expertise in the niche to deliver top-notch content.
Getting a content bundle is the best way to expand every penny spent on your content marketing and provide you with high-quality content that returns continuously year after year.
What is a Done-for-You Content Bundle, and Why Should You Use Them?
Yes, you could order a single blog written by a subject matter expert, but if you buy an entire bundle, you are unlocking even more benefits while saving time and money.
By bundles, we are talking about the blog, its meta, SEO research, images, and the expertise behind it.
A popular bundle option is our Authority Package service. Within the Authority Package, you receive:
An In-Depth Content Strategy Designed around Your SPECIFIC Topic: A content strategist researches your desired topic and creates a click-worthy headline that touches high on the EMV scale. Then, they search for high-volume, low-competition keywords to sprinkle into your content so that you rank well in the SERPs. The strategist will look for strategic linking opportunities and even provide details for the writer to hit on to satisfy the topic with E-E-A-T in mind.
A Subject Matter Expert Writing Your Content: Once you approve your content’s research phase, it heads over to an SME writer with genuine experience in your field (not only do they have 5+ years of experience writing in it, they have advanced degrees in that field as well).
In-Depth Editing: To ensure everything is included and that you receive the highest quality writing possible, an editor reviews the content and fine-tunes it before delivery.
Custom Designed Images: The Authority Package doesn’t use stock images. Instead, it includes custom images created in Adobe by an in-house designer. It includes a header image, inset, CTA image, two custom images or graphs, and four pull quotes to help specific text pop off the page.
In 2022 alone, Express Writers provided authority packages for hundreds of clients saving thousands of hours of work.
Add social media posts and emails to go along with that package. You now have a blog with authority, an email newsletter to let readers know it is there and ready for consumption, and social media posts to sprinkle on your favorite platforms.
What are the Benefits of Using DFY Content?
Let’s break it down and look at the benefits you receive with DFY content.
You Get Three Professional Services in One Package Price
Taking the Authority Package example, you have three core services in play. If you were to do these yourself, you would need to outsource to multiple freelancers for your SEO, writing, and professional design. In the package, you get all three professional services already vetted and ready to go from the same location.
Saving you the hassle and time of searching for freelancers to fulfill these gaps yourself.
You Unlock Access to a Team that is Up-to-Date on Google’s Wants and Needs
Google does a lot of updates, and they all carry the same theme: authority and trust.
Trust is not new to the marketing sector.
If you think about it, trust has been around since the dawn of content marketing.
Sales pages, landing pages, Ebooks, emails…the goal has always been getting your reader to trust you.
So, what has changed?
Google now wants to see that trust for itself.
When people do not trust your site, they will never purchase from you and will not return. You have that one shot at building trust, building up those relationships, and converting them.
Trust is a central component of Google’s latest guidelines with E-E-A-T. Trustworthiness doesn’t help your ranking directly, but according to Yoast, that “back” button when a client realizes they don’t trust you can.
When you hire someone to do DFY content, they are more than aware of the latest algorithm changes and what Google demands in their latest E-E-A-T. EW writers are all trained on E-E-A-T and what it entails by offering an in-depth course within our university. So, when an SME writer tackles your content, they bring every aspect of E-E-A-T to the digital table: experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness.
You Save a Significant Amount of Time
Think about how much time you would invest if you did each component of DFY content bundles for yourself.
First, you need to subscribe to tools like Ahrefs and SEMRush to start generating your reports and researching your topic. You would need to familiarize yourself with the EMV scoring system and how to improve your titles so they are click-worthy. You would need BuzzSumo to help you find what is trending in your industry so that you can play off both trending and evergreen topic ideas. That’s a few hours (if not days) of work when you are unfamiliar with using these products.
Next, you would have to research and write. Even the most experienced writer takes an hour or so to research a topic (despite their familiarity with it). Then, there is the writing phase which may take a few hours. On top of that, you have to self-edit and clean it up before you hit “publish.”
Writing your blog is more than just adding a few paragraphs. Instead, you need deep industry research and statistics to back it, articulation skills to keep your content concise, and of course, editing. Orbit Media surveyed how much time the average blogger spent on their writing. In that survey, you will see that the time it took got longer and longer as the years increased, and that’s because Google demands more today than it did ten years ago. In 2021, Orbit’s survey found writing one blog took approximately 4 hours and 10 minutes. So, let’s consider how much time you spend if you DIY it.
After the writing phase would come design. Yes, there are plenty of free design tools and affordable paid options, but do you have the time? You know your branding and colors, but you’ll need to upload those and search for graphics you can use either from a paid stock photo subscription or a royalty-free site. Then, you must go through the time it takes to design the images alone.
When you calculate total hours spent and break it down to your hourly earnings, did you save much in the end? What could you have done with that time while someone else was creating the content?
You Get White Hat, White Label Content
You’ve saved yourself hours (if not days) ordering DFY content.
Even better? Once you get that content package ready to distribute, it is white hat and white labeled, so you can claim it as your own.
Whether it is an Ebook you sell on Amazon or a blog post you put on your website, the author is you.
Think about it. While you are working on your next marketing campaign, right now, a writer could be creating your next Ebook to publish. So, you are working on the next big thing that will generate revenue while someone else is finishing up your last “big thing” that will soon generate revenue.
Bottom Line: Done-for-You Content Marketing is the Future of 2023
Content is not over.
AI might be here, but it cannot compete with subject matter experts and certainly cannot fulfill the requirements of Google’s E-E-A-T. A well-vetted SME can.
At Express Writers, we not only vet SME writers to join our team, but we continually train them in-house to provide the best quality possible for our clients.
Whether you are looking for a single blog or want done-for-you content bundles like our Authority Packages, we can help grow your brand, build your authority, and, most importantly, gain trust with your readers so that those who come and visit stay and buy.
Try one of our SME services today and see the benefits of DFY content for yourself.
Maintaining a regular blog is a valuable marketing tool that can help businesses connect with their customers and grow their business.
According to a study published by HubSpot, companies with blogs are more successful than those without. These companies receive, on average, 55% more visitors and get 97% more inbound links.
With powerful statistics like these, it makes sense to make blogging a business priority in 2023.
Whether you have been blogging for years or are just now considering adding a blog to your marketing plan, this list covers the best blogging tools to take you through 2023 and beyond.
Blogging Tools for Topic Research
Choosing the right topics can make the difference between a successful blog and one that gets little to no attention. These blogging tools can help guide your topic research.
1. BuzzSumo
BuzzSumo makes it easy to research relevant topics. On the homepage, you can enter either a keyword or domain name to generate content ideas. The results page shows you recent trending topics that include your keyword and how they performed on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
In the example above, you can see the most popular content with the keywords “content marketing budget” has 181 total engagements. It also has an evergreen score of 2. This score is unique to BuzzSumo and represents how popular content is with audiences a month after its release. For the score, the higher the number, the better.
In the Content Analyzer results, you can skim through a few of the most popular topics to see how they approached the topic. You can then customize your topic to fit your target audience and business niche.
BuzzSumo is a free tool. However, it only gives you a limited number of free searches each month. For unlimited searches and more in-depth information, upgrade to a premium account.
2. AnswerThePublic
This unique website offers an innovative way to do topic research. Type your desired topic into the search field, and results are returned as an interactive wheel that shows questions people have asked related to your topic.
Quora is a crowdsourced website that answers questions and shares commentary on popular topics. Here you can search for topics related to your industry and see what questions people are asking. If you have valuable insights to share that answer those questions, this could be a great idea for an in-depth blog.
In some ways, your blog title can be more important than the blog itself. The title is what attracts people to your blog and convinces them to start reading. Of course, you need quality content to back up your engaging title. Although it won’t matter how good the rest of your content is if your title doesn’t work.
To help you create more creative titles or even give you inspiration for the rest of the blog, try using Portent Idea Generator. Enter your chosen topic into the search field, and it will generate titles for you. You can click “See Another Title” until you find something you love. You can also click on words and phrases within the title. The tool then offers a quick explanation of why it works in the title.
There may be times when the latest news connects with your brand. Check the trending topics section on the Twitter homepage to see what people are talking about. This is a great way to try out newsjacking – tying your brand into the latest viral news story.
Blogging Tools for Organization
Once you have a list of great ideas, you should organize them into a workable content schedule. There are numerous tools available to help you do this.
6. Dropbox
There may be some blog topics that include files, like images, videos, or PDFs. Dropbox makes it easy to store these items and keep them together.
7. Google Calendar
Google Calendar and other calendar tools can be easily transformed into an editorial calendar. For example, if you plan to publish one blog per day, you can record the daily topics as events and reorganize them, as needed. You can also schedule time for writing and any other content creation needs.
8. Evernote
Evernote is a popular note-taking app that helps you organize projects, notes, and schedules. It has a robust tagging system to help you categorize your content in a variety of ways, whether by topic, planning stage, or anything else. Evernote also works with other apps like Google Calendar allowing you to track everything in one place.
9. Todoist
Whether your content team is small or large, Todoist is versatile enough to work with any size team. It is one of the most popular organizational apps. You can be flexible enough to adjust your schedule to be as simple or as complex as you like by breaking down tasks into subtasks and moving tasks into projects.
Blogging Tools for Optimization
An optimized blog is one that fulfills the needs of the searcher. For example, if someone searches for “content marketing budget” and you have written a quality, optimized blog focused on that topic, it has a better chance of appearing near the top of the search results. These tools can help you create the best optimized blogs.
10. Yoast
Yoast is a plugin that works with WordPress. It can help you optimize your content for keywords, in addition to suggesting relevant internal links. It uses red, yellow, and green color codes to show you what you did well and where you need some more work.
11. Keyword Planner
Keyword Planner is a free resource available as part of Google Ads. It can help you research keywords for your search campaigns and discover new keywords that can give your business a boost. To start, try entering some basic keywords and Google will tell you how popular it is along with its search volume.
12. Google Trends
Google Trends is a free, simple tool that can show you how the popularity of keywords changes over time. Simply type in your desired keyword and it will give you a chart showing the interest over time. You can adjust the results based on location, time, category, and type of search.
Beyond the chart, Google Trends includes interest by subregion, related topics, and related queries. Some keywords may not have enough data to incorporate all this information.
Blogging Tools for Better Writing
You could have the greatest trending topic, an excellent title, and optimized keywords. But if your writing isn’t up to snuff, none of these other things will matter. Consider these blogging tools to improve your blog writing.
13. Hemingway App
Blogs should be free of grammatical errors and easy to read. You can copy and paste your blog content into the Hemingway App to discover any issues with your writing. Hemingway highlights words, phrases, and sentences with specific colors to show you potential problems, including passive voice, sentence difficulty, and the use of adverbs. It also gives your content a readability rating based on grade level.
You decide which editing suggestions you want to take.
14. Scrivener
Scrivener has similar functionality to Microsoft Word. However, it offers more versatility in saving and categorizing your documents. For example, if you are planning multiple blog posts as part of a larger project, you can save multiple documents in one file. Features like this make Scrivener an ideal choice for large projects like blogging, books, and research.
15. Google Docs
As a free online resource, Google Docs is an excellent way to collaborate with others on content creation. You can quickly share documents and get feedback with the “suggestions” and “comments” features. Google Docs also integrates well with many CMS platforms.
16. Grammarly
Publishing error-free, high-quality content is key to establishing your business as a trustworthy expert in your field. Grammarly can help you do that in real time while you write. It works across multiple platforms, including social media and email, to help you edit and proofread your content as you work.
17. Distraction Free Writing
If you struggle to stay on-task while writing, the Distraction Free editor in Word Press is a helpful tool. To turn it on, click on the Toggle Full Screen button. Once you start typing, the toolbars and borders fade out so you can focus exclusively on your writing.
Blogging Tools for Visuals
Along with expertly optimized content, blogs need additional visuals to attract the right audience. Eye-catching images and videos add more appeal to the written word and typically improve the attention span of your readers. Consider these blogging tools for adding visuals to your writing.
18. Canva
While stock images can be useful, there are times when you want or need something unique. Canva makes it easier to make to create appealing visuals with little to no graphic design experience. The platform includes templates with drag-and-drop functionality, making it user-friendly. Choose from a wide range of free templates for documents, presentations, and infographics.
Whether you are adding a video to a blog or creating standalone video content, you need it to look professional. If you are a B2B brand, Vidyard can help you produce new marketing videos. It offers personalization options along with A/B testing capabilities.
20. Meme Generator
If your brand image is more casual, and you want to have some fun in your blog, try the Meme Generator. Memes can be a great way to connect with your audience while encouraging sharing. You can upload your own image or use preexisting meme designs and add your own words.
Blogging Tools for Distribution
You’ve written an optimized blog, added engaging images, and published it to your website. Now what? These tools will help you promote and distribute your blog and attract the right audience.
21. Facebook Ads
Even with struggles in recent years, Facebook continues to be the most popular social media site in the world. Paying for Facebook ads can promote your blog and target the right audience. Additionally, ads on Facebook are often cheaper than other PPC campaigns. Once your blog gains more visibility, you should gain more organic traffic, and you might be able to skip paying for ads.
22. Buffer
If your brand has a social media presence, Buffer is a great tool for planning and publishing all your social content in one place. Choose from social platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and even TikTok. You can program and schedule posts unique to each platform. Then you can share the same blog multiple times using different images and headlines.
23. Filament
If you use WordPress for your blogging, Filament can be a useful plugin. One of its features is a social share button called Flare. With this option, your readers can easily share your content to the social media platform of their choice.
24. MailChimp
MailChimp is one of the most popular (and free) email marketing resources available. Through MailChimp, you can set up email campaigns that automatically email your subscribers whenever you publish a new post. Plus, you can use this feature for free if you have fewer than 2,000 contacts in your email list.
25. Click to Tweet
Even with the uncertainty on Twitter right now, it is still a valuable resource for sharing and promoting content. Click to Tweet from CoSchedule is a WordPress plugin that lets you highlight short snippets of your blog for others to share on Twitter with just a click.
Whether you use one or all these blogging tools, they can help you and your content team become better bloggers. However, if you don’t have the time or skills required to make your blogs successful, you can trust the expert writers at Express Writers.
We have a large team of versatile writers with skills and experience in a wide range of industries. We will match the best writer to your needs.
Many businesses are so focused on gaining new customers, that they sometimes forget about the ones they already have. Your loyal customer base is one of the most valuable resources you have. Show your customers you still appreciate them with valuable content. Content marketing for brand loyalty is a great way to invest in your customers.
Research from the Harvard Business Review shows that a 5% increase in customer retention leads to a 25% to 95% increase in profits. With statistics like this, it just makes sense to use content marketing to build your brand loyalty.
If you’re wondering how to use content to connect with your customers, we will show you how. In this guide, we will explore why content marketing is so important and offer 10 tips you can use to improve your content marketing strategy.
What Is Content Marketing?
Content marketing is marketing focused on creating and publishing valuable content (blogs, videos, social media posts, infographics, etc.) relevant to your brand and your customers’ experiences. This content is created for and targeted toward a specific audience with the goal of attracting new customers, retaining existing ones, and building brand recognition.
One of the most important keys to a successful content marketing strategy is creating content that your target audience wants to read, watch, and share. Ideally, your content should add value to your products, entertain your audience, and keep your customers engaged with your brand.
How Content Marketing Builds Brand Loyalty
Your existing customers likely already enjoy using your products and services. Marketing statistics show that current customers are 50% more likely to try new products than new customers. With content marketing aimed at your current customers, you can introduce them to new products while getting a better return on your investment.
Loyal customers want to read and watch the content you produce. These interactions create a strong bond between your business and your customer base. This, in turn, leads to a better bottom line.
10 Tips to Use Content Marketing for Brand Loyalty
There are numerous ways you can communicate with your customers through content. These are 10 of our favorite tips to build brand loyalty.
1. Connect with Your Customers on Social Media
According to the Pew Research Center, 72% of Americans use one or more social media platforms to connect with the people and things they love, including businesses. Focus on a couple of the most popular social media platforms based on your customer demographics. For example, if most of your customers are young Millennials or Gen-Zers, you should probably open a Tik Tok account. Or, if your audience tends to be a bit older, you will likely find them on Facebook.
Social media content should be eye-catching and engaging. Check out the latest trends to see if they will work for your brand image. Social media is also an excellent place to share your latest content from other platforms, like your blog or YouTube. You can break down long-form content into shorter, more digestible segments better suited for social media.
2. Create an Automated Customer Communication System
Whether your customers are contacting you or you are reaching out to them, you should have regular communication. Use a customer management system (CMS) to keep track of your interactions. If too much time has passed after the last communication, program your system to automatically reach out to your customers with a pre-written email (this counts as content). It could say something like, “We miss you! Come check out our latest products with 10% off your purchase.”
A message like this shows your customers you still care about them, and a discount may entice them to make a new purchase.
3. Produce Regular, High-Quality Content
Producing as much content as possible is not the key to success. You need to focus on high-quality content, especially content that appears on your website and blog. Search engines like Google, along with your customers, can tell the difference between high-quality content and something that adds little to no value to your website.
The more value you offer your customers, the more likely they are to come back for more. In addition, create content in a variety of formats:
Blogs
Product demos
Videos
Podcasts
FAQs
How-to guides
Onboarding materials
Infographics
If this many formats feel overwhelming, keep in mind that you should repurpose your content. For example, if a blog includes numerous tips and statistics, this could be reworked as an infographic. Or, you can create a YouTube series where one of your product experts works through your FAQs in a visual format. Some customers will prefer learning through video instead of text.
High-quality content also works best when you have a plan. Have regular brainstorming sessions with your marketing team to create a list of upcoming content ideas along with a content schedule.
If your business struggles with creating the caliber of content you need, outsourcing your content is always a respectable choice. This gives you access to experienced, professional writers who understand SEO and other content marketing principles.
4. Look at the Customer Journey
Ideally, you should have content that addresses every stage of the customer journey. The typical stages of the customer journey include:
Awareness
Consideration
Purchase
Service
Loyalty
Offering valuable content at each step reduces the effort your customers must put in to interact with you. When customers find it easy to do business with you, they are more likely to come back and spend more.
5. Show Customer Appreciation from the Beginning
Earning a new customer is a critical stage in the buyer’s journey. Show your excitement and appreciation for them from the start with engaging onboarding materials. This should include a welcome email and some basic instructions on how to use the new products or services they just bought. You can also include links to how-to videos or introduction blogs.
Keep these customers engaged with regular communication that gradually introduces them to new features and products. The onboarding process lays the foundation for the relationship you have with your customers and establishes a baseline for what they can expect from you in the future.
If you create a welcoming environment for your new customers that keeps them informed, they are more likely to continue doing business with you and share their experience with others.
6. Stay Focused on Your Customers
While there will be times when you can appropriately brag about your business’s accomplishments, most of your content should be focused on your customers. Your customers should be showcased as the superhero of your brand.
This type of content can help foster a genuine emotional connection between your business and your customers. Those emotions encourage brand loyalty and improve your reputation. In addition, Google has updated its algorithms to prioritize “people-first content.” This is content written by people for people. In other words, quality content that your customers can easily relate to and understand.
7. Address Customer Issues
Your customers are inevitably going to struggle with your products or services. Instead of chafing at their complaints, welcome them as opportunities to improve your products and your content. Some customer issues may be as simple as not understanding how your products work. You can address those problems with in-depth user guides, demonstration videos, and FAQ pages.
Another way to add more value to your products and introduce customer-submitted content is with customer testimonials, product reviews, or user-submitted photos and videos of your products. This type of content is incredibly valuable and establishes your brand as an authority.
8. Highlight Your Loyal Customers
Customers want to have a personalized experience with your brand. If there are customers who stand out for their dedication to and support of your brand, give them some recognition with some personalized content. This is particularly valuable if you are a B2B business.
You can highlight how your customers use your products and services and how your products help them solve their problems. If you have a customer committee, showcase that program and how those customers are crucial to improving your products and services. Content like this can encourage other customers to stick with your brand if they have feedback they want to share.
Other ways to offer customer-centric content include:
Social Media Posts: A simple tag in a social media post can make your customers feel respected and valued.
Customer Forums: A customer forum is an excellent place for loyal customers to share feedback and tips with each other.
Guest Customer Posts: You can stay connected with your customers by inviting your most loyal fans to write guest blogs or testimonials to post on your website.
9. Incorporate Humor
The right kind of humor can quickly win over a difficult crowd. Incorporating humor into your content is an excellent strategy to make your content more engaging and share-worthy. Humor triggers an emotional response, which makes content more appealing and memorable automatically.
However, before you hire a comedian to start writing all your content, there are a few things to consider:
Consider the use: Humor is not a good choice for all types of content. For example, you probably shouldn’t use it in a report to your CEO, but it would fit nicely in some blogs or social media posts.
Vet the humor thoroughly: What some people find funny, others find distasteful or even offensive. While you can’t please everyone, thoroughly check your humorous content so you can avoid an online faux pas.
Make it genuine: Don’t use humor simply to get attention. Most customers will be able to tell when it isn’t genuine. It should also be the right fit for your brand. If your brand voice is typically serious and straightforward, some of your customers might be turned off by a sudden shift to humor.
Think about the timing: There will be times when you have clever, humorous content planned, but you need to scrap it. For example, if your business is suffering through a PR issue or there has been a local or national disaster, humorous content will likely be seen as distasteful and could cause some customers to leave.
10. Respond to the Needs of Your Customers
While you have an excellent understanding of your products and services, your customers are the people using them every day. Are they running into the issues over and over or finding your products difficult to use? If so, they have likely shared these concerns with your customer service team. Make sure you interview your customer service representatives or give them an easy way to share customer feedback with your content team.
You can use this customer feedback to craft content that addresses those needs. For example, if customers routinely use your product incorrectly, record a video showing its correct usage.
Or, if customer feedback leads to product updates, be sure to share those updates with your customers, pointing out how their valuable feedback led to the changes.
11. Create a Customer Email Newsletter
A regular customer email newsletter can help keep your brand at the front of your customers’ minds. Choose content that you know your customers love. Depending on your customer base, it might be valuable to create multiple newsletters based on your customer segmentation. Certain customers might favor one type of content over another and vice versa.
Consider the goals you want to achieve with your newsletter. Do you want to drive traffic to your blog? Invite customers to check out your latest products? Whatever you decide, make it clear with your newsletter content.
To avoid having your newsletter turn into promotional material, include exclusive content, like tips you haven’t shared before or a message from one of your internal product experts.
You also need to consider the timing of your newsletter. How often do you plan to send it out? Weekly? Monthly? Find a routine that works for your brand and stick with it. The day of the week and time of day you release it can also make a difference.
Many people feel overwhelmed by all the emails in their inbox on a Monday or feel burnt out by Friday. Research from HubSpot shows that mid-week emails sent between 9 AM and noon tend to get the best engagement.
Build Your Brand Loyalty with Quality Content from Express Writers
If your team struggles to produce enough or the right types of content, it might be time to turn to the experts. At Express Writers, we have a team of professional SEO content writers ready to take on your specific content requirements. Whether you need a one-time blog, email marketing templates, or content delivered on a schedule, we are here to meet your needs.
