Videos are now the most sought-after type of content by consumers. Because of this, business owners are pouring a lot of money into ensuring their websites have the right number of videos that will pull in visitors and nudge them towards the next stages of the sales funnel.
However, if you are a business owner, investing only in well-made videos will prove to be a poor decision. To create a website that stands out from the competition and serves as a useful selling platform, you need to diversify your content.
This means making sure your website has the right amount of written content as well.
According to research, Written content is still crucial in persuading visitors to stay longer and explore your website more. Additionally, your posts play a vital role in encouraging these online users to revisit your site.
Because of these reasons, you have to make writing and publishing high-quality content one of your top content marketing priorities.
Creating Standout Content
To ensure you have only the highest quality posts on your website and that you get the most from them, avoid these common web content writing mistakes:
1. Writing for everyone
There is nothing wrong with aiming to get as many people as you can to read your content. However, if you write content that appeals to everyone, you will come up with pieces that won’t impress and convince anyone.
In order for your website content to help you reach your goals, always start by identifying your target audience. Next, put yourself in their shoes and imagine what information they would like to get or know more about. Try to think about their interests, preferences, and hobbies as well.
Once you have these details, you will know what your users need and are interested in. You will then be successful in writing content they will find valuable.
Next, note down your purpose for writing your post. Reflect on what you want your content to achieve. Do you want it to educate, entertain, or convert?
By knowing the reasons why you are writing a post, you will successfully link the visitor to your content. You can then close the gap by presenting a solution that meets their needs.
2. Failing to do sufficient research
With the help of the Internet, anyone can write about anything. However, there is more to creating content than reading a few articles, rewriting sentences, and cobbling them to come up with a new one.
To create high-quality content, you need to conduct extensive research. This, however, doesn’t mean only reading some articles online. You need to learn more about your product or service, your industry, and even what your competitors are offering.
If you want to land on the top spot in search engine results pages, you need to arm yourself with a substantial amount of information about your topic. You can only do this by doing sufficient research and digging for vital, valuable details from various sources to reveal ones that others have not shared yet.
3. Neglecting SEO
When writing, you should always keep your target audience in mind. But this doesn’t mean you should forget about search engines. If you do, your content will be useless.
To get the most from your content, make sure you include key search engine optimization (SEO) strategies in your posts. These include using the right keywords and the related search terms in your article.
Additionally, always format your content correctly by using titles and subheadings. Lastly, don’t forget to add meta tags and alt text in the images you will place in the post.
By optimizing your posts, you will make it easier for search engines to scan and map your website. This, in turn, will help boost your ranking.
4. Not double-checking your work
No matter how much time and effort you put into doing research and writing your content, everything will go to waste if your post contains typos.
Errors, even the simplest ones, will hurt the credibility of your brand and affect the reader’s impression of your content and company. Because of this, it is vital that you double-check your work before publishing it.
Start by using spell and grammar check tools to go over your content and correct the mistakes. Next, use traditional proofreading techniques such as reading the post out loud and having another person review it to ensure you will be publishing an error-free article.
5. Overlooking the importance of having a content
Many website owners go through short spurts when publishing content. They may post two articles in one week but fail to release even one the following month.
Regardless of the reason behind this inconsistency, keep in mind that your website will be affected by this irregularity. This is because search engines typically favour sites that are consistently updated with new content.
Additionally, online users prefer sites that are always up-to-date and regularly provide fresh and valuable information.
To avoid this mistake, create a content calendar. With a schedule, you won’t have a good excuse to avoid or delay writing.
When creating your calendar, be realistic with the amount of content you want to write every month. Also, remember that quality always trumps quantity. As such, if you have to choose between publishing three short, run-of-the-mill articles and one lengthy, detailed, and well-researched piece, go for the long post.
Publishing only the best content on your website is certainly not easy to do. However, since it is an integral part of content marketing, you need to find a way to include this in your strategy.
If you and your staff don’t have the time to come up with high-quality articles, work with a reputable freelance copywriter to ensure your website only has the best, new content on a regular basis.