Is your website lacking in high-quality content? That’s probably why you’re “invisible” in search results! Here are some content marketing best practices broken down into core pillars for a long-term strategy that enhances your website’s online presence and authority.
How Does Content Marketing Help With SEO?
Think of SEO and content strategy as two sides of the same coin: when you make high-quality content, your SEO gets stronger. When your SEO strategy is strong, your content performs better. Content marketing elevates your website’s authority by ranking for a variety of keywords, supporting internal linking, earning backlinks, and more.
The 7 P’s of Content Marketing
1. Purpose
The first thing you should always ask is: What is the purpose of this piece of content? For example, is it meant to build awareness, generate leads, retain attention, or educate? Content flops when it doesn’t have a meaningful “why” to back it up.
2. People
The next question to ask is: Who is this content for? In order to understand how to connect with your target audience, you must research their needs, motivations, and pain points. Without audience analysis, your content will become background noise, and they’ll find solutions to their needs elsewhere.
3. Plan
Planning a consistent content strategy is one of the most important content marketing best practices. You can’t expect results if you only create content when you get time; you must have a content calendar (with a smart SEO strategy behind it) and stick to it.
4. Production
Whether you’re writing content for your website, social media posts, or paid ads, content should always:
- Include high-ranking keywords: research what your audience is searching for and what keywords you have the best chance of ranking for.
- Have clear messaging: use simple, conversational language that incorporates the overall tone of your business.
- Answer questions: your website should be the authority concerning your target niche, or else you’ll be invisible in AI search engine answers.
- Have a call to action: CTAs encourage engagement and help you connect with your audience on a deeper level.
Does AI content rank in Google? It certainly can, as long as it meets Google’s guidelines for quality content. A lot of AI-written content can be weak, especially when it comes to real-world experience and authoritativeness, two of Google’s quality signals. This is where editing and personalizing the content to fit your brand is crucial.
5. Promotion
You’ve written your content, so now what? Instead of just publishing and hoping for the best, content requires strategic distribution that’s driven by data, analytics, and insights. Organic SEO isn’t determined just by ranking in traditional search engines but also by being referenced in AI search results.
A content marketing strategy also benefits from multiple platforms and channels, such as social media, paid ads (yes, they can still be effective), as well as email and SMS marketing.
6. Personalization
Generic content providing surface-level information won’t help you improve SEO. Another one of the content marketing best practices is personalizing and segmenting content based on different groups or stages in the marketing funnel.
7. Performance
Evaluating your content marketing ROI is essential for constantly improving, adapting, and growing your business online. Metrics such as engagement, traffic, conversions, and retention matter, but they aren’t the entire picture either.
This is where online marketing experts like IMEG can help: we know what works and what doesn’t in addition to what data is most important to pay attention to, and what results aren’t as significant as you might think.
IMEG: The Best Content Marketing Agency
These best practices in content marketing can drive sustainable business growth when applied correctly. If you want to work with one of the top content marketing agencies that can partner with you and lend their expertise, get in touch with us today!
