Every single day billions of people take on Google to search for information about how to solve problems, gain new knowledge, and learn about products and services.
By making blogging part of your brand’s content marketing strategy, you can provide some of the answers people are searching for. But to rank high on Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs), you MUST produce high-quality blog content.
High-quality blog content is expertly written, highly researched, and properly optimized content that adds immense value to readers and keeps them coming back to your blog to learn more.
The benefits of high-quality blog content are plenty to mention. From increasing traffic to your site, keeping you engaged with your clients, creating awareness for your brand, increasing your lead and sales, and much more.
But how do you know that your blog content ticks all the box a high-quality article should? How do you tell what you are doing is enough to harness the power of blogging?
Look out for these five key components:
It is Valuable to Readers.
If your blog content isn’t adding value to the reader’s life, it lacks the essential component every high-quality blog should have. When readers click on a link that leads to your content, they look for useful content.
Useful content has three components, which are:
- Educative,
- Informative
- Entertaining.
High-quality blog posts are entertaining. They have the right tones and are expertly written to keep the reader interested and engaged. They also leave the reader with new educative information to help them solve a problem or make a decision.
You achieve this by publishing content in the best format. Your content goals and your audience user intent should guide your format selection. Some different types of article formats are listicles, How-to, case studies, and infographics.
If your goal is to showcase your products or services and your audience wants to learn more about them, you should create a listicle article. And if you are looking to educate and inform readers on how to use your products, a How-to article will get the work done.
Valuable content goes in-depth to answer all the audience’s questions and equip them with new knowledge. If a blog content doesn’t achieve this, it is far from high-quality.
It is Scannable and Easily Digestible
Everybody loves organized and neatly presented blog posts. When readers open your article, they should be able to scan and skim through it. And get the most valuable information as quickly as they can.
All that effort you put in researching your content and publishing it will go to waste if you can’t present it in an easily digestible manner.
Writing Digestible Articles
Crafting understandable, skimmable content that is helpful to readers will require little creativity. Here is how you can do it.
Create Rhythm – You do this by creatively writing your sentences. Use short sentences. Use medium-length sentences to grab the reader’s attention. And when you have their attention, use long sentences to convey your message.
Short Paragraphs – Use less than four sentences and less than 100 words in your paragraphs to make them easier to read and understand.
Use Lists – They allow you to emphasize the vital ideas you are passing. Incorporate numbered lists, bullet points, and checklists in your article to help the reader skim through quickly.
Avoid Jargon – Write in simple English using everyday vocabulary to make your content comprehensible.
Use Visuals – Include relevant images and embed youtube videos in your blog posts. They’re not only great for SEO, but they will help you convey more information using fewer words.
Be Conversational – Talk to your reader and get them involved. Use both first and second-person pronouns. It will help you sound more human to readers.
No one wants to strain their eyes by looking at blocks upon blocks of text when they are simply trying to get information. Always be intentional with your blog representation if you want your content to be high-quality.
It is Written for Humans, not Search Engine Bots.
With Google updating its algorithms daily and broad core algorithms every three months, Black Hat SEO is dead. Keeping up with emerging tactics to rank your content will only waste time. And if anything, black hat SEO tacts will do the opposite.
High-quality content is written for humans, not the google bots that scroll the internet to decide what will rank. You need to use keywords naturally, let your thoughts flow and avoid hard sale pitches.
The following steps will help you create content tailored for humans.
- Use Best SEO practices.
According to Google, these practices make it easier for search engines to crawl, index, and understand your content. They include tasks from aligning your content with audience search intent to earning authoritative backlinks to help you rank higher in the SERPs.
Alt: SEO Best Practices. Source: Semrush
- Know your Audience
Performing extensive audience research will help you identify the problems your audience is facing and the type of solutions they’re after. Study your audience demographics and interest to create content that will resonate with them.
- Write Quality Content
Once you know your audience, write a well-researched blog post for human consumption. The content should be relevant, upto date, and contains no errors. Stay away from quoting false research that could hurt your blog’s reputation.
Following those three steps when writing a blog post will help you create beneficial content for readers and help you rank.
Remember, SEO is a long-term strategy. Improve your prospects of ranking in the future by creating valuable content now, earning backlinks, and slowly building a reputation for your blog. All that starts with creating content optimized for humans.
It is Original Content and adds Value to the Discourse
With everyone creating blog content as part of their content marketing strategy, the competition is tough than ever. And the only way to stay ahead of the pack and realise an ROI on your blog content is by creating original blog posts are:
Different from competitors – Tell your brand story in new ways. Interviewing your clients and getting in-depth feedback can help you talk about your products/services from a new perspective. An organic content marketing approach such as interviewing clients can help you increase sales.
Adds value to the ongoing conversation – Leverage your experience to create content that adds value to the discourse. Research competitors and blog about the tiny things they’re ignoring.
Breaks boundaries – Invest in your blog content creation. Make sure your website is modern, get help and create interactive blog content that keeps users engaged. Add well-designed infographics and make content available to the disabled (blind) and older people.
It is Authoritative
High-quality blog content can help you achieve goals no other marketing strategy can. And it all starts with creating authoritative content that will earn you backlinks and help you rank first on SERPs. Authoritative blog content will help you demolish competition and win a larger market share.
Characteristics of Authoritative Article
- Authoritative articles use real-world examples to convey new ideas, sell products, and build credibility.
- Shares original in-house research and data to develop new trends in the industry. Competitors can quote your research in their articles, establishing you as an industry leader.
- Shares case studies can persuade readers to take appropriate action, from subscribing to an email list to buying a product.
Creating High-Quality Blog Content is Hard, but it is Doable.
Learning to write a blog post that incorporates all the components that make it stand out and help you meet your goals takes time. It will take a lot of learning, unlearning, and a lot of practice. Only with practice will you know if your strategy is working.
Creating low-quality blog content is not something your business can afford. If readers can find your articles valuable, they won’t spend a single sent on what you are selling.
If you are a novice or just too busy running your business to create time to create high-quality blog content, you should consider outsourcing your content needs. You can hire a team of writers and SEO strategists or freelancers to do the work for you.
