Content Trends

Content Marketing, SEO and Digital Marketing

How To Write Quality Content that is Search Engine Friendly

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Certain golden rules when applied can transform anybody into a web content guru. That is the ongoing purpose of this blog.

Web content writing is an exciting and constantly evolving field. It is all at once challenging, educational and exciting to write quality content that is fresh, consistently engaging and informative.

A genuine love, passion and involvement with your topic will shine through and will keep visitors engaged and involved with your site.

Writing quality content however is only part of the job. The more challenging job is to ascertain that the content is found, indexed and ranked by most browsers so that you get the maximum traffic.

Here are some ideas and tips which will equip you in no time at all to write quality content that is found easily by most search engines and which will in turn build and increase traffic to your site.

 

Use a writing style that grabs interest

  • Use the inverted pyramid style of writing which places the most important information first. If visitors don’t find the info. they are looking for in the first couple of minutes they will go to another site where they can.
  • Break up large blocks of text with bullet lists for ease of reading.
  • Use meaningful headlines and subheads that explain key points at a glance as well as help optimize the page
  • Focus on the best keywords for your business. There are several tools such as Wordtracker that will get you started with keyword research.

    • Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques

    SEO is the science of increasing your web rankings by improving factors that influence browser search results. In layman’s terms it involves making your content relevant to the google bots so that they know how to index and rank your page. Here is a previous post that is dedicated to Seo and free tools that you can use to optimize your content.
    Search engines also look for the following information among other parameters:

    • Focus on keyword density which involves repeating select, target keywords so that search engines find your site more relevant and give you a higher ranking in search results. Experts recommend that the ideal keyword density is between 2-5 percent.
    • Use effective titles and headings. The titles and headings must not only grab attention but must also have keywords.
    • Build links. Muster all your efforts in making your content so useful that other sites link to you. The more links you receive the higher your page will rank in search results. Always link to internal content and articles that relate to your current post.

    Search engines love fresh content

    • Content is really king and fresh, compelling, useful, relevant and quality content is of utmost importance especially in these days of rapidly changing technologies and instant news updates.
    • Search engines penalize websites that have static content. Fresh content makes for higher search rankings.
    • Research before writing as info these days becomes obsolete at the bat of an eyelid.

    Use Social Media and Comments to Define Content

    • According to the latest Google updates, content that is shared most on social media is ranked higher.
    • Web Marketing experts recommend you use a variety of tools (such as bit.ly, HootSuite, TweetMeme) to find out which subjects are hot, what’s new and what gets shared most on social media. Focus on a topic that is going viral or at the very least being talked about extensively.
    • Use Google Analytics and Clicky (real time analytics) to discern what gets shared most, which piece of content is talked and tweeted about and then create more of that content
    • Visitor interaction will help you understand what’s working. Use comments to engage visitors and understand their needs and which piece of content is popular with them.
    • Send regular white papers and newsletters to your customers via email. It’s important that the content is both beneficial and useful as this strategy will not only enhance your relationship with your visitors but will convert them into customers who regularly visit your site.

    Ultimately, the purpose of writing content is to provide valuable and useful information to your visitors. But by keeping these techniques in mind, you can also cater to the Google bots that are constantly crawling the internet in search of fresh, relevant and quality content.

    Ten Surefire Ways to Break into Today’s Freelance Writing Market.

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    Today’s market has opened up tremendous writing opportunities for freelance writers. Opportunities abound every which way you look. There are already thousands of people who earn their living writing from home.

    Here are ten proven techniques and methods for breaking into today’s freelance writing market:

    1. Write for the web.

    Online communications have opened a floodgate of opportunities. Billions of dollars are spent daily on creating content online, and you don’t have to be a big corporation to capture your share of that pie.

    There are several reasons why so much money is spent on creating content online:

    • According to Google’s latest seo updates, fresh content is rewarded with higher search engine rankings. Static sites, on the other hand, are penalized with lower rankings.
    • Web visitors like to see fresh content.
    • Site owners constantly need to attract traffic to their sites and will invest in paying writers to produce new material.

    Current opportunities include writing articles, blogs, managing content on social media, writing ebooks and newsletters and managing discussion forums and groups.

    Writing for the web is easy but requires acquiring certain skills and techniques. Here is a post on Web Content Writing Basics, that covers the basics of how web content writing differs from writing for other media.

    An easy site to begin content writing is for eHow.com. This site is good to build a portfolio to show clients samples of your work. Search engines also give a good ranking to eHow. It may not be the top site for earning solely through your writing but it is definitely a great starting point.

    2. Blog for fun and profit.

    The key to learning how to become a blogger is to start blogging! It is really that simple. The advantages of blogs as a small business are very low start-up and operational costs. The only real cost is the blogger’s time. The challenge for all for profit bloggers is creating a large enough audience to support the business.

    Most for-profit blogs run ads. Blog networks such as Blog Ads and Goggle’s Adsense make it easy to add advertising to a blog site. However, only the top sites in terms of traffic generate more than a few dollars per day. Most ecommerce sites have affiliate programs, and they are easy to use. For example, The Amazon Affiliate Program rewards sites that sell Amazon products.

    3. Bid for your next freelance project at freelance-bidding sites.

    These sites connect freelance writers to different markets that require their skills. The membership process is simple. You register and often pay a small fee. Once you are registered, you can browse through all the active projects and bid on the ones that interest you. These websites make a small commission on all projects that are awarded. The buyer is billed directly. Sologig, Elance, Guru and The Freelance Work Exchange are a few examples of freelance-bidding sites.

    4. Contact the editors of local newspapers in your town or city.

    Local newspapers are excellent places to start building a network of contacts in the industry. They run on a tight budget and have a skeleton staff. They constantly need writers to cover stories as “stringers”. Stringers are freelance journalists that are paid per piece as opposed to being paid a regular salary. Check out Newpapers.com for an online database of newspapers across the country.

    5. Write for an international publication.

    The world is flat and this global marketplace is a haven for writers. You can reach an ever-widening audience thousands of miles away. NewsDirectory provides a list of newspapers and magazines around the globe. Worldwide Freelance Writer highlights many paying markets in its market section.

    6. Turn your hobbies into a lucrative freelance writing career.

    Hobbies can be fun, exciting and expensive. Most of all, hobbies are the result of a passion or love. At the risk of stating the obvious, a passionate love for a subject makes for truly ingenious copy. Check out the latest Writer’s Market, which provides detailed descriptions of magazines that hire freelance writing talent.

    7. Write for professional trade journals.

    Fitness instructors, computer geeks, artists, astrologers, doctors and lawyers have become well-published writers in their field of expertise.
    Join writers’ organizations in your field and also visit various websites and blogs that specialize in your topic. You could also contribute by being a guest blogger to a blog that caters to your field or profession.

    8. Take advantage of your ethnicity and write for ethnic markets.

    There are two types of markets available to journalists of ethnic origins. The first is the English speaking and writing market.

    Join an association for a particular ethnic community and broaden your contacts and enhance your networking skills. These websites have special information for ethnic writers:
    SAJA (South Asian Journalists Association)
    AAJA (Asian American Journalists Association)
    Journalismnext.com (Website for minority journalists and media professionals)
    NAHJ (National Association of Hispanic Journalists)

    The second market open to ethnic journalists is the foreign language media. According to the U.S 2000 Census results, 45 million people aged 5 and older spoke a language other than English at home. Wikipedia has a listing of foreign language newspapers in the U.S

    9. Contribute towards nonpaying writing opportunities.

    An unpaid opportunity is an excellent way to build up a portfolio and hone your writing skills. Non-profits need content for their websites and often require proposal and grant writers. VolunteerMatch is an online network of thousands of participating nonprofits. Your local church, homeowners associations’, local clubs and community groups need volunteers to write their newsletters.

    10. Use the internet in your search.

    The internet is the most powerful tool for research and is also the most easily accessible tool for finding your next freelance project. The following resources are helpful:
    American Society of Journalists and Authors
    Absolute Markets
    Writersdigest.com
    Writersweekly.com
    JournalismJobs.com
    MediaBistro.com