How Important Is Quality Content?

For several years the marketing community has been stating that “content is king” and that it is critical for a quality SEO strategy, but what type of content are we talking about? Low cost SEO copywriters have popped up all over the place, from local Craigslist listings to overseas outsourced writers that tend to get lost in translation. This flood of cheap content worked for a while when the key to being ranked well was to produce a lot of pages, each optimized for a different long tail keyword. SEO and content marketing have changed a lot in recent years.

How have things changed, exactly? Well, first there was Google Panda.

The Panda update penalized sites that had mediocre content and poor quality links. Then, there was Hummingbird. Before Hummingbird, Google would treat two similar keyword phrases as completely different terms. Now Google has become “smarter” and treats similar phrases the same. Search engines have become completely aware of the relevance between keyword phrases and a quality page can now rank for a variety of search terms. For example, previously they would consider “Houston moving company” and “moving service in Houston” very differently, but after Hummingbird the search results look very similar.

Every search engine update aims to improve the results for the end user. they want to dig deeper and deliver exactly what the searcher is wanting. For example, let’s say you search for “where can I get a haircut in Chicago?” Google knows that you really want to see a list of barber shops and salons, and that’s what you’ll get.

Since the shift has gone even further toward provided relevant, quality results for the end user and a page can now rank for many different search terms, how does this apply to your SEO and marketing efforts?

Publish great content that people will want to read. Publish content that deserves to rank for several keywords.

Instead of grinding out dozens of pages of content that are saturated with a specific keyword phrase, start writing for human beings again. Dig deeper and invest your time creating fewer, longer, and higher quality pages that people will find absolutely amazing. If your readers think it’s amazing, so will Google. Amazing content will get more clicks, more shares and reduce your bounce rate. This all sends positive SEO signals to Google and keeps you ranking well. These days, a quality content writer is more important than ever. Skip the low cost content mills and partner with a quality Internet content creator that has experience in your industry and has the capability to create amazing content that your readers will truly value.