SEO Content Marketing – Crafting Strategies for Success

SEO content marketing can generate more leads, a spike in website traffic, and result in more collaborations. However, combining the two concepts can prove challenging. What is SEO when applied to content marketing?

SEO content marketing utilizes the elements of SEO for producing and optimizing content. For example, you can use on-page SEO elements like keyword research and link-building to improve your content. Off-page SEO, including quality backlinks and getting on directories, will also further your content marketing goals and increase your authority.

This guide to SEO and content marketing will first explain the concepts separately, and then delve into how they enmesh. We’ll also share actionable strategies and benefits.

SEO Content Marketing Definitions

Let’s begin by expanding on the definition of SEO content marketing from the intro, unpacking it with its two core concepts.

What Is SEO?

Search engine optimization or SEO determines how well your website ranks in search engine results pages or SERPs.

Marketers employ SEO strategies to push their site toward the top of the SERPs page and possibly reach the illustrious first position.

Landing at the top of Google’s results for a search term can lead to 32 percent of clicks, reports Backlinko, so it’s worth aspiring to become number one.

Digital marketing agency Mediaboom partnered with Meraki Global Advisors, a global multi-asset operations and outsourced trading firm, to improve its web presence. Through a combination of services, SEO chief among them, Meraki experienced a 336-percent uptick in organic traffic.

What Is Content Marketing?

Next, let’s shed some light on content marketing. This form of marketing entails producing and sharing content to further a company’s goals, such as increasing brand visibility, website traffic, email list-building, lead conversions, and customer loyalty.

The type of content you can use runs the gamut from blog posts to whitepapers, webinars, eBooks, videos, checklists, and infographics. The content you select depends on your campaign and audience.

What Is SEO Applied to Content Marketing?

SEO tactics like keyword research, link-building, domain strategizing, and website redevelopment can bolster content marketing by making your website more trustworthy and increasing traffic.

Improve Content Marketing Through On-Page SEO

Now that you see how content marketing and SEO intersect, let’s explore the measures you can use to improve your content, beginning with on-page SEO or the SEO improvements made on your website.

This form of technical SEO will help you sharpen and optimize the content you focus on and improve the user experience.

Keyword Research

The keywords you select for your content have far-reaching consequences. They affect how well your article will perform and where your website will rank. Harnessing the right keywords will assist your traffic growth rate and aid in customer acquisition.

Keywords vary by industry, but the best keywords to incorporate into your content share several common threads. They have a good monthly search volume, they’re authoritative, and they’re relevant.

Search volume is measured by the number of searches the average search engine user does per month. You shouldn’t select oversaturated terms, as you have more competition, which makes it harder to rank.

However, you shouldn’t select such obscure keywords that no one even thinks to look for them. Ahrefs found that 15 percent of Google searches haven’t ever been searched. Don’t let yours be one of them.

Keywords that increase your authority will boost your rank, as will relevant keywords.

High-Quality Content (Articles)

Now that you’ve researched keywords in your industry or niche, it’s time to begin writing content.

These best practices will help you produce high-quality articles, eBooks, whitepapers, and other written content:

• Focus on search intent and answer a user’s questions.
• Keep your content readable by breaking up long paragraphs, adding bullet points, and including images or videos.
• Format your content using header tags like H2s and H3s.
• Know your audience and write for them.
• Only present accurate content and back up assertions with high-quality links (i.e., studies).

Internal and External Link Building

Next, it’s time to focus on your link building, one of the most important aspects of SEO content marketing.

Let’s begin with internal links. Don’t create pages just to do it but determine that your website has enough pages. For example, do you have landing pages for each product or service you sell?

Do you use links across your website in your written content? If not, you should start.

Then you can turn your attention to external link-building. External links are outside of your website and are also known as backlinks.

For example, if you wrote a whitepaper and linked to a scientific study relevant to your topic, that’s an external link. The presence of external links builds authority and trustworthiness.

Page Loading Speed

Visitors won’t get to your content if your website loads too slowly. A website should load in two seconds, according to website performance resource Pingdom.

Taking too much longer will hurt your website traffic. Statista data unveiled that customer satisfaction drops by 16 percent for every second they spend waiting for a website to load.

Further, one in every four website visitors will leave a website that doesn’t load in four seconds or less. Most customers, 64 percent, do not come back to a slow-loading website, the data reports.

UX/UI Experience

UX/UI represents user experience and user interface, in that order. The terms relate to how well a website is designed for functionality and usability.

Your website must make it easy to find the information you seek, with a neat, concise navigation bar, clear menus, a search function, and CTAs above the fold.

We have plenty of examples of A+ website design to inspire you, such as this collection of luxury travel websites or these examples of real estate website design.

You can rely on Mediaboom for crafting an incredible website that drives results. When we teamed with Clarity Software Solutions, a healthcare communication company, to redesign its website, conversions increased by more than 1,200 percent.

Clarity also boosted its organic traffic by over 300 percent and its total traffic by more than 250 percent.

Explore Mediaboom’s website development services today.

Improve Content Marketing Through Off-Page SEO

Next, let’s review the off-page SEO measures you can use for your SEO content marketing strategy. Off-page SEO refers to improvements made outside of your website that still relate to your site for improving your rank and optimizing your content.

SEO Audit

First, take a hard look at your SEO and content marketing with an SEO audit. SEMrush is a handy tool for this, but you have plenty of other options. An SEO audit can reveal the following:

• Your current ranking
• Technical website issues and how to improve them on a page-by-page basis
• How your outreach campaigns are going
• Who the top domain owners are so you can reach out for backlinks
• Where you’re missing backlink opportunities
• Keywords you’re not utilizing correctly
• Keywords you’re not using
• How much organic traffic you generate
• Your authority score
• Competitor insights
• The quality of your internal links
• Your core website vitals
• Your website loading speed
• How mobile-optimized your website is
• Whether your website has duplicate versions
• If your site has indexing issues

High-Quality Backlinks

Earlier, we discussed external links or backlinks. Now, let’s focus on backlink quality, a major determining factor of SEO success.

In the example before of writing a whitepaper and using a study as an external link, a study is a fantastic high-quality backlink. Studies are published by medical and scientific journals and are widely trustworthy.

News articles, trusted review websites, product or service reviews by reputable bloggers, and social media sites are examples of quality backlinks. Ideally, a quality backlink ties to your business, such as a news site that quoted your CEO.

Disavowing Toxic Domains

As you begin generating quality backlinks, you’ll get better at sniffing out the toxic ones. Toxic backlinks harm your SEO as search engines perceive them as spam.

Websites deemed untrustworthy and those that overuse links can be toxic, but there is no hard and fast definition.

Optimized Tracking Setup

Another off-page SEO content marketing strategy is optimizing your tracking setup. You must begin tracking SEO metrics like organic search results, conversion rate optimization, keyword rankings, click-through rate, bounce rate, and exit rate.

Your SEO tools should begin generating this data for you. These metrics indicate the success of your campaign.

However, keep in mind that SEO results are anything but overnight sensations. You could have to wait months to see the needle move and your rank increase.

Mentions in Directories

Many industries have business directories, and you should aspire to have your company name added. Getting on a directory increases your backlinks, hastens a search engine’s indexing speed, and improves your visibility.

Social Media to Boost SEO Content Marketing

Social media is an important component of an SEO content marketing strategy, as you can appeal to your target audience and grow your customer base. Here are some methods for achieving those goals.

Social Signals

Search engines gauge your rate of social signals, including retweets, votes, likes, or reposts across social media platforms from Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook.

The priority of social signals by search engines has increased and could continue to grow. Begin bolstering yours now using SEO content marketing.

Social Bookmarking

The SEO strategy of social bookmarking involves creating web document bookmarks that are sharable and editable. You can use bookmarks to store your links in one concise location, retrieving them from any device you wish for off-page SEO.

Google and Social Media Authority

Increasing your authority across Google and social media will automatically improve your content marketing strategy and SEO ranking. You’ll focus more on researched keywords, relevant content, strong backlinks, and audience targeting.

Mediaboom can help your company develop authoritative content that ranks and build your clout on social media. Contact Mediaboom today to begin discussing your SEO content marketing strategy.

What Can You Expect After Optimizing Your Content Marketing SEO Strategy?

Deploying an SEO content marketing strategy takes time, patience, and hard work, but it pays back dividends if you stick with it. Here are some of the benefits your business can begin reaping in the coming months.

Traffic Increase

The spike in organic traffic you receive will attract new attention to your website. You should have already redesigned your website for a faster loading speed, easier navigation, and an overall improved user experience. That will keep people on the site for longer.

You should also be ready to convert traffic to your email list with opt-in forms and lead magnets such as webinar transcripts or checklists.

More Leads and Sales

Once leads join your email list, you can begin nurturing the professional relationship, guiding them through the sales funnel until you can present your products or services. Your leads will feel readier to buy, increasing your rate of sales and conversions.

SEO content marketing can also boost your lead generation rate as your website becomes more visible.

Increased Authority

Between producing well-researched, trustworthy content and building a backlinking strategy, your brand will be viewed as an authority in your industry. Your reputation will precede you, and your authority will continue to generate traffic to your website as you publish quality content.

Partnerships and Collaborations

The rate of collaborative opportunities and partnerships that pop up once your company’s website ranks higher will steadily increase. You might get to do more guest blogging, sponsorships, and other mutually beneficial arrangements.

These partnerships will make your brand even more visible, increasing your ranking further if you’re not yet in the top spot.

Hire Now an SEO Content Marketing Agency!

SEO content marketing links these two concepts. You’ll use SEO strategies to build stronger, more engaging content and a website that ranks.

Mediaboom are SEO specialists who understand what it takes to produce enduring content. Work with our experts to launch your SEO content marketing strategy.