Whether in marketing, academia, or any field, content is always crucial when dealing with people. Without content, your marketing has no message and hence will fail. Content is the fuel of any successful marketing strategy.
In the same vein, your website content is one of the most vital features of your website. It influences how visitors perceive you, it helps you tell your story in a manner that captivates your audience. Without good content, you’re better off without a website.
The quality of the content on your website will go a long way in determining the success of your online marketing campaign. Brands are potentially missing out on many website visitors by lacking the kind of website content that ranks well in Google and answers the questions people are searching for. You also may have been leaving a lot of money on the table by not paying enough attention to the quality of content on your website.
In this article, we will look at the different types of website content, how to create content that captivates both people and search engines, and how to get content ideas for your website.
What Is Website Content
Web content refers to the textual, aural, or visual messages published on a website. Content may be any creative element, for example, text, applications, images, archived email messages, data, e-services, audio and video files, and so on.
Web content is the key to traffic generation to websites. Developing engaging content and organizing it into various categories for easy navigation is the most important strategy for a successful website. Also, it is important to optimize the web content for search engines so that it responds to the keywords used for searching.
There are two basic kinds of web content:
Text: Text is simply what it is – text. It may be added on the web page as text blocks or within images. The best form of written content is one free from plagiarism.
Multimedia: This is another kind of web content. Another kind of web content is multimedia. By definition, Multimedia is a representation of information attractively and interactively with the use of a combination of text, audio, video, graphics, and animation. Multimedia content aims to make a message more attractive, interesting and engaging to the consumer.
- Animations: Animations can be added with the help of Flash, Ajax, GIF images as well as other animation tools.
- Images: Images are the most popular multimedia content on websites. They present a pictorial representation of the message to be passed across to the audience.
- Audio
- Video
Why Is Website Content Important?
A website without content is like a marketing campaign without a message. High-quality content is one of the most important strategies for a successful website. Good website content helps you get your website, product, or service into the hands of potential customers looking for information about the solutions your business provides. But what are the ways good website content can help your website?
A Good Website Content Helps Your Website Rise in Search Engine Rankings
High website content can help you rise in rankings on search engines (like Google). A high ranking on search engines puts you right in front of your customers right at the time when they’re searching for a solution like the one you provide. This strategy is very effective as it is easier to convert such customers who have already shown interest in a service.
It Adds Value To Your Website
Good quality content not only increases your rankings on search engines but also helps to engage users and retain them. Good quality content always keeps visitors coming for more thereby improving the retention rate of your website. Once your customers know your website serves as a means of a valuable, reliable source of information, they will keep coming back.
It Can Help You Gain A Broader Following
Good quality content can also help to improve your social media following. Sharing your website content on social media channels can help you connect with more people and drive them to your website.
What Are The Examples Of A Good Website Content?
Good website content has been optimized to solve a pain point and also for search engines. Search engine optimization involves understanding what your audience is searching for, and strategically using them to strengthen the message of your website.
However, SEO isn’t the only measurement of good website content. Other ways to measure good website content include;
- A good website educates rather than sell
- Good content is clear and concise.
- Good content is easily navigated and thoroughly solves the pain point.
Website Content Writing Types
Website content writing can be defined as any type of writing that is found on a website. Does this sound too broad? Let’s explore the types of website content writing that can be found on a website.
Blogs
Blogs are no longer known for writings that are about one’s feelings or how your day went. Blogs today are now a vital part of a website’s content marketing strategy.
A blog today can be defined as a website or a webpage on a website that is regularly updated with posts on various topics either for personal use or to fulfill a business need.
For instance, Qckbot blogs talk about various topics concerning search engine optimization, inbound marketing, etc.
Listicles
To put it in simple terms, a listicle is an article written in a list format. Every item on a listicle usually includes a few sentences or multiple paragraphs. A listicle aims to either educate or delight readers. An example of a listicle might be an article with the topic “7 ways to improve your website SEO.
Case Studies
Case studies as the name implies are content that attempts to illustrate the value proposition of a brand. This is achieved by writing about how their product or service helped a customer. Contents like this are unique to a brand and should provide a detailed case against results.
Reviews
A review is content that aims to examine the benefits and downsides of a product or service.
A lot of prospective customers want to feel confident about their purchasing decision before completing a sale. Reviews are a great source of information for customers to research their buying options and analyze the pros and cons of a product or service.
Brands may also use product reviews as a powerful marketing tool. This may be done to create a positive perception of a product or service and increase brand awareness.
How To Write Good Website Content
Understand Your Audience
For you to write good content, you need to first understand your audience. Your audience is the ones who are going to be interacting with your content. Therefore it makes sense to put them into consideration while writing the content.
You will have to analyze who they are, what they are looking for, and what their language is. Creating buyer personas too will help you achieve this to a greater degree of efficiency.
Define The Purpose Of Your Content
One of the most important things you should understand about your content is its purpose. Having a clear picture of our end goal from the outset also helps you to develop the perfect piece of content. It also allows you to be able to come up with an ideal call to action.
The purpose of any content on your website should align with your overall business goals. To define the purpose of content, you need to ask the following questions;
- What is my overall business goal
- What is the focus of the website?
- Who am I talking to?
The answer to these questions will set you on the right path to creating good website content.
In-Depth And Up-To-Date Information
Nowadays, the first thing people do when they hear about a business is look up its website. Your website is your business card, and you want to make a good impression. Do the following to keep your website content up to date;
- Refresh your content from time to time. You may add some new information such as trends or updates to product details.
- Update Your Educated Banners Or CTAs. You should only have relevant offers and marketing messages on your website.
- Repurpose Your Content. It will help to try a different format for the content, such as creating a video and incorporating it into the page.
Should Have Visual, Audio, And Text Content
It has been said that people only remember 20% of what they read, but 80% of what they see and do. Adding visuals to your content will help to grab the attention of your visitors and make the content more engaging and relatable.
Should Be Organized And Easy To Read
The format of your content is also a very important factor to consider while writing content. You should ensure that your content is well-organized, well-spaced, and structured. Keep your sentences simple and your paragraphs short. You should also keep your grammar simple such that even a five-year-old can understand.
Reference Other Reputable Sources
No one has a monopoly on knowledge. Chances are that you are creating the content using help from other researched resources. It is a good thing to reference sources which you got some of the information contained in your content from.
Not only does this eliminate the risk of plagiarism, but it also adds some credibility to your content. Depending on the reputation of the source, your content sounds more genuine and believable when you reference reputable sources
Subheadings And White Spaces Are Important
Subheadings and white spaces are important, they improve the layout of your content and make it scannable. Having content that looks all jammed up reduces the readability of your content.
Have A Regular Posting Schedule
Create a posting schedule and try to stick to it. If you are consistent enough, this will condition your audience to look forward to your content at a particular time. This will help to improve your website retention rate as more returning users will be visiting.
How Do I Get Ideas For My Website
One of the most important decisions you would have to make on your website is deciding how to source content ideas. This process does not have to be stressful. You can get content ideas using the following strategies.
Create A List Of Topics
The first thing you want to get done is get a list of topics that are related to your business.
Use Content Idea Generating Tools
After listing out the topics that are relevant to your business, you can refine them into ideas using a content idea-generator tool. A majority of these tools are free. They take your input and return a list of possible content ideas. Take note that you have to be accurate with your initial list as the tool will only work with what you have provided.
Take A Sneak Peek At Your Top Competitors
If you have competitors who are already doing well online, it would be a good idea to look at what they are doing. This is not to say that you should copy and paste what their content is, but it would serve as a source of inspiration.
The fact that they are already doing well makes it even more rewarding. This means that you already have an idea of what works and may not need to spend too much time planning.
Conduct Interviews
How do you know what type of content your audience wants to see? Ask them directly to tell you.
Conduct interviews. Ask them about their habits.
The great thing about an interview is it doesn’t have to be direct. You don’t have to have a clear black-and-white question with a definitive yes or no answer. Just find ways to get people talking. You’d be surprised how interesting some of these statements can be.
The responders may start feeding you new content ideas without even realizing it.
Use Community Forums
Another way to get content ideas is through the use of forums like quora, Reddit, etc. On forums like this, you are privy to questions that people have about a particular topic. This can inspire a content idea. If one person has such a question, chances are that many other people may have similar questions.
Final Thoughts
Website content can make or mar your business. Hence it is something you should be paying a serious amount of attention to. Please know that it is okay to ask for help if in any way you do not feel confident about taking on this task on your own. You can request a quote for our content planning and writing service. You can also get a full Search Engine Optimization plan for your website which will also include content writing.
