Writing ‘Quality Content’ for your website

We look here at the importance of having quality content on your website to encourage high search engine rankings and enhance your users’ experience.

SEO experts the world over will agree on the importance of having ‘quality content’ on your website to ensure a chance of higher rankings on search engine listings.

Whilst there are many ranking factors which determine your website’s position in search, ‘quality content’ is regarded as being the most important – by Google themsleves.

Quality Content as defined by Google

So, what constitutes ‘quality content’? More importantly, how does Google measure this?

Well, Google has published the following Webmaster Guidelines. This guide warns against using any tricks to cheat the system and states “Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines.” In other words, spammy, keyword-stuffed content will eventually be marked down by Google. It is better not to take the risk.

Google provides tips on writing quality content here on the Advanced Webmaster Course.

As you begin creating content, make sure your website is:

Useful and informative: If you’re launching a site for a restaurant, you can include the location, hours of operation, contact information, menu and a blog to share upcoming events.

More valuable and useful than other sites: If you write about how to train a dog, make sure your article provides more value or a different perspective than the numerous articles on the web on dog training.

Credible: Show your site’s credibility by using original research, citations, links, reviews and testimonials. An author biography or testimonials from real customers can help boost your site’s trustworthiness and reputation.

High-quality: Your site’s content should be unique, specific and high-quality. It should not be mass-produced or outsourced on a large number of other sites. Keep in mind that your content should be created primarily to give visitors a good user experience, not to rank well in search engines.

Engaging: Bring color and life to your site by adding images of your products, your team or yourself. Make sure visitors are not distracted by spelling, stylistic and factual errors. An excessive number of ads can also be distracting for visitors. Engage visitors by interacting with them through regular updates, comment boxes or social media widgets.

Google have also provided us with this information on the Webmaster Central Blog

if you want to step into Google’s mindset, the questions below provide some guidance on how we’ve been looking at the issue:

• Would you trust the information presented in this article?

• Is this article written by an expert or enthusiast who knows the topic well, or is it more shallow in nature?

• Does the site have duplicate, overlapping, or redundant articles on the same or similar topics with slightly different keyword variations?

• Would you be comfortable giving your credit card information to this site?

• Does this article have spelling, stylistic, or factual errors?

• Are the topics driven by genuine interests of readers of the site, or does the site generate content by attempting to guess what might rank well in search engines?

• Does the article provide original content or information, original reporting, original research, or original analysis?

• Does the page provide substantial value when compared to other pages in search results?

• How much quality control is done on content?

• Does the article describe both sides of a story?

• Is the site a recognized authority on its topic?

• Is the content mass-produced by or outsourced to a large number of creators, or spread across a large network of sites, so that individual pages or sites don’t get as much attention or care?

• Was the article edited well, or does it appear sloppy or hastily produced?

• For a health related query, would you trust information from this site?

• Would you recognize this site as an authoritative source when mentioned by name?

• Does this article provide a complete or comprehensive description of the topic?

• Does this article contain insightful analysis or interesting information that is beyond obvious?

• Is this the sort of page you’d want to bookmark, share with a friend, or recommend?

• Does this article have an excessive amount of ads that distract from or interfere with the main content?

• Would you expect to see this article in a printed magazine, encyclopedia or book?

• Are the articles short, unsubstantial, or otherwise lacking in helpful specifics?

• Are the pages produced with great care and attention to detail vs. less attention to detail?

• Would users complain when they see pages from this site?

Creating Your Own Quality Content

First of course, you need to have a website that you can add new articles to, or at least one where you can instruct your web designer to add pages to. In addition, it helps if your website has a sound seo infrastructure, is SSL (https) enabled, and passes the Google PageSpeed Insights test.

Being in business, it is highly likely that you have a unique insight into at least several topics of interest. If you are not the best of writers, don’t worry, there will be someone around you who is!

A simple search keyword analysis will show you the terms that your potential customers are using to find your product or service. What questions are they asking which you can answer? Search for keywords and phrases using Google Adwords’ tool or other 3rd party utilities.

Once you have picked a topic, search the web for similar articles. What information can you offer that they do not already cover?

Images will help considerably. If possible, create or photograph your own. If you can’t, buy them for just £5.99 each from a resource such as Adobe Stock Images. DO NOT copy any from the internet as this will likely result in copyright infringements.

Publishing Your Content

Publish first on your website or blog, then link to it from your social media accounts such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Twitter and others.

We use website tools which automatically publish a new article to social media – this can save a great deal of time.