Without high-quality content, your SEO campaign will fail. We sound blunt here – but it’s true. You can put in the keyword research, you can find backlink opportunities, you can build fruitful relationships. Yet, without content, you won’t get anywhere with organic traffic.
The same harsh truth also applies if your content isn’t search engine optimised. You can put together a well-crafted web page or an informative blog post, but these won’t scratch the surface – aka the first page of Google – without clever SEO tactics incorporated.
Don’t panic, though; we have put together this guide to help you produce top-quality SEO content that ranks. Coming up, we’ll answer pressing questions such as what is content writing, how to write SEO content, and more!
What Is Content Writing?
So, what is content writing exactly? In simple terms, this is a process where you plan, write, and edit online content. This content is generally intended for digital marketing purposes – such as SEO campaigns. However, content writing can also be used for everything from social media posts to podcast scripts.
As for what is content writing from an SEO perspective, it’s usually centred on web page copy, blog posts, and online articles. That’s also what the rest of this guide will focus on.
How to Write a Content Plan
When you’re learning how to write SEO content, you’ll discover that the first step is to put together a content plan. Ultimately, you need an idea of your overall goals and objectives when producing content – and this plan helps to set everything out clearly.
To know how to write a content plan effectively, here are some important points to cover:
- Decide on your goals and KPIs
- Know your target audience
- Choose your content types
- Audit current content
- Determine your resources and budget
- Select how the content will be created
- Set a content schedule
Of course, once you have written and published your content, you’ll have to promote your posts/articles and measure the results. Monitoring and measuring the results is essential for understanding if your content plan is working as expected – and hitting those KPIs – or if tweaks are necessary.
How to Write a Content Brief
Once the content plan is done, you need to know how to write a content brief. A proper brief in place supplies a clear picture of what you hope to achieve from a piece of content. While a content brief is a given if you’re outsourcing the work, it’s also recommended even if you’re doing all the content production yourself.
Generally, there are numerous aspects to consider for your content brief. For a single article, here are the main points to include:
- The topic of the article
- The general format and structure
- Subjects to include
- Keywords to incorporate
- Internal/external links to include contextually
- Estimated word count
- Audience persona, aka the target audience for the content
If you’re struggling for inspiration when planning your content brief, don’t be scared to look at the competition. Obviously, you want to avoid copying your competitors, but you can gain some motivation from their articles, blog posts, social media posts, and any other content they’ve produced.
How to Write a Content Page
You have a brief, but you need to know how to write a contents page properly. Even with the topics, structure, and keywords as a general outline, this doesn’t teach you how to write a content page that delivers the desired results.
As for how to write a contents page that is search-optimised, here are some tips to keep in mind:
Write a Draft
The first step in learning how to write a content page is to put together a rough draft. This might seem counterintuitive, but it’s always recommended to get some words down on the page. The hardest part of writing is getting started, and this initial draft helps to avoid that problem.
Once you have a draft, you can then go back through the content, make revisions, add research and sources, flesh out points, and so on. The best content ever created will have multiple drafts, edits and revisions, so don’t be hard on yourself if you don’t get it right the first time. Content writing takes time and is an art to master – and practice makes perfect!
Attention-Grabbing Headline
There are seemingly infinite articles and blog posts out there. How can you compete against the competition in the search results pages? One of the best ways is to create a headline that packs a punch. When you deliver a clear and interesting title enriched with your main keyword, this will grab the attention of searchers and turn them into site visitors.
An attention-grabbing headline should also be paired up with a short-and-sweet meta description. This meta description should elaborate on the article topic and answer searchers’ questions, doing so in an interesting manner to generate an emotional response from your target audience that makes them want to click on your content.
Seamlessly Incorporate Keywords
If you’re wondering how to write SEO content that ranks on Google’s search pages, you’ll need to include targeted keywords. Strategic keyword use will help your content show up in relevant search results; however, you must avoid keyword stuffing because Google penalises sites that commit this search engine ‘crime’. You must add your keywords seamlessly and naturally throughout your content, ensuring they don’t stick out too much from the rest of the article and don’t sound weird or off.
Break Up the Content
When learning how to write a contents page, an important lesson is to realise that an article shouldn’t solely be a big block of text. To keep readers engaged and scrolling down the page, you need to break up the content when appropriate so that it’s easier to read and doesn’t look overwhelming to users.
Subheadings, bullet-point lists, quotes, images, and videos – all these can be used to keep the page varied, sectioned into bitesize readable chunks, and, of course, interesting for readers.
Practice Writing Content
Are you wondering how to improve your content writing skills? You can take lessons, watch YouTube tutorials, check out guides, and read other people’s high-quality written content. However, the best way to improve your writing skills is to write, write some more, then write again, and continue to write content regularly.
Sure, lessons, classes, tutorials, and guides are excellent for improving content writing – but there’s no substitute for real practice, no matter what anyone tells you. With practical experience, you’ll develop techniques, expand your vocabulary, and become a better content producer. Granted, it takes time, but your efforts will be rewarded in full when you’ve become a fantastic writer after all that practice.
Outsource the Work
A common question we see is this: how long does it take to write website content?’ While the answer depends on numerous factors – experience, content type, length, etc. – it is often too long for those running a business or dealing with other digital marketing aspects. However, this is when outsourcing can come into play and save the day. Whether you work with a freelancer or an agency, an experienced specialist will know how to write content that ranks.
As for how much to charge for content writing as a writer, you want to avoid going too low – you should be appropriately paid for your work, and most clients will understand that high-quality content commands fair pay. You get what you pay for in this industry, after all.
Need Help with Content Writing?
If you’re struggling with content writing or simply don’t have the time to undertake the task yourself, why not seek the services of one of the UK’s leading digital marketing agencies? We at Click Intelligence have decades of experience in SEO and content production for clients in over 40 industries, generating high-quality, SEO-geared content of all kinds that sees our clients reach the coveted high ranks of Google’s search pages.
Don’t hesitate to contact our experts if you need help with your content strategy or would like us to take on the job entirely on your behalf while keeping you updated every step of the way. The search engine-pleasing results you want are only an email or phone call away!
