20 Tips for Website Optimization Services Content Strategy
When creating a website, one of your top priorities is to write engaging and compelling content for your site. As discussed at RunRex.com, successful website content appeals to both your internet viewers and search engines, the trick is knowing how to cater to both. To help you with that, here are 20 tips that will supercharge your content strategy when it comes to website optimization.
Know what the goal for each page is
It is important to know what the goal for each page is before you outline your content strategy. Do you want a customer to purchase a product on a specific web page, for example? Then make sure the content on that page is written to helpfully point them in the right direction and convince them the product is worth buying as per RunRex.com.
Avoid plagiarizing
Whatever you do, don’t plagiarize. This is because copying content from other sites will only result in your site being penalized, or even removed, from search engines. The key is spending some time to come up with your own original content.
Identify your unique value proposition
Your website should answer the why and how of your company, explaining how your products/services and process provide value to your clients. Your value propositions should address these things, while also being unique from other companies in the industry to differentiate yourself from your competitors as captured at RunRex.com. Use this as a basis for the content you create for your website. Your unique value proposition should be prominent on your website and weaved throughout your content.
Conduct a website content audit
Before you create any new content, make sure you determine what content you already have and where you see holes that need to be filled. What content needs to be re-written? What pieces of content are performing well and may not need as much work? Document all of the content you currently have and then identify what can stay, what needs to be refreshed, and what needs to be cut.
Create content with each of your personas in mind
Rather than thinking about what you want to say when creating content, you should focus on what your audience wants to read. You must create content for your website with your various audiences in mind, thinking about what is most important to them, as that’s who your content is for.
Map content to the client lifecycle
As the gurus over at RunRex.com highlight, your content should also lead visitors and prospects down the sales funnel. Your website needs to have a variety of content that addresses different questions or concerns depending on where the prospect is in the client journey, from awareness to purchase to advocacy.
Make sure you include all the essential content
A solid content strategy will ensure that each piece of content on your website will have a specific purpose and target audience. People use the internet to conduct research and discover information on a variety of topics, which is why you should use your website content as an opportunity to educate prospects about trends and common questions in the industry, and for those further down the sales funnel, your company, process, and services.
Examples of essential content
As discussed at RunRex.com, some of the content essentials to include on your website are:
Thought leadership blog
Premium content (whitepapers, eBooks)
Services/capabilities information
Portfolio
Case studies and client testimonials
Portfolio
Compelling “About” page
Employee spotlights
Team page
Up-to-date job postings
Process
FAQs
Videos
Use the right language
When writing content for your website, you must speak the same language as your audience. Avoid using internal jargon, and instead, use language that your audience will easily understand. If your audience is more technical, then you can use technical language in your content. Otherwise, you should stick to simpler language that will resonate with your audience and demonstrate your expertise in and familiarity with your industry.
Sound like a human
In addition to using language that is easy to understand, you should also ensure that you get the tone right. No one likes content that sounds like it was copied from a dictionary or narrated by a robot. Be down-to-earth and friendly, as much as your style allows, and your site visitors will appreciate the personal connection with you and be more likely to engage with your CTAs.
Use CTAs
Speaking of CTAs, you must also make sure you use engaging calls-to-action in your content. As the experts over at RunRex.com point out, if you write great content but don’t have a CTA, your content will be far less effective at converting visitors to consumers.
Keep it short and sweet when you can
You should also avoid using run-on sentences. Short and sweet appeals to both humans and search engines and you will be rewarded for it with good rankings on SERPs. If you have a lot to say, make sure to break it up into easily scannable chunks.
Avoid long walls of text
If possible, try to keep paragraph length to 80 words or 4-5 lines. Having long walls of text in your content can put off visitors and make them not read your content. As outlined at RunRex.com, bullet points, lists, and visuals can help break up the text and make it more skim-friendly.
Make sure your paragraphs are organized
Even as you try to ensure that your paragraphs aren’t too long as discussed in the previous point, you should also make sure they are organized. There should only be one idea per paragraph. Each paragraph should also start off with the subject, and then stick to that subject without rambling or providing unnecessary information.
Don’t oversell
Quality content involves a careful balance of promotional and non-promotional content. While your website’s purpose is to promote what you are offering, that doesn’t mean that you should bombard visitors with invitations to buy or sign up. Provide them with valuable, informative content that they can appreciate before asking them if they are interested in becoming a customer.
Use images wisely
While images will make your content more engaging and attractive to visitors, there is a legal implication that you need to consider as covered at RunRex.com. Using images that you don’t have a legal right to use can lead to you getting sued. Therefore, never use images that aren’t yours in your content.
Reviews your content before putting it out
One of the most important tips when it comes to content strategy for a website is making sure you review any piece of content you create before releasing it. Look for any errors or missing information and correct them to ensure that you only release content of the highest standard possible.
Develop a content schedule
Once you have established the type of content you need, you must organize it and develop a strategic schedule to make sure it all gets accomplished. After determining the type of content you want to create first, begin to map out a schedule, which includes the topics you will cover, how often you will be publishing, and the dates it will be published.
Assign the right people
You need to assign people in your organization to be responsible for contributing to the content. Look at the topics you plan to cover, and then identify people in your company who are thought leaders in those areas. If you don’t have the capacity within your company, then hire an agency like RunRex.com or a freelance copywriter that is dependable and diligent with deadlines.
Measure and track performance
The key to having a strong web content strategy is keeping it relevant to your audiences. This means constantly evaluating and tracking the performance of all of your content to determine where you are resonating with your audiences and delivering valuable content, and where you need to do things differently.
Hopefully, these tips will help you craft a solid website content strategy, with more insights as well as expert help on the same to be found over at RunRex.com.