If you want to run a successful website and blog, you need a content marketing plan.
Search engine optimization (SEO) significantly affects the number of clicks your website will receive in search results. But you need to provide value to more than just Google. Your readers need to find your content engaging, informative, and valuable – and if they do, Google will follow.
With a proper content marketing plan, you can unlock the potential of your blog with content that ranks well and keep readers coming back. If done incorrectly, however, you may spend hours writing without more than a few clicks to show for it.
How to Craft Your Content Marketing Plan
Perform Keyword Research
A crucial part of any online marketing plan is keyword research. Keywords are terms that people search in Google and other search engines around the web. Keywords identify and categorize content so that searchers can find relevant information.
As a website or blog owner, keyword research helps you to determine what questions need to be answered and what your audience is interested in. To discover keywords that can be targeted or see search volume, you can use Google’s Keyword Planner. [1] Once you have a topic, Google can extrapolate potential keyword combinations, their search volume, and how competitive the terms are for ranking.
With this information, you can begin to identify topics to cover. For example, if you’re selling vacuums, inputting “vacuum” into the planner may return with “best vacuum,” which can open up a topic like “Best Vacuum of 2020” or “Top 5 Cordless Vacuums”. This way, you have a starting point for a blog post relevant to searches, includes the keyword you’re targeting, and helps earn clicks.
Identify Your Audience and Their Pain Points
Keywords aren’t enough to create a successful blog – you need to actually implement your target keywords effectively to see results. To do this, you’ll need to write valuable, tailored pieces on what matters to your reader (audience).
To identify your audience, consider who your average reader is. Are you aiming your content at someone who has no experience with your industry and wants a quick guide? Or are you looking to add thought pieces and unique research-based reports to build authority from backlinking?
After identifying your audience, you need to address their pain points. Pain points are what people within your demographic want answers to. And they are one of the best ways to create useful content. Readers are most likely not visiting your blog for some light reading. They have questions, and you need to provide answers!
Find the Sweet Spot Between Your Audience’s Needs and Your Knowledge
How well do you know your niche? Do you fit your audience profile yourself, or can you reliably answer the questions they’re posing?
If you write something that you aren’t familiar with or interested in just because it’s popular, you likely won’t see the results you want. Similarly, if you write on topics that interest you but aren’t relevant to your audience, it won’t translate well to clicks and engagement.
Successful blogging is about incorporating your expertise into content that your audience wants to read. The more detail, personal experience, and specificity you include, the better. When you find the “sweet spot” between supply and demand, you can create something unique, valuable, and effective for your blog. [2]
Produce Evergreen Content
One way to establish an audience is by providing beginner-friendly content that simply answers a question. This “evergreen” content is almost always relevant to people visiting your blog and helps earn search clicks over extended periods. Plus, when done correctly, they can rise in the search rankings until they become a cornerstone resource for searchers.
If you’re an expert in your niche, including basic or introductory content in your blog may seem tedious or unnecessary. However, even if the “how-to” is already available elsewhere, you can still post it because it helps to complete your blog as a resource. You aim to make yours stand out through clever or unique content and SEO implementation.
Earn More Readers with an Expert Content Marketing Plan from Full Circle SEM
A successful blog has more than just well-researched topics and expertly-written posts. If you want to see the traffic your site deserves, you’ll need to take advantage of the best SEO practices available. Implementing these strategies can help your site rank higher in searches and earn more shares to grow your authority and brand recognition. However, planning, writing, editing, and optimizing blog content for SEO can be time-consuming and challenging to pick up.
At Full Circle SEM, we’ll create a content marketing plan to set your blog apart from the competition. Rather than spending the time yourself, let our expert team of marketers, writers, and editors craft exceptional, shareable, and optimized blog posts that will draw more traffic to your site.
Get started today: Content Creation for Businesses
SOURCES:
[1] https://ads.google.com/home/tools/keyword-planner/
[2] https://moz.com/blog/how-to-find-your-blog-topic-sweet-spot
