To all writers and non-writers out there, now is
the time to start digging up
those creative writing skills.With modern communication technology comes
the popularity
of information-based marketing, which is
one of the oldest and most effective techniques in getting targeted prospects to sites and converting them into buyers. This is
Would you like to get more traffic from your business website? It's a rhetorical question, of course, because we all want more traffic for our websites. It's the first step to Internet marketing success.
In this article, I'll show you an easy way to increase your website's traffic levels (and overall success) through a systematic and proven technique. And you probably already guessed the technique based on the title of this article. Essentially, you are going to write one page of quality web content for each of your key phrases.
When combined with other aspects of search engine optimization, this will greatly improve your online visibility and traffic levels. Of course, the first step is creating a list of key phrases. So let's talk about that first.
We all know that people search for things online by typing certain words and phrases into their favorite search engine, such as Google or Yahoo. So in order to help these Internet searchers find your business website, you must integrate the right kinds of phrases throughout your website. This process begins with a thorough round of key phrase research.
Step 1 - Choose a Keyword Research Tool
There are several keyword research tools available online. WordTracker and Keyword Discovery are two of the most popular. Both of these tools charge for their service, but WordTracker does offer a free version of their tool. If your website is limited in scope (for example, if your business serves a particular niche in a particular town), then you can probably get by using the free version of WordTracker.
If you want your website to come up in search engines for relevant phrases that people are actually searching day in and day out, then you must -- you must -- spend some time building a list of key phrases. By key phrases, I mean phrases your target audience would enter into a search engine when researching products or services like yours.
There are a variety of keyword research tools online. Two of the most popular tools can be found at WordTracker.com and KeywordDiscovery.com. If your website is limited in scope (for example, if your business serves a particular niche in a particular town), then you can probably get by using the free version of WordTracker.
Step 2 - Create a Spreadsheet With Key Phrases
Once you have access to a keyword / key phrase research tool, your next step is to set up an Excel spreadsheet or a Word document for your list of phrases. For starters, you only need two columns in your spreadsheet -- "phrase" and "count." Later on you can add columns for other purposes, such as keeping track of web pages you've written, your search ranking for each phrase, etc. But for now, you only need the two columns mentioned above, "phrase" and "count."
The phrase column is self-explanatory. This is where you list the phrases that relate to your business, the kinds of products or services you offer, etc. You will find these phrases by starting with a basic phrase and entering it into a keyword research tool, like the ones mentioned above. The tool would then generate a list of related phrases, along with the number of times people search them each day. This data goes into your "count" column.
Step 3 - Build Content Around Your Phrases
Think of your key phrase list as a blueprint for website growth. After all, the best way to grow your website is by building content around the phrases and topics your ideal audience is researching online!
And now that you have your blueprint in hand, all that's left to do is build content around it, specifically by creating one page of quality content for each unique phrase on the list.
When working with client websites, this is usually the first step in my process. I consider it "low-hanging fruit" because it's one of the easiest yet most reliable ways to climb the search engines.
It might seem overwhelming to create that much web content, but you don't have to do it all at once. Start with ten pages of content to support your top ten phrases. You can include variations of the same phrase on any given page, so that will help you make this task more manageable.
For motivation, you simply have to refer back to the truth of search engine visibility we discussed earlier. Your website cannot begin to appear in search engine results for certain phrases until you have those phrases on your website. That is what you're doing here -- creating the content needed for search engine success. Only instead of having one page focusing on dozens of topics (which is confusing to people and search engines alike), you are going to create one page per topic / phrase.
Helpful hint: If you're not much of a writer, you can outsource the writing projects using a website like Elance.com.
Regardless of who writes your web content, make sure it's the kind of content your audience would find helpful. Then go back through it to ensure you have your key phrase spread naturally throughout the page.
That's really all there is to it. It's not complicated, but it does require time and effort. And that's exactly why so many website owners neglect this process. It can be hard work. But who ever said online marketing was easy?
Brandon Cornett manages an Austin SEO firm specializing in website content strategies. He has also written an Internet marketing book that you can download for free (or read online) by visiting http://www.onlineequalizer.com
