A craveable, delicious, delightful blog post isn’t much different from a pastry.
As long as you follow the recipe, steps included, you will create a post your readers are hungry to devour – and might even return for more.
The good news is you won’t make a special trip to the grocery store to get started on the perfect blog post. Everything you need is in your virtual pantry – you just didn’t realize it.
Writing a blog post, especially in today’s competitive market, is intimidating. Once you break it down and understand the ingredients, however, you can whip up these readable bits on the fly and stay up with the trends for the future of blogging in 2023.
So, What Do You Need to Craft the Perfect Blog Post in 2023?
The future of blogging has certainly changed. What worked last year doesn’t necessarily apply today. Therefore, staying up on the latest blogging and SEO trends is essential so that you know what Google expects – and, more importantly, what today’s reader wants.
The Perfect Blog Recipe
Before you start to type, you want to make sure you have the following essentials ready to add to the mixing bowl:
1 click-worthy title
1 attention-keeping introduction
A pinch of creativity
A few cups of informative, scannable subheaders
A splash of succinct body copy
A handful of authoritative research and your expertise
1 part formatting
1 delectable conclusion
A dusting of enthusiasm for the topic
A garnish of passion for your niche
Putting it Altogether – How the Future of Blogging will Change How You Use These Ingredients
As you can see, the ingredients haven’t changed, but how and when you use them has.
We will break down each portion of this recipe so that you know how to mix it all in and get your readers to come back for more.
Creating Your Title
By far one of the most essential ingredients!
Your title sets the stage for what the reader can expect, even determining if they ever get past the SERPs to read your blog.
Spend time on this stage of your recipe. In fact, whatever you title it as your “working” title, be prepared to come back and rework it until it is just right later.
Don’t hastily toss forth the first title you have in mind. Instead, let it sit and rest, and the flavors meld together. Think of title creation as a slow, steady simmer rather than a rapid boil.
A good title mixes intrigue and information and is not too long.
Yes, Google says there is no limit, and the length of your title will not influence your search engine results. Instead, it affects whether or not someone will click on it. The first 60 characters matter the most – so make those count even if you have a 100-character title.
Whatever you do, don’t over-sprinkle in the keywords for your title – not only will it kill your readability factor and turn off any enthusiastic taster, but it will turn away Google too.
Roll Out Your Introduction
Your introduction supports your title. So perhaps you may not create it until you have solidified your intro – and that’s okay.
An introduction requires time and patience. While you will mix up something short, sweet, and enticing, you will also want it to rest a few hours before you revisit and rework it again. While adding a keyword to the introduction is essential, ensure it is not the highlighting flavor.
An introduction gives readers just a taste of what else is to come, but the full flavor doesn’t explode until the end. Of course, if your introduction isn’t tasty enough to keep reading, the end doesn’t matter much.
So, take your time, rework it after the entire blog is done, and ask yourself, would I eat this up?
Never Forget the Power of Creativity
Too many recipes lack creativity.
Think of those five-star restaurants – are they working with “vanilla” recipes used over and over again?
Of course not.
They are hashing out something unique that stays with their branding but still tantalizes the tastebuds.
Never leave out a pinch of creativity in your content – all of your content. Creativity should be tossed in from the start; if you can’t taste it, add more.
Start Rolling Out Subheaders
Subheaders help your reader scan and understand what they are about to digest. They should go in an even flow, make sense, and inform.
Ideally, subheaders are introduced every 300-500 words max (there’s nothing wrong with adding them in fewer words as long as the words in between pack a powerful punch). Subheaders are a great place for optimizing with secondary keywords but don’t overdo it.
Time to Mix in Your Body’s Copy
You have a working title, and you’ve rolled out the subheaders. Now comes the time to mix together your blog’s body.
But before you add anything, do your research. You may be an expert in your niche, but that doesn’t mean you won’t need resources to back up what you say. Today, using authoritative, high-quality links is still a must-have for any recipe. Search Engine Journal states that every site needs credible, authoritative, and trustworthy content – and a reader can’t take you at your word without some citations.
As you mix up that copy, make sure to spice it up enthusiastically. Nothing turns a reader away more than negativity. So, likewise, be as passionate about your niche as you want your reader to be as you create your blog – if you are not excited about it, why should they be?
A few other things to keep in mind while you mix up your body’s copy:
Optimize Gently. Optimizing your content is like working gluten. Too much, and it’s gotten too chewy, stiff, and undesirable. Yes, keywords matter in 2023, but how and where you use them has changed.
Focus on Your Brand’s Authority. What Google praises more than keywords are brand authority and trustworthiness. Ever heard of E-E-A-T? Nowhere in that acronym is keywords. What is, however, is expertise, experience, authority, and trustworthiness.
Be Unique. Today, readers are overwhelmed with choices. You won’t stand out in the crowd if you are the garden variety. Personalization is important.
Focus on the Reader and Not on Google. Yes, Google matters, but the person you are talking to in your blog post is not a search engine but a reader. Center your content’s quality, information, and focus around the reader; you’ll win them every time. Focus on keywords and search engines, and your recipe falls flat each time.
Arrange Your Formatting
No matter where the future of blogging goes, one thing is sure: the wall of text is never coming back.
Today’s reader doesn’t have the patience. Today’s reader prefers the amuse-bouche rather than traditional hors d’oeuvres. They want all of the flavors in a quick little nibble rather than having to enjoy it in a few more bites.
UX planet estimates that readers only take in about 20-28% of the body.
To increase the amount read, make it pretty – after all, we all eat with our eyes and not our stomachs.
Ensure you have an excellent mixture of:
H1, H2s, and H3s to break up the chunks of the body
Sprinkle in bulleted or numbered lists to get to the point
Add images to keep the reader’s attention on the page
Top it Off with a Conclusion
Your conclusion is where you drive action. The reader has stuck with you until the end, so this is an essential piece of content to deliver. Just as with your introduction, keep the conclusion short and sweet. Nothing over-the-top, nothing out of character. Just end the blog on a tasty note with a solid CTA that tells your reader where to go for their next meal.
Let it Rest before You Do the Rest
If you are self-editing your blog posts, you’ve mixed, mashed, sprinkled and dashed, but now it is time to let it rest. A good four to six hours is all your blog post needs before it is picked up again.
Come back refreshed and ready to cut out the fluff, trim the fat, remove unnecessary ingredients in your copy, and add a few more splashes of your brand’s unique voice where it seems suitable.
You’ve Followed the Recipe – Now What?
You’ve followed the recipe, but it is not quite time to plate it.
Before you plate your dish and send it out, you want to make sure you have social media posts and your email newsletter ready to fire off the second your blog goes public. Share across your favorite social media platforms with the same enthusiasm as you did in your piece!
Crafting great content is a lot like creating a great recipe. Not all of us are natural-born chefs, but we don’t have to be. While the future of blogging continually changes, one thing that will never change is the power of hiring talented people to craft your delicious content.
While AI can share the workspace with a traditional writer and editor for content marketing, there is one thing it cannot do – SME content creation.
The only genuine SME (subject matter expert) out there in your niche is, well, you – and the talented freelance writers out there that know your field just as well as you.
More importantly, Google knows it and expects to see that in your content.
What is AI Content Generation?
It seems like almost daily another AI content generation tool is launching.
Some are free, others are paid, but are any of these tools able to truly replace a genuine expert? TechTarget lists 36 AI generation tools in their 2023 guide, and while there are loads of tools to choose from, they are all based on the GPT-3 model.
AI content generation is content that is created by a platform utilizing the GPT-3 model. The content is generated and while marketed to be “new,” it really is not. Think about how AI generators work.
Generative AI tools take keywords, themes, and even voice/tone preferences, and it works to generate a blog, web page, or even a social media post, but it is not creating them out of thin air or using any expertise in the field to offer unique opinions and insights.
Instead, AI generates your content by pulling information from the internet. It searches and scours the thousands of web pages and blogs already out there to piece together information and generate copy.
But, AI Doesn’t Understand What it is Creating….
While it is fascinating to watch AI work, AI has no clue what it is writing. It is solely based on an algorithm pulling data based on your input.
Only a Genuine Industry Expert Knows the Content for their Industry
AI is incredibly fast and can write a blog post quicker than any writer, but because of its limitations in terms of understanding and having any expertise in the niche, it is not a specialist.
Here is where you may hit a speed bump or two, if you are using AI generation for your content marketing:
Let’s Talk about E-E-A-T and How AI Falls Short for Industry Professionals Seeking SME Content Creation
In Google’s February release, they mention guidelines for using AI generation in your content, and make it clear that they reward high quality regardless of how it is produced (whether human-made or AI-generated).
Many took that as a green light to go ahead with AI, but that is not what Google conveyed.
Let’s go back to the double update released in December 2022 when the extra “E” was added to the E-A-T standard, making it now E-E-A-T.
Image Source: Google Update, December 2022, Page 26
What was that extra “E” for?
Experience…
Trust is crucial with Google. Some websites may fall short of the bar, no matter how experienced, professional, or even authoritative they are if they don’t have the reader’s trust, and one example given from Google within their update reveals the most consequential sentence that websites need to pay attention to:
“…the content creator lacks adequate experience” means they will have a low E-E-A-T score.
For example, if the content creator reviews a restaurant, but never ate at the restaurant, they are not experienced or trustworthy, which means they have a low E-E-A-T to Google.
Let’s break it down further by looking at each component of E-E-A-T.
Experience
Experience, in Google’s eyes, offers another level of dimension they can use when evaluating content. Content must demonstrate it was assembled with a degree of experience – after all, a reader will value a person’s content more if they have life experiences on the topic and they are not basing it exclusively on research.
AI has no experience with your topic. Let’s take a look at divorce law, for example.
You want to write a blog for your law firm on the latest guideline changes for calculating child support, but you will find a few speed bumps along the way using AI to do so:
AI typically doesn’t access the latest data – so it may not even know or find the latest guidelines for calculating child support. Worse, it could create a blog on outdated guidelines that it notes as “updated.”
AI has no actual understanding of handling child support cases. AI hasn’t had to calculate what a child support payment would be based on your state, the local laws, or the parent’s income. It has definitely never filled out the child support worksheets – but you have.
If you go off the premise of why “experience” was added by Google, you can see why AI might not meet the mark. AI is not an attorney or a financial expert, and therefore, there is no SME content creation happening when you use AI to draft your blogs.
Expertise
SME content creation comes down to one important factor: credibility. A person without qualifications should not be writing a topic out of their realm of expertise. Period.
Why?
Google is unlikely to rank a website with content not written by a credible source over a website they know has content written by a believable source.
In areas where a subject matter expert is required, such as healthcare, Google has a higher level of scrutiny than things based more on personal opinion and less on facts.
Authoritativeness
Authority means you have proven you belong in the niche your website represents.
Sure, backlinks to relevant and authoritative sources will help build that authority, but only so far. If you only have quality backlinks, but don’t meet the other areas of E-E-A-T – well, you don’t have much to go on.
There’s not much more to say there. Authority is a building block, and it requires more than one block to finish your foundation.
Trustworthiness
Now, we’ve already covered where AI falls short for SME content creation, but the biggest area you are going to see harmed by the use of AI is “trust.”
Readers need to trust the content they read, and the website publishing that content, and Google has made it clear what they expect.
In fact, Google has made it evident that a website should have a clear owner, and that owner is responsible for that site.
When you are in industries that require an expert, such as legal, finance, technology, etc., the reader needs to know that a genuine SME is writing that content – not AI.
In Google’s policies update (modified March 14, 2023), they made this clearer.
In Section 2, Google notes that content distributed online cannot misrepresent the provenance of where it was developed. Meaning, if your content is AI generated, but you claim it was written by an SME, you’ve violated that AI use policy.
Likewise, impersonating an individual that is respected in the industry can be equally detrimental to your rankings. Such as using AI to create fake author bylines or even entire author profiles.
One area to pay particular attention to is Section 2c, which states that any misleading claims of “expertise” in sensitive areas, such as finance, legal, healthcare, etc., is a direct violation of of the AI use policy.
No one is going to trust content that is not written by a genuine expert in these delicate fields. While it is tempting to skirt that and just create an expert to back up AI-generated content, Google has made it abundantly clear it will not be tolerated.
Bottom Line: Flaunt Your Expertise with Genuine SME Content Creation
If you don’t have the knack for the written (typed?) word, that’s okay.
Just don’t turn to AI to create it for you.
Instead, seek out content agencies that hire genuine subject matter experts in those unique industries so that you are receiving content from a person that knows what they are talking about. They have degrees, work experience, and years of expertise writing in those niches.
While AI is permitted, Google has made it abundantly clear that they expect E-E-A-T to rule over it all, and that means if even one component of it is missing, you are risking your website’s rankings.
Let’s face it – after all of this time, we all know how hard it is to bounce back once Google has lost interest in your website. So, it is best to avoid ever reaching that point.
The team at Express Writers understands the importance of genuine SME content. We have a team of subject matter experts ranging from medical to healthcare to finance to legal and more. When you have a distinct niche, you need a team of writers that can provide your website with high-quality content and meet the demands of Google. Reach out to our team today and check out our SME content creation options, or visit the shop and order your first piece of SME content.
This post was originally published in March 2014 and completely updated in August 2020.
SEO, SMO, CMO, UXO, CRO… What does it all even mean?
It’s another one of those alphabet soups that digital marketers love, but make the rest of us want to pull out our hair.
However, if you look closely, you might notice something. Each of these acronyms has something in common.
It’s one word: optimization… Something else that digital marketers love.
Whether it’s the user experience, the search engine rankings, or the conversion rate of a website, savvy digital marketers will attempt to optimize anything and everything.
We’re going to focus on that last one right now: conversion rates.
According to research by Wordstream, the average conversion rate for a website hovers around 3%. But the top 10% of any given industry will demonstrate conversion rates of 11.45%.
How do you aspire to that jaw-dropping percentage?
You use one of the most powerful yet underrated tools in digital marketing: conversion rate optimization.
Let’s explore!
[bctt tweet=”What is CRO, or conversion rate optimization? It’s the process of tweaking your website & content to generate better conversions from existing traffic. In other words, convince them to ACT! More on the Write Blog ➡” username=”ExpWriters”]
What Is CRO in Marketing?
CRO stands for conversion rate optimization. According to HubSpot, it’s the process of adjusting your website and content to generate greater conversions from the traffic already landing on it.
Most forms of marketing focus on improving site traffic, generating better quality leads, or positioning your brand in front of your target audience. These are all important activities, but they’re only half of the marketing puzzle.
We’ve all clicked through to sites doing an amazing job marketing themselves with edgy social media posts, only to find ourselves not sold enough to commit once we’re on the landing page. This happens because the brand focused on external marketing and hasn’t optimized the user experience for conversion.
Just because you’ve attracted an audience doesn’t mean they’re showing up with cash in hand, ready to buy. In fact, only a small percentage of people who land on your site will go through with a transaction, whether it’s completing a transaction or signing up for a newsletter:
Lots of people will view your site. A handful of them will even put things into their cart, but only a sliver will go through with the sale. Source: Crazy Egg.
CRO is all about bumping up that 3.3% to a higher number by taking immediate, metric-oriented steps on your site. It’s a simple, powerful, and overlooked strategy for generating greater revenue.
No fiddling with keywords or social media settings required.
What It Really Means to Convert
Let’s talk about conversion real quick. In the simplest terms, a conversion happens when we turn one thing into another. In marketing, conversion specifically refers to people who engage in a specific desired activity that furthers your business goals. For example:
Curious readers into avid subscribers
Digital window shoppers into paying customers
Early-stage buyers into account holders
The mechanism by which you attract and convert your target audience into customers is called the sales funnel. Conversion is often considered the final step in the funnel, but you can have several smaller conversions along the way as a user moves from being a curious onlooker to a paying customer.
However, not every action a user takes represents a conversion. Conversion is not:
People clicking through from the search engine or social media to your site
People clicking around on your website
Although they’re both desirable actions, neither of these behaviors indicate that a user is moving closer to subscribing or purchasing from you.
CRO vs. SEO
SEO stands for search engine optimization. It’s the process of analyzing and optimizing your digital presence to improve your position in Google so your target readers can find you. Typically, SEO focuses on things like keywords, metadata, and content structure to boost site traffic and get noticed by potential customers.
SEO gets mixed up with CRO a lot, but the two do have quite a bit in common. In fact, it’s a good idea to focus on both as they work well together. In both cases, you’ll focus on:
Well-written, expert content that both elevates your standing in Google and improves conversion rates.
Optimized headlines, meta descriptions, and technical SEO to entice potential customers and improve the user experience.
Page layout. Well-designed pages are helpful from more than just a human perspective. They also help Google index your page and provide the most useful featured snippets.
Why CRO Matters If You Want to Succeed
Obviously, presenting a compelling user experience is important because it leads to more revenue for your brand. However, there are a few other reasons you should spend more time with CRO if you aren’t already:
1. Content Marketing Has Become the Dominant Form of Advertising Online
If you’re relying on paid outbound marketing like PPC or sponsored posts, you’re at risk of falling behind. These days, pretty much all digital marketing takes the form of content marketing. That’s an approach to marketing that emphasizes the creation of helpful, engaging content that provides your target audience with the answers they’re already searching for in Google.
It’s not enough to simply have a great product and assume your customers think you’re the obvious choice. Your customers have a lot of choices, and they want you to demonstrate your authority on the matter.
Question: Do you know HOW to demonstrate your authority using incredible content marketing? It’s time to learn. Check out my Content Strategy & Marketing Course to get the serious skills you need to make it happen.
2. CRO Forces You to Study and Adapt to Your Customers
The impressions you make on customers – often the first ones – heavily determine your conversion rates. That might seem like an obvious statement, but you’d be surprised as to how frequently this gets overlooked online.
How many times have you ever clicked onto a site and been put off by the colors, the font, or something else entirely?
According to psychology, the brand has about a tenth of a second to make a first impression.
That’s why a one-second page delay can decrease conversion rates by as much as 7 percent, or why simply changing the color of a button can increase conversion rates by 21 percent.
In the sea of content your readers sail upon every day, it’s also why 94 percent of marketers see personalization as vital to success.
But you aren’t going to know why people are clicking away unless you’ve taken the time to unravel the mysteries of customer behavior. Even worse, you may change the wrong thing and send those conversion rates plummeting further.
Signs You Need CRO for Your Site Right Now
So – you’ve done everything right. You’ve got great content on a well-planned site. Your product descriptions are the bomb. You’ve made it super easy for people to check out and you’ve got one hilarious newsletter that keeps your audience engaged.
Think you don’t need CRO? You’re dead wrong, especially if any of these signs apply to you:
You’re getting lots of traffic, but low or declining conversions. So, people are finding you. Your Google Analytics dashboard looks fantastic. Yet, sales are trickling in. That indicates something is going wrong in your funnel just before conversion, and you need to fix it.
You can’t identify where people fall out of the funnel. You’ve got half-finished signups, abandoned carts, unsubscribes galore… But you can’t spot any pattern to it all. That indicates a lack of analytics tools, and possibly a lack of understanding about the customer journey.
Consumer psychology is a new concept for you. Most of marketing hinges on understanding consumer behavior. You can’t sell to people you don’t understand.
Your website still looks exactly how you designed it… Six years ago. In 2014, mobile-optimized design was still considered cutting edge. In 2020, about 67 percent of the world accesses the web via a mobile device… And they aren’t going to waste their time on your site if it doesn’t work.
You’ve just revamped your site or are in the process of updating it. Is it “new decade, new site” time in your neck of the woods? Make sure to include someone on your development team who knows about CRO and start off with a high-converting web presence.
Customers are complaining. They might not be complaining to you, but they’re still complaining. If you’ve recently come across a Reddit post or a Yelp review talking about how difficult it is to do anything on your site, it’s time to get it looked at and optimized.
[bctt tweet=”Barriers to conversion rate optimization: ❌Requiring registration from users to access content or complete a purchase ❌Burying information like shipping charges ❌Overwhelming customers with forms. More on the Write Blog:” username=”ExpWriters”]
6 Strategies and Best Practices for CRO in Marketing
Optimizing your site for maximum conversion rates is the single most important thing you can do to improve your brand’s viability. Sometimes, all it takes is just a few tweaks to dramatically improve your audience’s response to the experience you create for them.
Unlike SEO or other forms of optimization, CRO can have immediate effects for minimum effort. That might sound too good to be true, but it’s not!
Here are six things you can do today to optimize your conversion rates and transform more readers into paying customers.
1. Identify Your Metrics Before Getting Started
Like much of digital marketing, CRO is metric-oriented and data-driven. You need this information to understand exactly what your customers are doing at any given moment while they’re interacting with your digital presence. Otherwise, you’ll be completely blind with no way to tell if any of the changes you’ve made are actually effective.
You want to track metrics that give you a good sense of how your users are interacting with your site across the board. A few I particularly like include:
Exit rate/time on site. This will tell you how long users are spending on your site before they leave it entirely. You may also want to track interactions per visit.
Cart abandonment rate. Are users filling up their carts, and then walking off without checking out? Find out how often this happens by tracking the abandonment rate.
Bounce rate. Unlike time on site, a bounce rate tracks single-page sessions. In other words, how many users are viewing only a single page before leaving?
Click-through rates. This will give you a sense of how many qualified leads are actually coming to your site.
Traffic sources. Different types of traffic sources (direct visitors vs. search visitors, for example) have different levels of engagement.
New vs.returning visitor conversion rate. Are you attracting many new customers with few of them returning? Or is most of your business from the same individuals returning over and over?
Engagement rates. Are some pages getting more attention than others? Consider looking into why.
2. Start Tracking Your User Activity Before Doing CRO Activities
If you don’t have Google Analytics for your site already, get it set up. It’ll provide many valuable insights into where your traffic is going and how people are interacting with your site.
After that, I like using heatmaps for analyzing behavior. Heatmaps show you where visitors are clicking, or where their attention gets drawn. That’s powerful for identifying where to place CTAs, how to organize content, and whether the page design is working for the content it holds.
Heatmaps, like this one from Crazy Egg, can show you exactly where users are clicking or tapping. Source: Crazy Egg.
3. Know Your Brand’s Value Proposition
Have you identified your brand’s value proposition? It’s time to do that now. A value proposition includes all of the benefits your product offers, plus a recognition of your customer’s pain points. It’s how you’ll connect with your customers and set yourself apart from the competition. (If you haven’t identified yours, HubSpot has a great guide on doing that.)
According to HubSpot, knowing and expressing your brand’s value proposition can improve your conversion rates. It:
Informs your content, especially your CTAs
Highlights your solution as relevant to your target audience
Reduces consumer anxiety surrounding the buying process
4. Analyze Your Site From Your Visitor’s Perspective
Most people go into business because of something they’re passionate about, and that’s great. But being so close to your passion project can make it difficult to spot pain points or tricky navigation that’s only easy for you because you use it every day.
When you start a site analysis, make sure to approach it from your customers’ experience. Note any unusual flows, poorly placed CTAs, or ill-chosen colors.
I also recommend you use the metrics above to try to figure out why users are behaving on a certain page in a certain way. For example, if your heatmap shows that users aren’t scrolling down a page, try to identify whether it’s a content problem or a design problem.
You may even want to consider having a third-party reviewer take a look at your site and record their experience.
Make sure you’re displaying the information your users are looking for. Source: XKCD.
5. Start with Your Lowest Hanging Fruit
Once you’ve made a list of the improvements your site needs, take a moment to prioritize them in terms of difficulty and complexity. You may have entire pages that need to be overhauled, but that can take a long time. Since CRO can have immediate effects, start with the easiest changes first. For example:
Move to more complex projects, like a new site homepage, after you’ve done the little things.
6. Don’t Be Afraid to Ask for Input
Finally, if you’re really struggling to identify strategies for optimizing your conversion rates, ask your readers! Consider running a survey on your social media, website, or newsletter. You can even gamify it with a series of fun tasks to entertain and encourage responses.
Optimization is a major goal in digital marketing, whether it’s optimizing for the search engines or conversion rates on a site. CRO is one of your most powerful tools when it comes to strategizing how to encourage readers to transform into avid subscribers or paying customers. Hopefully, I’ve left you with a few ideas about how to optimize your conversion rates and increase your revenue.
However, while you’re revitalizing your CTAs and metadata, make sure all of your content is up to par. An expert writer who knows the ins-and-outs of writing that converts can help you perfect your message to compel your readers to act.
Our guest host this week was Jess Ostroff. Jess is the Managing Editor at Convince & Convert as well as the CEO & Director at Don’t Panic Management. She joined our chat to share her tips on productivity when it comes to content marketing.
Q1: How do you maintain productivity in content marketing? What are your best tips?
Chat participants shared some amazing tips on Tuesday. Check out some of the ones that were shared:
Jess knows just how big of a difference planning can make. When you take the time to plan your content marketing efforts, you’re going to see a huge difference in terms of your productivity.
A1 Dedicated time for planning. Don’t let anything distract you then. And an editorial calendar. Track ALL your ideas #ContentWritingChat
Julia agrees in the importance of planning. Set aside time to plan your content marketing strategy and don’t let anything distract you. Just stay focused!
A1) Well honed processes/communication are key! We’re fortunate to have @jessostroff keeping us productive/accountable. #contentwritingchat
The Convince & Convert team knows well-honed processes and communication are essential. They rely on their team member, Jess, to keep them accountable.
Brainstorm ideas and then move them into your content calendar. Having a content calendar is the best way to plan everything in advance. You should also set clear goals for your content so you know which metrics are most important to track
As Jess said, before you start you need to figure out what you’re going to use to measure. She reminds us that you shouldn’t just look at the return, but you should also consider the investment as well.
A2) Listen to your customers. Know their pain points and FAQs. Winning content ideas lie there. #contentwritingchat
Andy knows you have to keep testing. Running A/B tests is a great way to see what your audience is responding to.
Q3: How do you begin the process of creating worthwhile content? Tips on planning/mapping?
The content creation process isn’t always easy, but our chat participants shared some awesome tips on Tuesday. Check out what they had to say and implement them for yourself:
A3: Of course, you can’t create anything without defining your audience and figuring out what stories THEY need to hear. #contentwritingchat
Jess said you need to start with knowing who your audience is so you can figure out what they need to hear. She then recommends considering your deadline and working backwards from there. It’s a great way to keep you on track.
If Leah needs to do some brainstorming, she takes her dogs for a walk since it’s when she does her best thinking. Sometimes getting away from the desk, moving around, and getting some fresh air makes a huge difference.
A3: Work with your team to understand your audience & figure out what’s going to get your audience talking #ContentWritingChat
If you have a team by your side, take advantage of that. Work together to understand your audience and come up with content they’ll love. Two heads are better than one, you know!
Q4: Which tools do you rely on to boost productivity in content marketing?
With so many tools available at our fingertips today, we had to ask everyone in the chat what they love to use. Here’s what some of them said:
A4: I have to say this to start: Sometimes the best tools are NO tools to start! Go outside with a pen and paper 🙂 #contentwritingchat
Sometimes you just can’t beat good ol’ pen and paper! When Jess turns to tools, she loves CoSchedule for content planning and schedule plus BuzzSumo for finding and analyzing topics.
Sarah relies on analytics to see what’s working, as well as a calendar to stay on track. The boss breathing down your neck will certainly get you moving, too!
Zala recommends setting up a system that keeps you running. It should be a combination of tools, workflow, and time to produce. Remember that what works for someone else might not work for you, so make your process your own.
Q5: How can you effectively scale your content marketing to get more ROI and reach?
Jess recommends thinking about creating at least 10 pieces of smaller content from one big piece. She said you can create graphics, sound bites, short videos, and more.
A5: Don’t create content for content’s sake. Create it to HELP your audience, solve a problem, or make them laugh. #contentwritingchat
This is another important tip from Jess. Don’t create content for content’s sake. It should serve a purpose by helping your audience, solving a problem, or making them laugh.
Lex brings up a great point about social shares. You may receive a lot of shares, but few conversions. Social sharing isn’t necessarily a sign that your business is growing because it’s not a guarantee someone actually read your content.
Jess feels predictive analytics are going to take over. She also said that people will think outside the box to form a deeper connection with smaller audience as opposed to reaching the masses.
Julia thinks Instagram Stories is where it’s at right now! She also thinks podcasting, video marketing, and webinars will continue to be powerful tools.
We look forward to seeing you at the next #ContentWritingChat! Mark your calendars weekly for Tuesday at 10 AM CDT for great chats centered around content writing and marketing. Follow @ExpWriters to stay updated on our new topics and guests!
Creating great web content online is the best way to help push site conversions and bring in awesome new clients. But, how can you create content that sells? In other words, have content ROI? Content that is crafted well has the ability to return on investment, or ROI, for your brand. In this infographic, we take a look at the top reasons you need great content, with 25 useful, fundamental tips to help you get knee-deep in the creation of copy that sells. Full transcript below. Enjoy! And if you like this, we’d love a share and comment!
Transcript
Why is Awesome Web Content Vital?
You have approximately 8 seconds to convince someone to stay – after that, you could lose them.
Around 96% of site visitors are not ready to buy yet, and content keeps them coming back until they do.
If you create and publish around 31-40 landing pages, you’re likely to generate 7 times the amount of leads than those who don’t. And 40+ generates 12 times more.
Visual content like product videos can increase purchases by 144%.
Research shows that Google consistently ranks posts over 2,500 words.
25 Surefire Ways to Create Web Content that Sells (Content ROI)
Here are some great ways to create wonderful content that can help boost your sales and bring you ROI.
Emotions Help Motivate. Emotions are an incredible way to motivate clients to act. Peer pressure, self-improvement tips, and more are excellent motivators. Weave these in your copy.
Create a Sense of Urgency. When writing your content, make sure you create a sense of urgency. Show that there is a demand for your product. Tie in brevity to urgency to compel your reader.
Create a Case Study. 63% of UK marketers think that case studies are excellent marketing tactics. You can use them to show customers information about your company and product, convincing them to choose you.
Create Evergreen Content. Well-researched, in-depth, long-form blogs that answer timeless questions are considered evergreen. These pieces can convert readers and rank you high in Google if done right. And, they’ll always stay relevant.
Have Excellent Headlines. Half of your content creation time should be spent coming up with a persuasive headline. Make it useful, have urgency, be unique, and specific. Plug in power words and adjectives to transform an otherwise typical headline.
Don’t Be Afraid to Have a Conversational Voice. Think of this like how you’d talk to a client who is also a friend over coffee. Enrich your content with a lively, fun, conversational tone. This can help immensely with building connections that will convert.
Find Your One “Thing.” Each company has a “thing” that sets them apart – yours included. Find your “thing” and focus on it with your content.
Research Audience Needs. Content that sells needs one crucial element – audience research. Know what your audience needs and create content they can use.
Stay Authentic. Marketing now requires authenticity, especially if you plan to market to millennials. Be unique, for example showcasing pictures of your office on Instagram, and your daily grind—and have fun while you’re doing it. Your brand fans will love it!
Create a Plan for Content. Plan out your content through various tools such as editorial calendars. You will find it easier to maintain a consistent content plan with one.
Make Important Info A Focus. Simple tip, but a vital reminder. This goes for pricing, calls to action, and any other pertinent info. Don’t let it get lost on site or else you’ll lose visitors.
Refine Your Approach. Compile a full list, or “brain dump,” of your ideas for content pieces. Next, narrow down and refine your approach. Create content on just a few of your narrowed-down, hot topics for impactful results.
Make Vital Points Standout. People only read about 20% of all of the content on your page – make what you want them to see stand out from the rest.
Remove Distractions. Too many choices can create higher levels of anxiety for visitors, which can negatively impact conversion rates. Focus on your highest seller or main pain point and dwindle down anything else.
Make Your Content Easy to Scan. Only 16% of readers will read all of your blog content, but 79% of visitors will scan. Writing easy-to-scan content will help you reach out to every visitor and reader. Break your content up with sub-headers.
Use the Power of One. The “power of one” helps you establish one big idea that you can focus on. This can often be your one “thing,” as well. Focus on one thought for every page or post.
Know Which Content Types Work Well. Multiple content formats are excellent, but before you jump into each, make sure you know which ones will work the best. Test, analyze, and check the engagement of your content types; and tweak or change your habits accordingly.
Utilize Visual Content. When an image is used, tweets see more engagement with 18% more tweets, 89% favorites, and 150% re-tweets. And Facebook saw a growth of 3.6x in the amount of videos used on the channel.
Write Long-Form Content. Long content gives the perception of added value, making people more likely to trust and read. Posts over 2,500 words also do very well in the rankings.
Create Relevant Content. You don’t want content that is outdated or doesn’t make sense to your audience. Instead, write content on trending topics within your industry as well as content you know your audience wants and needs to see.
Bloggers, Include a Subscription Box. Email subscription boxes are a great way to give visitors access to content, eventually converting them into leads. (For every $1 spent on email marketing, average revenue is $44.25.)
Test Different Calls to Action. Just by changing and testing the copy on their calls to action, Mozilla saw higher download rates for Firefox. They went from “Try Firefox” to “Download Firefox – Free”, and saw more clicks. Try and test actionable verbs and adjectives to convince people to click, purchase, and share your products and content.
Define Your Conversion Metrics. Define your conversion metrics by taking a look at the patterns and amount of people interacting with your content. This can help you know which content pieces work best.
Create Co-Branded Content. Working with an industry partner can bring your content to a wider audience. Consider getting together with even a competitor company to co-brand content like e-books to expand your reach.
Be Assertive In Your Writing. No one knows your product and services like you, which means you shouldn’t write hesitantly. Write with assertiveness once you know you’ve researched your facts and are presenting knowledge, and you’ll be able to convert more people.
