Google is God, Google is … Well, We have been kind of worshiping the search engines. We always wondered how we ever managed without them. But the way web world is constantly evolving, there is a feeling that a day is not far off when the search engines and portals will be less used and social media and blogs are getting more center and up front! Yes, things are changing and in style.

The question is – Will a day come when people will use more and more RSS (really simple syndication) feeds and depend less and less on search engines?

What are RSS Feeds?

RSS is a process used by websites to present updated and newer contents to subscribers directly through its readers. This is like speed-post delivered at home – fresh and updated contents delivered directly to the readers. Actually a synopsis called RSS feed is displayed and this small capsule of information can be used for selecting the full content/article. An RSS reader or editor sorts out the feeds and also generates the RSS feeds. Today RSS is fast-forwarding the web search for optimal content.

Benefits of RSS Feeds

RSS feeds have revolutionized the concept of web search today. We can pick and select the content we need and what suits us. No need to plow through the vast ocean of information available over the net. No spam or no bulk mail; everything you need is at just a click. Especially, when readers want timely and useful updates from their various favorite websites, and need the updates collected in a single place (done with a feed reader interface).

Marketing via RSS

Marketing strategy using RSS feeds is more effective because you send the latest and applicable information and it is sent directly to the target audience. Site optimization is easier with RSS feeds. Since more and more people are trusting social media opinions and recommendations about any new purchases they are contemplating, the RSS feeds from the social media are gaining more power.

Why not Search Engines?

Most likely the vast amount of information available on the Internet kind of frightens people. They feel so overwhelmed by the surfeit of contents, they start feeling confused and uncertain. When they ask for product information, there may be two diametrically opposite recommendations which confound the common man. This could be the major reason for shunning the search engines.

Scoring over by RSS

Why some people think that RSS feeds give them an easier way out – more so than the search engines? The single most use of Internet is for searching. Search is what makes people seek the net – to know, to learn and to know the pros and cons and perhaps to buy. If RSS feeds, due to timely and useful content, convince the visitor to buy a product, that is optimal conversion and that counts greatly in favor of RSS feeds. If RSS feeds satisfy the customer that they have achieved what they wanted, and visitors feel that they can come back for more and keep coming back – why, it is a greatest victory for RSS feeds.

The Question – Will RSS feeds undermine Search Engines?

Will the gateways change? Will Google, Bing and such lose their edge? Will Wikipedia not get as many clicks? Otherwise why Google started its own RSS feeder – Google reader – To play safe? (www.reader.google.com). So many questions!

All really boils down to individual choices. Much as fast-food is favorite with some people, RSS feeds will no doubt gather more fan following. Yes, many will be there – who will not have the time or inclination for a thorough research and may settle down to go by the recommendation or contents of RSS feeds.

But RSS feeds replacing Search Engines does not seem possible in the near future.

Certainly all that is good and great are not only on RSS feeds. A connoisseur will still not settle down with only fast-food; he would find time to learn and know; he would rather pick and choose what he wants, what he thinks as most relevant and not let others choose for him. He will still Google.

SEO content as an expression has been gaining traction gradually, as more and more organizations and content creators realize that it doesn’t merely mean putting keywords here and there and then fretting over their density compared to the overall content. What do millions of Internet users access everyday while surfing the Internet? They access the content present on various websites? What do people promote day in and day out on various social media and networking websites? They promote content links. So it’s clear it’s everything about content, whether it exists in the form of text, video or images.

Since everybody is seeking content, how do you create content that’s actually being sought? And if you create content that is highly sought after, how do you let people know of its existence? This is where SEO content writing can help you. Whether people are using search engines, online directories or social networking websites to dig out relevant information, one thing is common that they use: the keywords, the search terms. There are many Internet “gurus” that say SEO is fast becoming irrelevant because less and less people are using search engines and more and more people are using social media and social networking websites to retrieve information that can help them make informed purchasing decisions. It’s true to a great extent, but from where do those social media and social networking websites get that information that is later on “found” by their users? Right. From websites and blogs.

SEO content writing is not just about outsmarting the search engines. It’s about talking in the right language and using the right words; words people actually use. If I’m writing about SEO content writing, and if nowhere on my page this phrase appears (let’s say all the time I’m talking about getting more search engine traffic — a good thing to do actually, but here I’m just explaining the expressions and their relevance) how can the search engines find my page when people are looking for SEO content writing?

So it’s very important that you figure out:

• What’s your target market
• What search terms and expressions they actually use
• What they’re actually looking for
• How to incorporate the data into your entire SEO content writing process

How does it help you improve your search engine rankings

A lot of your success on the Internet depends on getting found, if you don’t have millions of dollars to spend on advertising. Search engine optimization is definitely a good start and when you include keyword targeting in your overall SEO content writing strategy it helps the search engine ranking algorithms compute the relevancy according to the searches being conducted. It has a circular effect:

SEO Content Writing

As you can see in the diagram, with the right start, one thing leads to another and it goes on and on.

But is it this simple? Of course its not.

SEO content writing has to be matched with relevancy — it must provide solutions and answers. Suppose someone wants to know what smart phone she should buy? Simply optimizing your content for iPhone or Nexus One or BlackBerry isn’t going to be of much help and if it isn’t going to be of much help people are neither going to link to it nor going to promote it. Unless your content really helps her decide, it’s of no relevance, and even if it appears on the first pages of various search engines (flukes do happen), it neither benefits you nor your visitors.

Create few SEO content pages, but create highly relevant pages. This is where everything begins. If you start focusing on every keyword under the sun and start generating tons of directionless traffic it’s not going to benefit you, and you’ll end up concluding that SEO content writing doesn’t work. Instead, focus on a few search terms and create highly relevant content around them. Just in a couple of months you’ll notice a marked difference.

How important is SEO to SEM today? Is SEO losing the edge? Are small businesses finally breaking free from the power of SEO and getting recognition still? Are we moving away from the obsession with SEO? Some intriguingly different questions indeed!

SEM rules still

The number of online customers making their purchases is continually on the rise. One click opens the virtual store and shows a range of products and services and all the information needed and another click clinches the deal most satisfying mutually. Today internet marketing is very much in; SEM rules the roost.

Importance of SEO

Until now, SEM blended the free SEO and the PPC to increase the exposure of any website. Search engine marketing campaigns all focussed on search engine optimization with keywords or increasing the pay per click – again on a key-word related ad. And SEO was the favourite all round. SERPs, Meta tags, keywords, keyword-rich contents, SEO keywords and keyword research – these words seem to be resonating in the web writing world. The first advice to any freelance writer is still ‘learn all about SEO.’

A Change is on the way?

Maybe it looks like things are changing, albeit slowly, but steadily. No, no, the SEM is here to stay and keywords and keyword-rich contents are all still the way to go. But maybe a day will come when search engine ranking or search engine optimization will not be the ruling factors to define the success of a website. Google has developed systems which are not SERP controlled and which are giving more attention to small businesses with far better analytics. Now the trend is moving beyond just the search engines and the search is on to find and nurture customers on social media – on networks like Facebook and Twitter.

Importance of Social Networks

Today, social media is gaining more importance and relevance in the search world. Search engines are incorporating media status updates into their search results – kind of a mixture of search and social media! So Digg, Delicious, Facebook and Twitter – where people like to belong to, are gaining importance and status updates on these sites influence the ratings. Already Google and Bing ratings are linked with social media site postings.

How to attract Social Users?

Quality content! Quality content is the only way to go. Make the content attractive enough and there will be enough flies to flock to the honey! Content that gives answers to their search, content that provides solutions, content that pen-pictures the product and content that will stir the consumer’s interest will make the visitor come away satisfied and eager to go back to and recommend to friends. Original and quality content will increase conversion.

Google’s definition of need for quality content is illuminating – “Delivering high quality, informative and well constructed content is what differentiates you from your competition and defines your web presence.”

Adding fresh content will keep the visitors come a visiting to the site. RSS feeds and even videos can be used to keep the content up-to-date. But unique and web-product relevant content should dominate the site. Quality and high-value content will be the major force to sell the products.

Will SEO be one day really obsolete?

Definitely not! Already the algorithms are changing. Blog-driven links and social-media tagging are taken due notice by the search engines. Google is also implementing personalization. Actually a highly efficient SEO never just is counting keywords or their placement. It recognizes the value of good and quality content. Compelling to read and easy-to-find content will truly be the king and SEO will revel in it.

What is content marketing? It is claimed that content drives the Internet. Does it then make content marketing too this powerful? Are right keywords all that essential to successful content marketing? And how can we choose the right keywords for content marketing? So many questions! Come, let us find a few answers.

How different Content Marketing is and the principles of content marketing

As opposed to traditional marketing, content marketing is all about sharing quality information that is relevant and current, with your prospective customers and clients. Whereas the traditional marketing uses interruption techniques, content marketing will gently but firmly hold the consumers’ attention and build brand loyalty. This is done more by educating the customer and letting him/her recognize the advantages of the product/service and go for it with the conviction of right choice. Knowing more about the product/service, trusting and starting to like it will be the way content marketing works.

The idea of creating and sharing content is aimed at rather gentle persuasion, targeting an intelligent and informed audience to let them accept the brand as a thought leader and industry expert. This shared content will grab a potential customer’s attention, make him read it, think about it and decide after learning all about it. Most of the content will aim at solving their problem along with entertaining them and make them feel good all over.

Some of the different forms of content marketing are

• Custom publishing – Custom media
• Branded entertainment – Branded content
• Database marketing
• Corporate media – Corporate publishing
• Corporate journalism

What is the importance of keywords in content marketing?

Online information that is concisely and succinctly expressed and worded elegantly and interestingly will be the way content is going to be presented. But how to get the customer know about the content? What will make him/her visit your site? Videos, blogging or PDFs are all great platforms but the most essential will be the right keywords that will drive the traffic towards your content. The keywords should be such that the search engines are able to index and rank your website according to the relevant search terms being used by their users; your website is then rated high in SEO.

Choosing the right keywords for content marketing

Right keywords are those:

• Words that fit as header tags (HI, H2, H3 etc) to facilitate the search engines to pick them up; especially the H1 tag carries a lot of weight.
• Words that fit individually as page tags depending on what is on that page.
• Words that can flow naturally and meaningfully with the content but yet can be repeated for the required density without an obvious put-on effect.
• Words that can be bolded and italicised where needed fitting with meaningful flowing text.
• The operative principle is that written text and chosen keywords present a meaningful and naturally flowing text.

Well, it may not be an exaggeration if tomorrow more than 80% of marketing strategy will be via content marketing. Content marketing creates so much credibility and trust with such persuasive authority that there will be no sales resistance left against it.

Writing for SEO – It’s all about search engine optimization these days – writers are explicitly asked to use certain keywords in the title of their articles (to be used on web pages) and also sprinkle them liberally in the body so that search engines will pick up them when they trawl the web and display them on the front page of the results. In short, everyone who writes content for the web wants their pages to earn a high rank. But before you start to shove words into your article and assume that’s what SEO is all about, read these essential tips you need to know about optimizing your writing for search engines:

• You must attract audiences: The first thing to do is to get people to visit your website. You do this by focusing on the placement of your keywords and choosing your website’s content based on your niche and what people want from that niche subject. You must also come up with catchy titles that make people want to click on your link and take a look at what’s inside – remember though, that the title should not be misleading and should stay true to the kind of content people associate with your website.
• You need to get people to come back: Now this is the really tricky part – most writers find that they can get people to visit once, but when it comes to getting them back, they fall short of expectations. This is because their articles flatter to deceive more often than not – the titles are great and the site is displayed on the first page of the search engine results, but the content is just pure rubbish or bordering on it. If you want to get people to come back, write articles of good quality, articles that do not repeat the same things over and over again and which use SEO keywords intelligently (it’s not obvious that they’re keywords) to rather than randomly.
• You need to get your facts right: Just because you’re on the web, it’s not right that you don’t pay attention to quality. You often see writers churning out articles that adhere to word limits and SEO rules but which are sadly lacking in accuracy or quality. When this happens once too often, you end up losing your audience.
• You need to be grammatically correct: No one likes to read bad writing; so even if your ideas are good and you have the facts down correctly, even if you’ve achieved top SEO status, when your writing is grammatically incorrect, it makes for a discomfiting and uneasy ready experience. If grammar is not your forte, then get a qualified editor to clean up your work before you publish it.
• You must provide content that’s needed: And finally, although it may be your website and your prerogative to decide what to put on it, unless you cater to the needs of your audience, you’re going to be left with no readers at all. So write content that you know people want to read, and watch your popularity soar.

It doesn’t help if you already have lots of content and then you realize that you are not targeting the right keywords. Although no situation is hopeless you can save yourself lots of time, and money, if you define your SEO goals properly. Make a list of keywords and keyword phrases you’d like to incorporate and then start generating your content around them.

There is also a business benefit of clearly defining your SEO goals — it keeps you focused. You know what sort of content you require for your website and blog and what you should avoid; yes, misplaced content is bad for SEO.

How do you keep your content SEO-focused?

• Create titles with your keywords. Your page titles are very important. They appear in the search engine result pages as hyperlinks when people search for the relevant terms. People click more on the links that carry the search terms they’ve just used. Even when people promote your content on social networking websites or link your your pages and blog posts they normally copy/paste your title — this associates these keywords with your brand.
• Use your keywords and key phrases when communicating your ideas. This tells the search engines that you have lots of content associated with the search term being currently used. If you provide content writing services then you should be talking about this subject a lot on your blog or website. But do it naturally; there is no need to use your relevant keywords excessively — this gets you penalized by almost all search engines.
• Link to your other pages not just the home page. Your different pages contain different bits of information and whenever you feel a particular phrase can be linked to a page giving more information about that phrase, create a link. It makes it easier for the search engine crawlers to reach other pages and it also creases the relevancy of your less prominent pages.

The basic idea of creating SEO-focused content strategy is keeping you focused and help you focus on the right search terms.

Online content writers often have to write “seo content” that can help their clients achieve higher search engine rankings. Is there really some difference between regular content and SEO content? It depends on how you want to define your writing, and what you need to attain as a professional online copywriter or content writer. Almost every (almost every seems contradictory though) website owner wants higher search engine rankings to increase their visibility and get more targeted search engine traffic and they know their content can help them achieve that. So when they approach a content writer they want to know whether they can get SEO content that can help them improve their search engine rankings. You can write “normal” content and you can write seo content based on the kind of competition the website faces on search engines. If there isn’t much competition even regular content can bring your website to the first page of major search engines (I may quickly add that merely adding SEO content doesn’t get you lots of traffic — it depends on many external factors too). More competition means you really have to highlight your message. This is where SEO content writing guidelines become important. Here are a few.

Cover focused topics

Don’t try to cover everything under the sun on a single page. Search engines prefer focused pages, especially talking about a particular topic or phrase. So if you are creating a page on “social media services” then stick to the topic and let it be known to the search engines that you’re really talking on this subject. Similarly, if you are talking about SEO copywriting then deal with only this subject. It also satisfies people crazy about keyword density. When you talk about a topic you use its associated phrases and terms on your own without making an extra effort.

Page title, yes, again

One of the most important parts of your page is the title, the main heading. It must present to the search engines the most compelling reason to crawl and index that page (or blog post). Preferably, use the entire phrase you are targeting, in the title. You don’t have to use the words in the same order, but try to use them. No need to sound esoteric, no need to use puns. Take for example the title of this blog post. It says: SEO guidelines for content writers. It can also be written as “how to improve your search engine writing” or something else, but I want to talk to content writers who are looking for SEO guidelines.

Organize your content using the right tags

The search engines specifically look for the right words at particular locations. They check for you keywords in heading, sub-heading, bullet-ed lists and anchor texts (text that exists as a hyper link). This is because many people simply go through the headings and bullets to get a gist of your page. Keywords in hypertext are a good accessibility policy.

Of course this is not an SEO tips blog post so I’m not going to talk about the changes in the source code; my main focus here is the text — how you can organize the text in order to SEOmize it.

And what about the keyword density?

There is no magical formula actually. Use the keywords wherever they seem appropriate, and wherever their appearance seems unnatural, don’t use them. If you are really hung up on using some sort of percentage, just use your phrase in the first paragraph, in one or two headings, in the bullet list at least once, and if you can manage, as a hyper text. Then use it in the last sentence but it’s not necessary.

By language here I don’t mean English or Portuguese or French; by language I mean the words and phrases that you use in order to create content for your website or blog.

Creating search engine optimized content is all about conveying the right message for the appropriate search terms. Whenever you are writing for your website you have to keep in mind – if it is important – for what search expressions your website should draw traffic from various search engines. For instance, my website is about offering content writing and online copywriting services. So any mixture of these expressions must get me higher rankings if I want to keep doing business through search engines.

There are many webmasters and Internet marketing experts that suggest that one shouldn’t solely depend on search engine traffic and this is true. Nonetheless the majority of your traffic comes from search engines if you don’t have thousands of incoming links from other web sites and blogs and you haven’t got tons of money to invest in online advertising. Traffic from search engines can be an invaluable, low-cost opportunity that you must leverage, and this can be done by using language that conveys the most appropriate message to the search engine algorithms so that they can rank your website or individual web pages accordingly.

Language definitely affects your search engine rankings at least in the current context. People talk about semantic optimization, and even natural language processing, but right now it doesn’t seem to be happening. The actual words still matter. If I am promoting content writing I’m not getting search engine traffic if people are searching for a creative writer, even if I wish I did and suggested subtly somewhere on my website – I get found if people are looking for a content writer because I talk so much about content writing.

This I learnt the hard way. Before deciding to become a content writer I used to design and develop websites. Due to some vague reason I ended up optimizing my website for the term “Web designing” rather than “Web designer”. I featured on the first page of Google for Web designing for a good two years and I didn’t generate much business (blogging hadn’t arrived at that time otherwise I would have converted the website into a blog). I should have actually optimized my website for web designer (of course the good side is I became a content writer). These are the small things that can have long-lasting repercussions if you’re not careful about the language you use on your website.

Image source: brandis78

You many often come across blogs and articles telling you how to get spikes of traffic by writing content that pulls people towards your website or blog. They advise you to use “highly compelling” titles and submitting your link to social networking and social bookmarking websites such as FaceBook, Twitter, Digg and Delicious. I wonder how much this sort of traffic helps your business. Mind you I’m not questioning the process and I’m not even suggesting you not to indulge in such activities, I’m just thinking about it.

For instance I provide online writing services, so I would, ideally, like to draw traffic that can fetch me more business. This doesn’t mean I don’t want other people to visit my website. After all I share my thoughts on various subjects on this blog for instance, and I’d love it if people from all over the world access my blog and participate in various conversations. I feel good when all of a sudden 200 extra visitors come to my website and 5 among them subscribe to my RSS feeds or my e-mail updates. Even if they never do business with me, it is exhilarating to see the number rising day bay day. The good doesn’t always come from prospective clients.

When more people, let’s say 2000 in a day, visit your website and read your blog post or article, all of a sudden so many people are made aware of your existence and what you do. If you somehow keep on generating such spikes this number keeps on increasing. Get 4-5 traffic spikes every month and you can easily become a known person.

Does becoming known get you more business? It certainly does. As they say, success begets success. Similarly, traffic begets traffic, popularity begets popularity and trustworthiness begets trustworthiness, and all this is needed to generate more business.

When people know you, they eagerly link to you. I’ve seen even dumbest posts by popular bloggers getting popular. They bookmark you, they forward your links, they follow you on Twitter (want to follow me? It’s @amrithallan) and they add you as a friend in FaceBook. All of a sudden, heavy traffic becomes a regular affair because even the search engines begin sending you 1000s of visitors every day. All this helps you build your brand.

Having said that, slow and steady wins the race. You don’t have to prove anything as long as you meeting your business goals. Just be regular and share your experiences sincerely. The traffic will magically pick up.

You want to know how to write SEO text to improve your search engine rankings, most probably. When you are writing for the web, it’s not just the human readers who are going to read, evaluate and then act upon whatever you have published, even the various search engines are going to evaluate your text and rank it accordingly. Although the search engine companies like Google are constantly trying to mimic the human psyche as closely as possible there subtle differences in the ways that humans and the search engine algorithms make sense of your text. If you want to learn how to write SEO text you should also spend some time understanding how the search engine crawlers access your individual pages and how those pages are ranked according to keywords and other, longer expressions present on your webpage.

Although there are many SEO experts who say that words don’t matter but they really do. Ever since we started using language to communicate words have been an integral, inseparable part of language. So in order to convey something you have to be careful about your words. For instance if you want to tell somebody, I love you, you don’t say I have the extremely opposite feeling of hatred for you. The search engines are going to think that you’re talking about hatred and not love. So if you want to learn how to write SEO you must also learn to use the right words to say something. Aside from that here are a few pointers that can lead you towards writing effective SEO text.

Make a list of the keywords that you’re going to use in the SEO text of the current page

The keywords of course must be context specific. Before preparing the text you should prepare a list of keywords and expressions that you would like to highlight on the page. Try to use these keywords while forming your sentences. Writing SEO text doesn’t meaning filling up your webpage with nonsensical repetitions. Don’t overdo it and stick to relevance. Recently I read that you should use your keyword in the first sentence of the first paragraph, in the last sentence of the first paragraph, once in every paragraph, and then once in the last sentence of the last paragraph. I don’t think all this is necessary, just use your keywords whenever you think they should appear justifiably. Use them in your headings and subheadings, bulleted lists and in anchor text. The moot point is that you have to convince the search engine algorithms that you are seriously talking about the keyword on your page.

Put your keywords in the title of your page

The title of your page is very important because it tells the search engines what your page contains. Although there is no harm in creating esoteric titles it helps a lot if your title contains the expression for which you want to be ranked higher on the search engine results pages. Various studies have revealed that search engine users have a greater tendency to click on the hyperlinks that contain the expressions they have just used to conduct the search. The title of your webpage appears as a hyperlink on the search engine results page.

Talk about the topic in the very beginning

The search engine crawlers have millions of pages to crawl and they are constantly economizing the time they spend on individual pages. Talk about the main thing in the very beginning of your webpage so that even if they don’t go through the entire page they can make out the basic theme of the page and analyze it accordingly for the appropriate keywords.

Organize your text with headings, subheadings and bullets

Headings, subheadings and bullets often present the whole picture. Many visitors just go through the headings, subheadings and bulleted points and skip the finer print. You can use your headings to kindle their interest and encourage them to read the rest of the text also. Anyway, since headings, subheadings and bullets often contain the main highlights, if they are present on the page the search engine crawlers first go through them.

Basically, there is no set formula for writing SEO text because every keyword has its own peculiar way of performing, and you shouldn’t worry much about it. Just make sure the text is properly laid out, you use the keywords enough times, and you make the text reader-friendly. And don’t try to cram many keywords into one page, 2-3 keywords should be focused upon, and in fact, you should have separate dedicated pages for all your important keywords.