How to Write People-Friendly SEO Content
Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.
Image courtesy of stockimages/FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Search engine optimisation content is often full of keywords and awkward to read. It can be easy to get so caught up in writing SEO content that you forget that your site or blog content needs to be written for your audience too, not just the search engines.
The Danger of Robotic SEO Content
Content that is so stiff and keyword rich that it sounds like it was written by a robot can be detrimental to your brand. First, this kind of content rarely gets, let alone keeps, the attention of your market. If you aren’t able to hold the interest of potential customers, how can you sell your services to them?
This kind of content won’t help you build your brand, sell your product or engage your audience, all things that you need to do to build a successful business.
Write for Your Market First
A good way to make sure your SEO content is people-friendly is to write with your target market in mind. Before you write your website content or add a blog post, ask yourself who you are writing for. Are you trying to attract new customers? Are you informing current customers about your newest product? With this mindset, your writing will have the correct tone and be more personable than if you were writing around keywords for your SEO campaign.
Determine What Your Message Is
Spammy SEO content rarely has a message. It is often just content for the sake of content, to add keywords to a site and rank a page. However, strong content that will capture your audience’s attention has a message. This message could be presented in a more subtle, friendly way, or it could be submitted in an urgent or formal way. The tone you choose will depend on your market and your brand.
Making sure your message is included and is clearly delivered through your content can help ensure that your SEO content is people friendly, not just a way to add keyword-rich pages to your site for search engines to crawl.
Use Keywords Naturally
If a keyword doesn’t fit, don’t use it. This simple rule can take your SEO content form mediocre to excellent. Keywords that make sentences grammatically incorrect or awkward can turn readers away and make your company look unprofessional. Of course, there are times when you’ll need to find ways to add keywords to your website, on your homepage for example. However, finding ways to add them in ways that don’t take away from the quality or message of the content is essential.
One of the best ways to make sure your content isn’t overly SEO optimised, to the point that it doesn’t resonate with readers, is to allow SEO components to compliment your copy, not take over the content. You can do this by writing with your audience in mind, working keywords in naturally and making sure your message is clear and that your content is tight and to the point.