A few days ago I received a comment on one of Blogsessive’s older posts on SEO & keywords. That comment got me a little worried about the fact that due to people spreading incomplete information, or just putting out statements like “Google doesn’t care about keywords”, some of you might think that having a keyword strategy is pointless. This is what reader David Housman asked:

I thought that search engines had stopped factoring keywords into relevancy?

The source of this belief is probably a post published on the Google Webmaster Central Blog back in September 2009 in which Matt Cutts refers strictly to Google not making use of the keywords META tag in order to calculate a search result’s relevancy to the search query.

In other words, you could type 300 keywords of your liking there. Google will just skip them entirely and rather decide if the result is relevant only based on the content itself. This doesn’t mean that the Google bot will ignore your keywords. It means that it will consider only those keywords present on page, in the content. That’s why it is extremely important to write your blog post from both the perspective of a human reader and a search engine bot.

I’m not going to get any deeper into the topic of writing SEO friendly content. Just remember that it’s a must if you want to rank high for certain keywords and phrases. For more information please read some of the articles I have published here in the past:

• Using Keywords for Blog Optimization
• Advantages of Long Tail Keywords Optimization
• Top SEO Mistakes to Avoid
• SEO-Friendly Content is the Key
• How to check and improve your WordPress SEO

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There are billions of blogs in the blogosphere. People always say that creating another blog might not be the better thing since almost everything online is saturated. Of course, that’s a complete baloney! Fortunately 60-70% of blogs don’t get traction and just couldn’t seem to make progress. And it’s because of several reasons which I wouldn’t want to talk about here.

Most people fall into this big misconception about blogging. This misconception is about “post and publish”. People think that the key to getting traffic is by creating a killer post, then publishing it. We all know it’s not the case. If no one reads your blog, then no one is even going to notice you created a good post! Obviously the one thing you have to do is to let people know “you” exists in the blogosphere. How? By spreading your content. Today I would like to talk about how you can possibly triple your traffic by spreading your content. Without further “fluff” here they are:

• Social Networking – I don’t understand why a lot of people are so much into the saturated social bookmarking when they have the whole social networking sites to work from! Look, how many of you have accounts in Friendster, MySpace, Facebook, Hi5, Bebo, etc? I have, and I have an average of 500 contacts on each of them. If you can let your article reach them without sounding spammy then it can bring you a lot. I have done it with my blog and so far I don’t see any saturation in what I am doing.
• Your Article into Podcast – Seriously I am flabbergasted with podcasts nowadays. I always thought before that it’s lame and doesn’t really make much sense to me. But look how a lot of people are using (and consuming) it now. Now you can use a little service known as Odiogo. What Odiogo does is turn your posts into podcasts and have them downloadable. It also has a nice WordPress plugin that you can easily integrate in your blog.
• Your Article into PDF’s – A lot of people hasn’t used this method and frankly I haven’t yet but I think it worths a mention here. Post2PDF is a little WordPress plugin that turns your posts into PDF formats. And it doesn’t end there. You can then go to some famous forums related to your niche and spread it in the freebies section. Now make no mistake about it, people absolutely LOVE free eBooks and stuffs (just look at the forums). If you’re content is a hit, then prepare for truckloads of traffic and subscribers.
• Your Article into Video Posts – Unfortunately there is no software that can possibly convert an article into a video, but you can always take some time to do it yourself. Do a video on one of your killer posts, then submit it to TubeMogul. TubeMogul basically submits your video to famous video directories like YouTube, Vimeo and a lot more. Signing up for an account is free and it’s a very nice tool to get viral very easy.
• Tweet It! – Since Twitter has been one of the most talked about web application nowadays, I can’t help but talk about it too. Twitterfeed is a very cool plugin that basically posts (automatically) the latest article on your blog. Twitthis is another cool tool which enables your readers to tweet the post for you. Whether you have just 100 followers or 20K+ followers, these tools can really get the job done for you.

You can see that the key to getting traffic is getting viral and spreading yourself in as many places as you possibly can without being annoying. The truth about blogging (in my opinion) is that what you can get is based on how much “smart” effort you exerted on it. By doing the steps above, maybe you can get your blog known for a wider audience and have your traffic increased. What say you?

About the Author

Melvin Dichoso is an 18-year old internet marketer who’s been working in the internet for over a year. He’s currently taking up BS Computer Science and is planning to work in internet full-time sometime in the future. He blogs at Melvin Blog dot com where he shares his personal tack on internet geeky stuffs. If you find the article interesting, do take the time to subscribe to his feed.

Blogsessive is always open to guest posters. If you feel like your articles do match Blogsessive’s line of content and quality, contact me.

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What is SEO-friendly content and why is it important? Where is the limit between helpful and spam? The answers to these questions are essential to producing high quality, high ranking web content.

What is SEO-friendly content?

Basically, SEO-friendly content is the type of content that is both interesting and helpful for your blog readers as well as attractive for search engine spiders, which leads to better rankings.

Think of this kind of content as the intersection of publishing high quality posts with the search user’s need to find that relevant, quality content. It’s the most basic search engine promotion you could do.

Creating SEO friendly content is by no means an easy task, nor a short term one. The “maintenance” is very important and insures that your search engine rankings are at least kept, if not improved.

Since optimized content can be of great help when it comes to blog and community growth, relevant organic traffic, bounce rate improvement, awareness and much more, you can imagine that these kinds of services don’t come cheap. But, don’t worry, with practice, you’ll find out that it’s not that hard to transform your articles in pretty decent SEO-friendly web content.

Effective optimization techniques

The first and most important thing you need to consider is your readers / future readers. Try approaching from your readers’ perspective. Is your content something of interest? If so, is it presented in an easily readable form?

Targeting simple keywords

The next step is to select the appropriate keywords to target in the optimization process. When it comes to keywords, the best thing to do is think natural. The more natural and simplistic way to express a “need”, the more chances that keyword will be one with a high level of searches.

Look at the little comic strip above and consider this. A publisher writes a review of the “Dark Knight Movie”. Users that want to see that movie will most likely do a search for a review. Which of the following keyword phrases do you think will perform best in searches?

• Review of the Dark Knight movie;
• Dark Knight movie review;
• Dark Knight review.

If we take a look at the results suggested by Google’s Keyword Tool, we’ll find the following statistics based on approximate average search volume:

1. Dark Knight review – 14.800 searches;
2. The Dark Knight review (variation) – 8100 searches;
3. Dark Knight movie review – 880 searches;
4. Review of the Dark Knight movie – irrelevant or very few searches.

So, you see how simplifying the targeted search query is more likely to put you in the spotlight for a higher amount of organic traffic. Repeat the process until you come up with a list of related keywords, to help support the main keyword throughout the post and to avoid unnecessary repetitions and stuffing.

Using the selected keywords

Now that you have a primary phrase to optimize for and a few support phrases, make sure to spread them seamlessly throughout the article. When it feels natural to do so, use bold text or italic (emphasis), but don’t simply bold out entire blocks. That will only hurt your optimization level.

Start from the beginning by using your main phrase in the first sentence or paragraph. Depending on the length of your post, you can try repeating a few times, as long as it does not sound bad for a reader. Repetitions can drive away your visitors and search engines both, as their spiders are “trained” to think and read based on a human model.

Use your main phrase in subtitles and, obviously, in the post title too. Add it to the post’s Meta tags, along with the support keywords. I’ve explained before how you can fine tune your blog to turn your post’s title into a SEO title.

If possible, try adding pictures (relevant for your readers) and use your keywords as ALT text for those images. Sure a search engine spider will not see the actual image, but image oriented spiders like Google’s Image Search will definitely be on the lookout for that alternate text.

You can read one of my previous articles for more tips on keyword optimization.

Conclusions

SEO friendly content is the best investment you can when it comes to your blog’s search engine promotion. It generates natural results with real people reading your posts, based on their needs. And when that happens, the path to conversion is at least half way taken.

Regardless to what some people think, there’s nothing wrong with helping out good content find its way to interested search engine users, as long as you don’t go overboard and turn into search engine spam. The line is thin.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

There’s this saying that goes around that “content is king“, which I’m sure that we all agree upon, but what does it mean? Why is it that so many people recommend writing high quality, original content and why some blogs don’t really make it big, despite the quality posts they publish? Let’s take a closer look at this matter and find out what it takes to make a king out of your content.

A king without a kingdom

Just like most websites, a blog is defined by many attributes. Among them, the most notable are the content, the design, the usability and its visibility. Excelling in any one of these categories, but ignoring the others will not be sufficient to make your blog stand out.

Think of your content as a king without a kingdom. Who is it going to rule over? How will people find your content if it doesn’t get enough internet and search engine exposure? How will readers navigate through your older posts if you don’t guide them or give them the required tools to find what they are looking for. How do you expect them to react if your blog looks like thousands of other blogs available out there? Why would they expect yours to be different if you don’t take the time to at least make it look different?

It’s highly important that you work on the whole ensemble of things that can improve your blog’s quality, before thinking of making a king out of your content.

Blog design and usability tips

Before making any decision on your blog’s design, keep in mind that a blog is meant to be read, not admired. Starting from here, consider the following:

Use web-friendly fonts in sizes that make them readable on most screen resolutions. Sans serif fonts (Arial, Verdana, Tahoma) are the most readable fonts used online, unlike pure serif fonts (Times New Roman, Georgia), which are more readable on printed materials. A size of 12 pixels/points or more should make them visible on most resolutions.

Go for a fixed website layout instead of a fluid (screen resolution dependent) one. While some readers might prefer a website that stretches to fit the entire amount of available screen space, the majority might have a problem reading extremely long lines of text. Find a resolution (between 900 and 950 pixels should be OK) and stick with it.

If going for a fixed layout width, then center it on the screen. People with bigger screen resolutions will see a lot of unused space around your blog or on the right of it. By splitting this unused, white space into two equal parts, on the left and on the right of your blog, the sensation of too much unused space will be minimized.

Use dark fonts on white or light backgrounds. Studies have confirmed that black on white is much easier to read than white on black, and is more relaxing also, allowing your visitors to read more without feeling tired.

Right hand sidebars are more user-friendly. No matter if you have one sidebar or one large one split into two smaller ones, keeping the sidebars on the right has its advantages. First of all, think about the fact that every browser (few exceptions) has the scroll bar on the right and people do use it a lot. It would the helpful to provide your visitors with more navigation options in the same area. Further more, code-wise, a sidebar positioned on the right, will most likely generate the code after your content’s code, which is a positive thing when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO).

Ease your visitor’s path with more/enough navigation and search options. That search form is basically built in every blog template, but how about suggesting people some related or popular posts on your blog? Maybe even a personal favorites list, like I did with the “Best Of” section, here, on Blogsessive?

If content is king, promotion is the court’s jester

Obviously, great content without enough promotion will simply remain great UNREAD content, and we wouldn’t want that. So, what should be done?

Network, network, network. You’ve heard this already, but it’s really important. Make friends; join discussions on blogs, on forums, on social media website. The more friends and loyal readers you gather, the bigger the chances of having your content promoted well.

Find the social media networks that work for you. Don’t simply take someone’s advice that DIGG is the God of social media, or who knows what other website they’ll point you to. Try out more and see which one brings the best results.

Learn and apply at least some basic SEO on your blog. No one says you have to be an expert in search engine optimization. Just learn enough to keep a clean and search engine friendly website. Result will soon start to show in an increasing amount of visits from search engines, with queries relevant to your content. If those visitors will be happy with what they’ve found, chances are that you’ll turn them into future readers or even subscribers.

Start some contests, offer some freebies. Free stuff is always nice and appreciated, but remember to always offer good quality freebies. If you’re going to give away junk you might just get an opposite reaction from your visitors.

The coronation of a king

As I’ve said before, a king without a kingdom cannot exists, so take your time to build your blog from the most basic item that you can work on to improve. Only by having a rock solid foundation you can make a true king out of your content, and YES, content is king!

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We’ve all been there, whether we’re talking about blogging tips, games, gadgets or celebrity gossip! Content crisis is one of blogger’s biggest nightmares, making us lose sleep hours, jump meals and drink tons of coffee. Facing such a situation could be a daunting task especially for niche bloggers, since their topics are much more restrictive that those of a “all-about-everything” type of blog.

When starting a new blog, every blogger feels like he/she has lots of interesting things to share with the world. If you follow closely one such blog, you’ll definitely see a higher publishing rate in the first months, but as time passes, bloggers publish less often.

I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, as long as it is consistent, and consistency is one the greatest things a blog can achieve. With time, people get over that publish-everything fury and start dealing with more important matters, writing more insightful posts, in one word, they evolve.

But even when taking their blogging skills to a higher level, bloggers have to face the challenge of creative new, interesting and why not, intriguing content.

My Ways to Face the Content Crisis

By now, I guess you’ve figured out that I’m a blogger (surprise!), so why should I be an exception when it comes to this struggle on creating new content? I’m not, and these are my ways to face a content crisis:

1. I get out. Shut down the computer, leave the blogosphere, jump on my motorcycle and take a ride outside the city. I’m not saying you’ll have to buy a bike to get over the crisis, just leave your everyday routine and simply enjoy life as non-bloggers do. You’ll be amazed how many topics for your blog you’ll find right there, on the streets, in the park, or simply by clearing you mind through a walk.
2. I read the news. May it be a news website, or new articles on all those social bookmarking websites; it is always a good ways to generate fresh ideas by reading other people’s writings on topics of your interest.
3. I read the comments on Blogsessive. As I always try to create conversational posts, I’m fortunate to have people leaving interesting comments. That’s always a great source of inspiration.
4. I follow the discussions on some of the biggest and most active communities. Most times, going through the comments of a post on ProBlogger or Copyblogger is as fascinating as reading the post itself. You should try it too.
5. I Google it. Whenever I have a vague idea of a topic, I Google it and try to get the most useful information out it. When reading what everyone else has to say about it, you might just be the lucky one to blog about something that others have missed, or simply share your own views on the matter.
6. I write ahead. It’s always good to have one or two draft posts, ready to be published whenever you’re facing a crisis. If time is too short to write a whole post, at least write a good title and leave yourself some notes on the post’s structure and idea. As time passes, they’ll be useful, just so you don’t forget what it was about.
7. I make friends. Making friends with bloggers in your niche is not only a good traffic and authority tool, but also a great way to secure quality content when in need. Having a close friend, willing to exchange guest posts with you in less inspired moments can be a God’s gift.
8. Have you checked Wikipedia lately? Try searching for your topics of interest. You’ll always find useful information there and it’s a good way to back your affirmations as well.
9. Take a short break. Spend one or two days away from your blog – you can even announce it – and come back with a fresh mind, motivated again.
10. Although, I not a big fan of it, you can always hire a freelance writer to create a few back up posts, but be careful who you choose. The internet is full of so called specialists and article rewriters. Unique, quality content comes with a price and when you’re talking about your blog, losing your readers against a few more bucks is simply not worth it.

These are my tips on facing a content crisis situation and I hope you’ll find them useful.

Over to you

Have you dealt before with similar situations? What do you do to overcome them?

Photo credits to Cristina Chirtes.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive

The quality of the reader’s experience is essential to your blog’s success. It is most important that you deliver original, interesting and well-written content every time you hit the “Publish Post” button. The way you manage to deliver this content will finally result in your reader’s reaction toward your blog. So, whenever you want to publish a new article, you should consider the following blogging tips:

1. Choose a topic

And stick with it. We live in a dynamic era. People have less and less time to spend for themselves or to look for information. Deliver you content in a straight-forward way, without altering the subject.

2. The Title is your best ally

Whenever you decide to post a new article, try to extract the essence of the topic and formulate one short, descriptive title that perfectly represents the information that unfolds below. The shorter and more expressive the title, the easier for people to find it, remember it and recommend it.

3. Unique content

Provide your users with unique content. It’s very hard these days, but it’s well worth it. If your topic has been approached before by other bloggers, it doesn’t mean that you can’t express your opinions on the subject. Just keep in mind the fact that readers tend to read multiple sources for a topic and select the most representative and clean information they find. Who knows, maybe you’ll find those who share your point of view on the matter.

4. Write for people

Some bloggers tend to write their articles in a fanatic-SEO way. It’s always good to use representative keywords in your post, but don’t exaggerate. Your most important friend is the reader. The better the reader’s experience, the better your blog will rank in search listings. Those indexing bots that everyone talks about have been developed, after all, by humans. You might fool them once, but does it worth the risk?

5. Use images

Only when they provide help for a better understanding of a term/fact/topic. A picture is worth a thousand words, but keep in mind that blogging is about writing, not drawing.

6. Reference

Give your article more credibility. Provide users with good reference to your content so that if a reader wants to find out more information on the topic, he/she will have the right tools at his/her disposal, making your website the perfect start for a future knowledge development.

7. Link building

If other bloggers have approached the same topic with interesting content, relate you content to theirs. This will attract fellow bloggers to you website and so help you develop a good linking system. The key to the success of this step resides in the quality of your content.

8. Use tags

Think of tags as if they were keywords. They are helpful for indexing bots, but most important, they help readers find related, relevant content. Pick your tags carefully, in perfect sync with the provided information.

9. Cross article reference

If, in the past, you have published similar or related articles, make sure to include them in your new post as related posts. This will help users find more content on your blog, spend more time and create more page views. If you use an ad system, I’m sure that the importance of those page views is familiar to you.

10. Respond to comments

Take a moment and engage your readers in a discussion. It’s always nice to show your appreciation to those that give a few minutes of their busy life to comment your posts.

Finally, consider these blogging tips, not as secure paths to success, but as ways to ensure the quality of your readers’ experience.

Free PDF eBook: Corporate Blogging Guide by Blogsessive