Do you use Facebook lookalike audiences? Are you aware of Facebook’s recent changes to lookalike audiences? In this article, you’ll learn what’s changed with Facebook lookalike audiences and discover four lookalikes to use with Facebook and Instagram ads. Changes to Facebook Lookalike Audience Creation Facebook recently introduced a big change in how you create lookalike […]
Building consistent organic search traffic is every digital publisher’s dream. But what does it really take to make your content SEO friendly?
The good news is it is not a rocket science.
On top of that, despite what many people think, it has nothing to do with “tricking” Google into thinking your content is high-quality or SEO friendly.
SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization”, which basically means making sure a search algorithm can easily access and understand your content. There’s no dark art involved.
Here are the steps you should take to make your content SEO friendly:
1. Match Your Content Idea to a Searchable Phrase (Search Query)
So you have an idea in mind which you feel like writing about. This is where any content creation starts: “I have something to say on this topic, and I feel like it will be interesting and/or useful”.
Is anyone searching for this topic?
Chances are, if you have come up with the topic, there should be other people who may feel intrigued enough to research it in Google.
But how exactly are people searching for it?
This is the key question you should ask if you want to generate organic search engine traffic to your future content.
You need to know what people type in a search box when trying to find answers to questions you are covering in your content.
So your first step is to find those actual search queries.
This exercise is also useful because it helps research. Knowing what people are typing in Google’s search box will likely help you discover interesting angles, narrow your initial idea down to make it more specific and even structure your future article to make it more useful.
So even if you don’t really care about organic search positions, keyword research is useful to do.
These days, we have a variety of tools that help you identify a keyword to focus on. Here are a few tools and approaches you can try:
1.1. Type Your Terms into Ahrefs
Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer is a great tool for that because it offers “All keyword ideas” tab that broadens your initial idea to related and synonymous terms.
So if you were to type [grow tomatoes] and click through to that section, you’d find both phrases containing the term (e.g. “how to grow tomatoes”) and related concepts (e.g. “when to plant tomatoes“):
This broadens your outlook and helps you come up with more words to include in your copy.
1.2. Discover What Your Future Competitor is Ranking For
If you’ve done at least some research on your content idea, you may have found some resources that are on the same or similar topic. So use those URLs to discover what they are ranking for.
Serpstats’ URL Analysis section is great for that:
Notice that Serpstat is also showing all “extra” search elements that show up for each query in Google, so you get a good idea of what your future target SERPs (search engine result pages) may look like.
Note that both of these platforms offer “keyword difficulty” metric signaling of the level of your future organic competition. Obviously, the lower the keyword difficulty is, the better.
On the other hand, the higher the search volume, the more clicks each SERP may drive. So you want to try and pick a keyword that has high search volume and low keyword difficulty.
While the process of researching keywords hasn’t changed much, the way we use keywords within content has.
These days, we don’t sacrifice the quality or flow of our copy for the sake of keyword density. In fact, we don’t pay attention to how many times we have used those keywords on-page.
We do use those keywords in prominent places on the page to make both Google and our human visitors more comfortable and confident there.
To put it simply, upon landing on your page, your users should clearly see terms they initially typed in the search box. That will put them more at ease and prompt them to linger a bit longer.
Keyword prominence means making your keywords visible on the page. It helps both search engine optimization and user-retention. Both of these help rankings.
Basically, you want those keywords to appear in:
Page title
Page URL slug (which in WordPress will be transferred from your title anyway)
First paragraph
Page subheading(s)
Image alt text (Do make those alt text descriptive as it helps accessibility)
Many SEO plugins (like Yoast and SEO Editor) can handle a lot of these SEO elements, so it is a good idea to pick one.
3. Use Semantic Analysis to Match Google’s Expectations and Make Your Content More Indepth
As I have already stated before, Google has moved away from matching the exact query to the pages in its index. Ever since its Hummingbird update, Google has slowly but surely become better and better at understanding each query context and searcher’s intent behind it.
To match that context better and optimize for the intent, use semantic analysis, which is basically about clustering each query into underlying and related concepts and covering you in your content.
Text Optimizer is a tool that takes Google’s search snippets for any query and applies semantic analysis to identify areas of improvement. Text Optimizer can be used for writing new content from scratch:
You can also use the tool to analyze your existing content to identify areas of improvements:
As you can see, Text Optimizer also helps analyze whether your content meets the query intent.
To increase your score at Text Optimizer:
Choose the most suitable words for your content and include them naturally into your article. Avoid keyword stuffing. Only choose terms that you find fitting your current context.
You may modify sentences or write new ones until you reach at least 80%
4. Diversify Your Content Formats
Google loves textual content, but the Internet in general and Google in particular has moved beyond text-only. Web users expect to see more formats, including videos and images. And Google recognizes that demand for content diversity, so it will feature all of those content formats.
In my previous article for Convince and Convert I described how videos improve SEO on many levels, including more exposure in search engine result pages and better on-page engagement.
With that in mind, any time you work on your article, think which other content assets can be created to enhance its value and improve SEO.
Luckily, creating videos doesn’t require any budget or skills. With tools like InVideo you can turn your articles into videos in a matter of seconds:
Select “I want to convert article into video” option
Paste in a maximum of 50 sentences (I usually use the tool to turn my article takeaways or subheadings into a video)
Pick the template and let the tool do the job
You can upload your own images (screenshots), tweak the subtitles and select the music
You are done! Now, upload the video to Youtube, add a keyword-rich title and description and embed it to your article.
For images, you can use Venngage or Visme to create nice visual takeaways or flowcharts (in case you have instructions to follow).
5. Set up an On-Page SEO Monitoring Routine
Finally, there’s always room for improvement, so monitoring your organic traffic is an important step here.
The must-have tool for that is Google’s own Search Console, which will show you which queries are sending you traffic. Just check your “Performance” tab regularly:
Another useful tool to have is Finteza, which shows your organic traffic performance allowing you to dig deeper to see whether your organic traffic clicks engage with your ads.
… or whether each search query sends traffic that brings conversions.
6. Don’t Forget External (Off-Site) Signals
Obviously, it is more to Google position than on-page optimization. You still need those backlinks that would help Google assign some authority to your content. But that’s a topic outside of the scope of this article. Besides, there’s a lot of content already written on that. And here’s another collection of tips on how to build links.
I hope this guide will help you optimize your content to make it easier for Google to understand and hence help the search giant’s algorithm assign search positions it truly deserves.
Building consistent organic search traffic is every digital publisher’s dream. But what does it really take to make your content SEO friendly?
The good news is it is not a rocket science.
On top of that, despite what many people think, it has nothing to do with “tricking” Google into thinking your content is high-quality or SEO friendly.
SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization”, which basically means making sure a search algorithm can easily access and understand your content. There’s no dark art involved.
Here are the steps you should take to make your content SEO friendly:
1. Match Your Content Idea to a Searchable Phrase (Search Query)
So you have an idea in mind which you feel like writing about. This is where any content creation starts: “I have something to say on this topic, and I feel like it will be interesting and/or useful”.
Is anyone searching for this topic?
Chances are, if you have come up with the topic, there should be other people who may feel intrigued enough to research it in Google.
But how exactly are people searching for it?
This is the key question you should ask if you want to generate organic search engine traffic to your future content.
You need to know what people type in a search box when trying to find answers to questions you are covering in your content.
So your first step is to find those actual search queries.
This exercise is also useful because it helps research. Knowing what people are typing in Google’s search box will likely help you discover interesting angles, narrow your initial idea down to make it more specific and even structure your future article to make it more useful.
So even if you don’t really care about organic search positions, keyword research is useful to do.
These days, we have a variety of tools that help you identify a keyword to focus on. Here are a few tools and approaches you can try:
1.1. Type Your Terms into Ahrefs
Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer is a great tool for that because it offers “All keyword ideas” tab that broadens your initial idea to related and synonymous terms.
So if you were to type [grow tomatoes] and click through to that section, you’d find both phrases containing the term (e.g. “how to grow tomatoes”) and related concepts (e.g. “when to plant tomatoes“):
This broadens your outlook and helps you come up with more words to include in your copy.
1.2. Discover What Your Future Competitor is Ranking For
If you’ve done at least some research on your content idea, you may have found some resources that are on the same or similar topic. So use those URLs to discover what they are ranking for.
Serpstats’ URL Analysis section is great for that:
Notice that Serpstat is also showing all “extra” search elements that show up for each query in Google, so you get a good idea of what your future target SERPs (search engine result pages) may look like.
Note that both of these platforms offer “keyword difficulty” metric signaling of the level of your future organic competition. Obviously, the lower the keyword difficulty is, the better.
On the other hand, the higher the search volume, the more clicks each SERP may drive. So you want to try and pick a keyword that has high search volume and low keyword difficulty.
While the process of researching keywords hasn’t changed much, the way we use keywords within content has.
These days, we don’t sacrifice the quality or flow of our copy for the sake of keyword density. In fact, we don’t pay attention to how many times we have used those keywords on-page.
We do use those keywords in prominent places on the page to make both Google and our human visitors more comfortable and confident there.
To put it simply, upon landing on your page, your users should clearly see terms they initially typed in the search box. That will put them more at ease and prompt them to linger a bit longer.
Keyword prominence means making your keywords visible on the page. It helps both search engine optimization and user-retention. Both of these help rankings.
Basically, you want those keywords to appear in:
Page title
Page URL slug (which in WordPress will be transferred from your title anyway)
First paragraph
Page subheading(s)
Image alt text (Do make those alt text descriptive as it helps accessibility)
Many SEO plugins (like Yoast and SEO Editor) can handle a lot of these SEO elements, so it is a good idea to pick one.
3. Use Semantic Analysis to Match Google’s Expectations and Make Your Content More Indepth
As I have already stated before, Google has moved away from matching the exact query to the pages in its index. Ever since its Hummingbird update, Google has slowly but surely become better and better at understanding each query context and searcher’s intent behind it.
To match that context better and optimize for the intent, use semantic analysis, which is basically about clustering each query into underlying and related concepts and covering you in your content.
Text Optimizer is a tool that takes Google’s search snippets for any query and applies semantic analysis to identify areas of improvement. Text Optimizer can be used for writing new content from scratch:
You can also use the tool to analyze your existing content to identify areas of improvements:
As you can see, Text Optimizer also helps analyze whether your content meets the query intent.
To increase your score at Text Optimizer:
Choose the most suitable words for your content and include them naturally into your article. Avoid keyword stuffing. Only choose terms that you find fitting your current context.
You may modify sentences or write new ones until you reach at least 80%
4. Diversify Your Content Formats
Google loves textual content, but the Internet in general and Google in particular has moved beyond text-only. Web users expect to see more formats, including videos and images. And Google recognizes that demand for content diversity, so it will feature all of those content formats.
In my previous article for Convince and Convert I described how videos improve SEO on many levels, including more exposure in search engine result pages and better on-page engagement.
With that in mind, any time you work on your article, think which other content assets can be created to enhance its value and improve SEO.
Luckily, creating videos doesn’t require any budget or skills. With tools like InVideo you can turn your articles into videos in a matter of seconds:
Select “I want to convert article into video” option
Paste in a maximum of 50 sentences (I usually use the tool to turn my article takeaways or subheadings into a video)
Pick the template and let the tool do the job
You can upload your own images (screenshots), tweak the subtitles and select the music
You are done! Now, upload the video to Youtube, add a keyword-rich title and description and embed it to your article.
For images, you can use Venngage or Visme to create nice visual takeaways or flowcharts (in case you have instructions to follow).
5. Set up an On-Page SEO Monitoring Routine
Finally, there’s always room for improvement, so monitoring your organic traffic is an important step here.
The must-have tool for that is Google’s own Search Console, which will show you which queries are sending you traffic. Just check your “Performance” tab regularly:
Another useful tool to have is Finteza, which shows your organic traffic performance allowing you to dig deeper to see whether your organic traffic clicks engage with your ads.
… or whether each search query sends traffic that brings conversions.
6. Don’t Forget External (Off-Site) Signals
Obviously, it is more to Google position than on-page optimization. You still need those backlinks that would help Google assign some authority to your content. But that’s a topic outside of the scope of this article. Besides, there’s a lot of content already written on that. And here’s another collection of tips on how to build links.
I hope this guide will help you optimize your content to make it easier for Google to understand and hence help the search giant’s algorithm assign search positions it truly deserves.
Editor note: At the start of the new year, I thought it would be a good idea to kick off with a tech article. because, like it or not, technology will play a larger and larger part in all our lives, whether we are writers, bloggers or freelancers. And QR code has been around a […]
Many years ago, I had an opportunity to hang out with The Black Keys and I learned the most important lesson of my life about monetizing a personal brand.
First of all, if you’re not familiar with The Black Keys, go check out this band. They are such a fun, raw and bluesy rock act … and one of my favorites!
But back to the story.
When I got to meet The Black Keys, they were not playing stadiums and arenas like they are now. They were playing clubs that might hold 1,000 people. But they were definitely moving up. They seemed to have a tremendous amount of momentum and had just recorded a huge album with the famous producer Danger Mouse.
I asked Patrick Carney, the drummer for the group, what their pivot point had been. What was the one event or moment that seemed to boost their trajectory to the big time? This was a vital question for me as I was in the process of building my own personal brand. I was no rock band, and I’ve never had an intent to play arenas, but I was trying to be “known” in the digital marketing business.
His answer surprised me.
Slow and steady
“There was no singular event,” he said. “We just keep making steady progress. Each album does a little better than the last one. You just keep moving forward, building your audience one show at a time.”
If you look at the band’s career this certainly played out. The next time I saw the Black Keys, they were playing in front of 3,000 people at an amphitheater in Columbus and a few years later they were filling arenas like Madison Square Garden. Today they are one of the biggest rock acts in the world.
So what does this mean to you and me?
The myth of viral
As I look at the people who are making in the digital/social media space, there is not one person who was “an overnight success.” Social media pioneer Chris Brogan once famously said that it took him three years to get his first 100 blog readers. A few years later, he was the leading speaker in the business.
There is too much attention placed on the hope of “going viral.” I have had several articles go viral, achieving thousands of shares, likes, and comments. Here is how it helped my business: zip.
Here is a chart depicting the number of subscribers to my blog since 2013 (and I actually began blogging in 2009):
Slow and steady. Each year is a little better than the next. Just like The Black Keys.
The trendline for my podcast downloads looks the same way.
Whether you’re a band or a blogger, it’s highly unlikely you’re going to experience a “big boom” that puts you on a path of fame and fortune. You just establish your voice, create that content, and keep grinding it out, year after year.
By the way, my most “viral” article (Content Shock) was published in early January 2014. Look at the graph to see the impact it had on my subscribers — nothing! There is no substitute for determined, steady progress.
Eventually, if you work hard and stick with it, you can gain enough critical mass to monetize an audience.
I didn’t have a paying sponsor for my Marketing Companion podcast until year three. I didn’t make noticeable money on my books until my fifth publication, The Content Code, in year six of my “second career.” I struggled for three years before I was getting speaking gigs that paid meaningful money.
There is no quick shortcut to building a personal brand.
An audience that matters
Monetizing a personal brand depends on just one thing.
Are you ready for this?
You have to build a sizable audience that cares about you. An audience that matters. That just can’t happen overnight.
I do a lot of one-on-one coaching in this space and this issue is by far the biggest misconception people have about building a personal brand.
People who hire me often need money NOW and they want to know how to make money through their blogging or podcasting in a matter of weeks or months.
Can’t happen.
It takes years. In fact, you need to adopt a three-year mindset to achieve meaningful success with your personal brand.
In my popular book KNOWN: The handbook for building and unleashing your personal brand in the digital age, I include a lot of research that backs up this idea of slow and steady. I plot out a four-step process to build your personal brand, but on average, it took about two and a half years for the successful people I profiled in the book to create a personal brand that “tips.”
In my interviews for KNOWN, I asked people successful in a wide range of industries what made them different. The words I heard were “tenacity,” “persistence,” and “resilience.”
Monetizing a personal brand
I don’t want to dissuade you or depress you, but I needed to provide a realistic view of your path to personal branding success.
Here are the facts about personal branding today:
In many cases, the personal brand IS the corporate brand.
A personal brand is transferrable between careers and can offer sustainable competitive advantage.
A meaningful personal brand can be a hedge against economic downturns.
Standing out as a personality may be the only thing that saves you in a world of automation.
Monetizing a personal brand can lead to deep fulfillment and a rewarding career.
So this is important! But you have to take that first step, and above all, you have to be patient about building that audience who loves you.
Make sense?
Mark Schaefer is the chief blogger for this site, executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions, and the author of several best-selling digital marketing books. He is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.
Illustration courtesy Unsplash.com. Photo of Black Keys courtesy Flickr Creative Commons
Editor note: At the start of the new year, I thought it would be a good idea to kick off with a tech article. because, like it or not, technology will play a larger and larger part in all our lives, whether we are writers, bloggers or freelancers. And QR code has been around a […]
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, in year six of my “second career.” I struggled for three years before I was getting speaking gigs that paid meaningful money.
, I include a lot of research that backs up this idea of slow and steady. I plot out a four-step process to build your personal brand, but on average, it took about two and a half years for the successful people I profiled in the book to create a personal brand that “tips.”
Mark Schaefer is the chief blogger for this site, executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions, and the author of several best-selling 