Just as the aroma of fresh, tasty food attracts hungry diners, Google and other search engines have a nose for fresh content - the kind of content web visitors clamor to consume.
Here are seven ways to deliver fresh content that will have customers and prospects filling up, then coming back for seconds. And thirds.
- Regularly update your website content. According to Jason Roy in an article on seositecheckup.com, "your frequently updated website offers search engines a haven for fresh content and sources of new information for their search requests."
- Add mouth-watering blogs to the menu. As Roy says, "The easiest and most effective way to stay fresh is to add a blog on your site and continue to add articles that will get noticed by your viewers. If they comment on those articles, that counts as an update on your site. So, write something that will get the attention to begin helping with your frequent updates."
- Keys to unlocking freshness. While the days of loading up on key words and hauling in big traffic are long gone, that doesn't mean key words aren't, well, key. When a search engine scouts out your site, they equate freshness with quality, not quantity. Roy continues, "Create quality content that yes, has your keywords within it, but only if they are naturally in place. In other words, write content that answers a question, explains how to do something for the reader or provides quality information that they want."
- New content alone is not enough. In his article, "Is your content fresh enough to attract Google?, Michael Brenner suggests stirring the pot by freshening up previously published content. "Fix broken links, add or change visual content to blog posts or web pages. Make sure everything is accurate, current, and well-written in terms of clarity, organization, and style and then republish using the same URL and keywords."
- Follow this proven SEO content recipe. On his eponymous website, Bruce Clay shares "the four pillars of SEO content: expertise, authority, trust and maintenance. These are exactly the qualities search engines look at to rank your site. Google even says so outright in its Quality Rating Guidelines."
- Feed hungry consumers with an RSS feed. An RSS, variously known as a Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication "is a format for delivering regularly changing web content. Many news-related sites, weblogs and other online publishers syndicate their content as an RSS Feed to whoever wants it." To get going with this tasty content delivery tool, digest this: What Everyone Should Know About RSS.
- Claim your online listings - and keep them updated. Registering your company name on local listing sites - and making sure they are updated on a quarterly basis - is one of the easiest and most powerful ways to extend your reach, and be in the places customers are looking. Be sure to snag your spot on these top seven sites: Google My Business, Facebook, Yelp, Yellow Pages, Bing, Foursquare and Yahoo local.
So remember, attracting search engine interest becomes easier when you focus on providing a steady diet of fresh, nutritious content. (To learn more about cooking up content that will stick to your reader's ribs, check out this delectable item. Then be sure to search here.
Last modified: November 15, 2017
