I have seen this error made quite often. Individuals get so focused on search engine optimization (SEO) ranking high on Google, or any other major search engine or the amount of visitors they receive irrespective of who they are or what their bounce rate will be that they forget all about their purpose. Always create content for your audience, and not for the search engines you are ranking for.
Individuals sometimes forget what the purpose of content really is. You do not create content around keywords you want to rank for. The minute you allow your keywords to dictate what you are writing is the minute you cease writing for your audience and begin to write for the search engines. From there on it is merely a matter of time before you lose that original spark that brought you into writing then you will find writing content to become a tedious chore that tends to never end. From there, as search technologies continue to progress, you will still be using the SEO method you learned years back and you will begin to notice your viewer base slowly declining, and you will lose all determination to create content and just give up.
And why is that? It is because the target audience you were creating content for was all coming from search engines and it possessed a high bounce rate. It isn’t that difficult to rank high, to reach the top, to gain traffic. It is challenging to sustain that position and make your audience return. You will not succeed at that by creating gibberish with a couple of keywords sprinkled around so it appears good on Google. You’ll do that by creating original, quality content that appeals to your base of visitors.
Two-edged sword
There will be two methods of creating content while having your target audience in mind. There is the hard way and the easy way. That is, easy being empty, sensationalist content that shouts ‘Look at me!’ and hard being engaging quality, and compelling content that makes your target audience want more. Life is not all black and white and that will apply to all things except the colors themselves. Therefore, it’s possible to mix it up a little bit, some sensationalistic content with a little engaging content, and achieve a pretty great article.
Keep your principles
Keep in mind what got you started, what your initial spark was that pushed you over the cliff, falling first with your fingers on the keyboard filled up with coffee each morning.
It is never about quantity. Do not create twenty articles in a week just so there are twenty articles on your blog every week. If you are that compelled to place your thoughts out there, place half of them into a Word document.
If you are writing too much your target audience is going to feel suffocated by the quantity of content you are putting out there, irrespective of its quality. If you are creating too little content, your audience is going to feel uncared for and abandoned. You must discover the proper balance.
If you still possess the energy and must write after you have attained your quota why not create a book? All excellent writers begin small. Why not become a famous writer?
Keep your friendship with Google
You are asking yourself how your content is going to become noticed by new visitors if you are not ranking all that high on the search engines. It is not as difficult as you may believe. I did not say you had to toss keywords by the wayside, burn your search engine optimization books, and let your SEO assistant go. There is more than a single way to utilize your tools and knowledge to work for you. For example, take this article you are reading. What keyword am I ranking for? Is it optimized?
To answer these questions, ‘Yes, it’s optimized’. Keywords still should be present yet not in such a way that the keywords pop out from the remainder of the post. Keywords ought to be going with the flow of your content and keep your audience immersed in the story.
Therefore, the next time you create an article, consider who you are creating content for. What’s the purpose of that piece and who do you have a desire to attract with it—the spiders on Google or individuals like me and you.
Ignore keywords, ignore all of the things you ever learned. Make content interesting keep readers engaged and give readers a call to action while you simultaneously teach them something. This will keep them coming back for more.
