Category Archives: Content Strategy

How to make sure your content is found by Google Discover

How to optimize your content for Google Discover

Google wants you to stop searching. It wants to search high quality content for you and then fill your feed with it. If there ever was a need to create high-quality engaging content, it is now. You need to optimize your content for Google Discover.

What exactly is Google Discover and why do you need to optimize your content for it?

Google Discover is a replacement for Google Feed that you often come across when you use the Google search bar on your mobile phone, especially Google Now. Of course, there might be many Android-based phones that may not have Google Now pre-installed, but in most of the cases, your phone, or the phone of your customer or client, may be equipped with Google Now.

Since Google Discover isn’t being sent out to all the phones yet, you may still be using Google Feed. The updates on Google Feed are obtained from your search pattern and browsing history. As you know, Google tracks every activity of yours (yes, it is creepy) on the pretext that it wants to give you the content you’re looking for even when you don’t know how to find the right content.

Google is constantly tracking you

What is the difference between any other newsfeed, for example, Facebook Stories or even Flipboard, and Google Discover?

The first difference is, Google is after all, Google, and it is present in almost every non-iOS device. Hence, its feeds are automatically there on your mobile phone and unless you are hell bent on not using them, you will end up using them. Besides, Google claims that over 800 million users are using Google Feed regularly. The moment Google Discover arrives on their mobile phones, they will automatically start using it.

The second reason is, there is nothing negative about using Google Feeds. At one single place, it gives you all the information you need to organise yourself, even your flight updates if the information exists in your email. These are called “cards” and it gives you important updates on news, sports and entertainment.

Google constantly updates your feeds according to your search history.

Then it upgraded its feeds algorithm and started anticipating what you would like to read or watch.

Google Discover wants to predict what you want to find

It no longer wanted to depend on your search pattern or browsing pattern. It now aspired to predict what you’re going to like before you even knew it. Google Discover is a highly advanced version of its older Google Feeds Avtar.

The basic point is, if people come across your content without having to search for it, they may not search for it. This also means that if they are able to find your competitor’s content, there will be no need for them to search for your content. This way, they may never search for your content.

Using artificial intelligence, Google wants you to stop searching and start discovering.

For people to be able to “discover” your content, you need to convince Google that your content is worth discovering.

People who have used Google Discover say that there have been many design changes. There is a clickable topic header above every news item or update. If you tap on that topic header, feeds specific to that topic are displayed and Google takes note of your preference. At the bottom of the card, you will be able to indicate whether you would like to see more of such updates or less.

Topic header in Google Discover

Google Feed was previously accessible only through the Google Mobile app but now, once the Discover feed is introduced, it will be available in all Google.com mobile browsers including the “OK Google” thing.

Optimizing your content for Google Discover

Interestingly, this shift towards discovering rather than searching is in the sudden shift. Google has been modifying its content discovering capabilities for many years now and this is why a lot of stress is put on creating high-quality engaging content.

Optimizing your content for Google Discover is like sowing a tree. To eat fruit you need the tree, and there is no escaping from it, but you cannot get the fruit immediately. You will first need to plot a sampling or sow a seed. In this case, you will need to encourage your prospective customer or client to interact with your content, to engage with it, and only then Google Discover will deem it fit to keep on discovering it even when your prospective customer or client isn’t actively searching for it.

This Search Engine Land blog post has some useful tips on how to optimize your content for Google Discovery and make it more discoverable.

The first thing you need to understand while optimizing your content for Google Discovery is that it is all about the experience. What sort of experience people have with your content and how they’re going to interact with it? Are they going to be passive towards your content or they are going to share it with their friends and colleagues, share with their own timelines, link to it, spend more time going through it or even bookmark it? All these actions tell Google that people find your content valuable.

Importance of understanding user intent for content writing

In my blog post The importance of understanding user intent in content writing, I have written about how important it is to understand what your user/searcher is looking for and whether you are providing it or not. User intent means if someone finds your content on Google, goes to your link, stays there, and then doesn’t come back to Google to carry on the exact same search, it means the searcher found on your link what he or she was looking for and now there is no need to look for the exact thing.

There is also an attribute called the Search Task Accomplishment Factor about which I have written in this Huffington Post blog post, which talks about the same thing – does the search get over one’s someone visits your link or not? If the search gets over, it means you are providing exactly what the searcher is looking for, for that exact keyword. Your rankings improve.

Factors like these are going to have a big impact when you optimize your content for Google Discovery.

The above-linked Search Engine Land blog post suggests that you take care of the following when optimizing your content for Google Discovery:

Create quality content people like to engage with

Google Discover is going to function the same way your typical Facebook Timeline functions. The updates that you see are the ones that are either similar to the updates you have interacted with before, or, are similar to updates your friends are interested in. In one way or another, it is the engagement that decides what you see on your timeline.

The same is going to happen with Google Discover.

Now, why would people interact with your content, why would they engage with it, if they don’t find your content useful, interesting, high-quality or engaging?

Proactively showcase and highlight your content

Millions of web pages, images, videos and blog posts are being published every day. People can interact with your content only if they can find it. If you are well known, they themselves look for your content. If you’re not, you will need to take measures so that they take note of your content and start interacting with it. This will entail

Promoting your content using your social media profiles.
Giving incentive to people to interact with your content and engage with it.
Making your content discoverable.
Using recommended SEO guidelines so that those who search for your content can find it.
Using your mailing list to disseminate your content.

Use images and videos to optimize your content for Google Discover

It is already recommended that you use high quality graphics and images, on your blog posts and web pages. Google Discover will highlight important content through images and videos that are present in the same piece of content. Images and videos draw attention of people easily compared to text, this is why Google Discover is going to put more stress on your images and videos.

Publish new as well as evergreen content

Don’t rest on your laurels once you have published great content on your website or blog. You want people to keep coming back to your website for more great stuff. If you give them an indication that you have given your best and now there is nothing new to expect, they will lose interest in your website. Even Google crawlers will stop crawlingg your website or blog if your pattern becomes haphazard or rare.

Evergreen content means content people would like to bookmark, to save, to refer back to it whenever they need to recall the great information contained within that piece of content. This is also important. People would love to link to this content and when they link to this content, Google will think that this content is important and will showcase it in the Google Discover feeds.

Concluding remarks on content optimization for Google Discover

So, is active searching history? Personally, I don’t think so but I’m not a farsighted person when it comes to predicting technology and even content marketing trends. Maybe something is there that I cannot see, but, presently, I don’t think active searching is going away. This is why, every content aggregation service gives you a search bar. There is no “discovery”, “story” or “feed” service or app that does not come with a search box or a search bar. Why is it so? Because there is always a possibility of the artificial intelligence not discovering what you want.

But yes, passive browsing is here. All social networking and social media apps thrive and survive on our proclivity to browse passively. How many times do you post on Facebook or Twitter? Most of the time you are just scrolling up and down, viewing what other people have posted. These posts and updates don’t even appear chronologically. Some algorithm somewhere is deciding what you should see, and then you see it. So yes, we are already tuned to browsing passively and content being discovered for us.

Maybe, someday it will be a full circle and things will be back to the way they were on TV and radio, but more targeted and narrowed down.

How to Create the Content Your Audience Desires?

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Create content your audience desires

How many times have you found yourself without inspiration and feeling unsure whether the content you want to create is going to attract your audience? Everyone has moments when we run out of ideas. Moreover, you may already publish content constantly and still feel that you don’t have the results you expected. One explanation might be that you create your content based on your assumptions and not on clear research.

This article is going to help you make your audience “hungry” for your content. It doesn’t matter if you own a small or medium business. These strategies work in any scenario. You just need to listen to your audience and you will see how easy it is to create “craveable” content. So, let’s get started!

Create Content Your Audience Craves For

Do you know how to use your analytics?

Analytics are the best tools to tell you what your audience likes best and how they react to different posts. Social media analytics will tell you exactly what type of content was preferred the most by your audience. For instance, it is very easy to check which were the most appreciated posts on Facebook. Just go to the Insights feature and you will immediately see which posts had the highest engagement rates. If you want to become viral on Instagram, then you should consider creating a business account. Once you have set up your account, the analytics icon will tell you which were the top posts that were sorted on different criteria like impressions, engagement, reach, and so on.

What should you do next once you identify your top posts? Of course, you cannot copy them and post them again. Your audience will become disappointed if you do so, discovering that you lack inspiration and you have nothing new to tell them. Therefore, if you want to follow the positive pattern, you should ask yourself the following questions before you create the next posts:

What is the common topic among your top-rated posts?
What is the source of your top content? Is it coming from your blog or from a specific publication?
Is there a particular type of content performing much better than the others? For example, do the photos have bigger engagement rates than the videos?
Which were the most interesting comments your followers left on the popular posts?

Find what your audience thinks!

Your analytics tools might be great, but they don’t tell you everything. So, what better source there is to tell you how to create content your audience desires if you don’t ask them directly? There are many ways you can find your audience’s opinion. For example, you can publish a poll on your social media profile and ask your audience to vote the type of content they like the most. Based on the results, you can adjust your content strategy.

On the other hand, you can also ask open questions. These questions will give you a lot of ideas for new topics you can address in your next posts. Furthermore, you can email your subscribers periodically and ask them about the type of content they liked the most on your website. This is how you will show your audience how important they are for you and how much you value their opinion.

Learn from your competitors!

If you don’t have enough time to use analytics tools and create an entire content strategy for success, then you can have a look at what your competition is doing. You did it when you created your products, so why not do it also when it comes to your content? Your competition already puts a lot of efforts into creating shareable content for their products. So, who says that you cannot have a look as well? There are plenty of tools you can find online to help you have a sneak peek on your competition’s most engaging posts.

On the other hand, you can learn from other companies even if they are not your competition. You most probably have your idols. You can learn from their success stories and discover what is their strategy to keep their audience engaged. You can have a look at general ideas and patterns and then adapt them to your brand specifics.

The sky is no longer the limit

The internet is full of mediocre content. Your competition is also producing average content which doesn’t make their audience vibrate with every word they read. So, you need to do something more than them and adopt the skyscraper technique. You should try to get out of the ordinary and become known on the market with amazing content. How do you do it? It’s not that complicated!

First, you should find which is the most popular content. Once you have identified it, use that content to create a better version of it. If you know which is the topic that attracts your audience, then you can enhance your content with relevant keywords. Therefore, you increase your content’s visibility. Keywords will also help you identify even more popular content which you can then enhance and surprise your audience with useful and informative content.

Create marketing personas

Creating a marketing persona will help you identify exactly what your audience wants to receive from your side. You already know what type of products your audience wants to buy from you. So, now you need to find out how to make them follow your page and come back for more products and information. Without a marketing persona, you will only guess what your audience expects from you in terms of content. This might affect your inspiration as you might be creating content around the topics that you know best. A marketing persona, on the other hand, will help you get out of your comfort zone and create content that wows your audience.

If you really want to have success with your content, you need to separate yourself from the competition. They might be doing an excellent job. However, this doesn’t mean that you don’t have anything new to say. On the contrary, their ideas can be an excellent source of inspiration for you. Your content is an excellent tool which you can use to express your personality, humor, and ideas.

Is artificial intelligence going to replace content writers?

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Can AI do content writing?

Last year, a Japanese AI wrote a novella and almost won a literary prize. Considering such developments, questions like, is artificial intelligence going to replace content writers are bound to be asked.

Artificial intelligence is already being used in chatbots where answers are provided to visitors according to the questions they ask, and the questions don’t have to match the exact string existing in the database. Some of the chat bots can even understand the context.

Google search already uses AI to know the intent of your search queries rather than simply focusing on words. As I wrote in my previous blog post on sentiment analysis and content writing, search engines already try to interpret what you really mean rather than the search terms that you are using, to give you the best possible answers to your queries.

If you have switched over to the new Gmail interface you must have noticed that when you open a message, there are options beneath it that allow you to send a quick reply based on the content of the email message. That’s context happening, powered by AI.

Artificial intelligence can even recognise what is present in an image, for example, if there is an image of a tiger hiding behind trees, artificial intelligence will tell you that there is a tiger hiding behind the trees in the photo. As you must already know, AI can recognise faces, as is the case with the tagging feature that Facebook has.

So, with all this intelligence, can AI also do the job of content writing? If AI can write novels and books, why not content?

Why would you be tempted to use an AI instead of a content writer?

Volume, coupled with quality, I would say.

A good thing about machines is that they never tire, and the performance is consistent.

What you want from a content writer? You want high quality content that can improve your conversion rate and your search engine rankings.

For conversion rate you need convincing content, conversational content, engaging content.

Can artificial intelligence achieve that?

Only when it thinks like humans.

We are not humans just because we are biologically alive and unlike animals, we are humans because we are more perceptive about our surroundings and we can think about thinking itself.

As René Descartes said, “I think, therefore I am.”

A human being, a human life, is a collection of memories, experiences and bits of knowledge gathered throughout a life period.

Hence, the way a person writes, comes from all those memories, experiences and bits of knowledge that he or she has gathered through her entire existence.

Artificial intelligence may have data but at least in the near future, it is not going to have memories and experiences.

So, how can artificial intelligence be used for content writing? Can it really replace content writers?

I think AI will be able to create a framework of ideas, but a life can only be injected in that framework of ideas by a human content writer.

When it comes to generating 500-1000 articles or blog posts per day then may be, yes, artificial intelligence will definitely replace content writers, if not in the near future, then maybe in the coming 5 or 10 years.

But when it comes to turning visitors into customers and clients by establishing emotional connections, AI won’t be able to replace content writers, because only humans are capable of making those emotional connections.

Artificial intelligence will be able to generate quantity. Quality will only come from content writers.

Sentiment analysis: Happy customers, better content marketing, better SEO

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Sentiment analysis, content marketing and SEO

Content marketing and SEO are not just intertwined, they are also constantly evolving as companies like Google constantly try to figure out how to churn out the best possible results.

Algorithms today can analyze billions of messages in the form of text, images and videos on the Internet and tell you the exact sentiment people have about your business, about you, about your political party, and pretty much anything people feel sentimental about.

This is advanced technology and not everyone can have it. But, as a business, you can develop a content marketing strategy that can help you create content that depicts positive sentiment.

This blog post on Skyword explains in detail what sentiment analysis means and how it is changing SEO, and improving user experience. The post says that MIT has developed an algorithm that can even interpret sarcasm through the emojis people have used in their social media updates while talking about brands.

According to this Search Engine Journal report, Bing has already started using Sentiment Analysis to influence search results, and Google is contemplating it.

In fact, Google, to an extent, has already been using this technology, or something similar, to show you Featured Snippets.

Example of Google featured snippet

Here are two blog posts that I wrote about Google’s featured snippets:

To show Featured Snippets, the Google algorithm tries to find the intent of the search and then goes through the links it has crawled and finds out the portions that exactly answer the question being asked in the query. It interprets the sentiment.

The problem with the current version of such snippets is that they tend to provide just one perspective.

For example, in the above Search Engine Journal blog post, the author takes the example of “are reptiles good pets?”

Same intent but different Google query results

It was noted that Google showed a different snippet for “are reptiles bad pets?” whereas, search engine experts like Danny Sullivan feel that the answer should be the same because the question is more or less the same – you want to know whether reptiles are good pets or bad pets.

Microsoft Bing, instead of shuffling between different snippets, has started showing two perspectives side-by-side. Here is a screenshot from their blog post on the same topic:

Sentiment analysis used by Microsoft Bing

What exactly is sentiment analysis, especially in terms of content marketing and SEO?

It means using online tools to analyze various pieces of writing (not necessarily on your blog or website) to gauge what sort of sentiments people have about your business.

A special thing about sentiment analysis is that it is not just the black and white of “you are good” and “you are bad”. Though, “good” and “bad” are also very strong sentiments, there are many subtle emotional tones that people use to talk about your business and the subtle differences can make a big difference on whether people decide to do business with you or not. Take for example:

“Yes, a great piece of writing, indeed!”

“Do you really think it is a great piece of writing?”

“This piece of writing could have been better.”

“I have certainly seen better examples of writing.”

“Your writing is good, but anyway I’m going to go with another content writer.”

Now, as a human, if you go through these lines, you can interpret them as positive, negative, comparative and even cynical (the first one).

Suppose, I have been gathering all the feedback from my content writing clients and storing it somewhere over the years. A good sentiment analysis tool can tell me what the overall experience of my clients with my content writing service has been. Of course, more data there is, better are the results.

The above-mentioned data can be gathered from multiple sources, not necessarily from the emails that you get from your customers or clients. You can get the data from your comments section, from reviews section, and even the chat transcripts that you might have been saving.

If you want to widen the net, you can use hashtags, trends, keyword strings and your brand name to collect data from all over the Internet and then run it through your sentiment analysis software.

Sentiment analysis isn’t just done to know what people think about your business, it can also be done to know what people think about a particular aspect of life or doing work or having a vacation and then accordingly you can make changes to your business.

So, how does sentiment analysis have an impact on content marketing and SEO?

As a business you can use specialized sentiment analysis tools to monitor conversations on the Internet and social media and then tailor your content to serve your customers and clients better.

As mentioned above, Bing is already using sentiment analysis to decide what results to show for your search queries, and Google is in the process of doing so.

For big brands, the search engines may analyze the conversations people have about these brands on various platforms and then rank their content accordingly.

Suppose, there is a greater number of people criticizing the latest version of the iPhone. So, instead of showing a blog post from Apple that lists great things about the latest version, the search engines may decide to rank another blog post highlighting the negative things about the phone better than Apple’s blog post.

Similarly, if people share your blog post on various platforms with “positive sentiment” its search engine rankings may improve, compared to a greater number of people sharing another blog post on similar topic from another blog, but with “negative sentiment”.

So, as a small business, how can you improve your content and your content marketing by observing sentiment analysis, and consequently, improve your SEO?

Age-old wisdom comes into picture: create and publish relevant content. It all boils down to that.

Why?

What is positive sentiment anyway? You get positive sentiment in the form of endorsements from people who read your content, who watch it, use it to better their lives or the way they do their business or make purchasing decisions.

How do they endorse good content? They link to it and surround it with positive expressions (a great example, great insight, well said, what a piece of writing, nice tips, and so on).

When your content is posted on social networking websites people comment on it, like it, share it and carry out other activities that prove that they appreciate your content.

Sentiment analysis and SEO

Although Google hasn’t completely adopted sentiment analysis, the search engine has been using “search intent” to show featured snippets.

There is another technology that is called RankBrain that observes user behavior when people find your content on search results. If search engine users find your content on Google, go to your page or blog post, spend a few seconds over there, come back to Google and carry on the same search, it tells Google that the user didn’t find what he or she was looking for and hence, your content doesn’t solve the purpose of being ranked for the search term it is currently being ranked for. Your content loses its ranking.

How to write content for Google RankBrain

Alternatively, suppose currently a link doesn’t rank well but a user finds it on second or third page, goes there, spends some time and then no longer carries the same search back on Google, Google thinks that your content has solved the purpose of being ranked for the search term. Your content gains its ranking.

This is also a form of sentiment analysis because Google observes how people react to individual search results and then this has an impact on your search engine rankings.

Concluding remarks on sentiment analysis

The success of your content marketing depends a lot on your ability to understand what your audience needs and then providing it.

This very much takes care of positive sentiment about your content in general, and your brand in particular. If people like your content, there is a great chance that they are also going to like your brand, although, if they don’t like your product or service, it doesn’t really matter how great your content is. Ultimately, it is the business experience that matters, especially when you intend to promote a business through content marketing.

People generate and share content everywhere these days. You are not directly in control of the content generated by the others. You are only in control of the content generated and published by your business.

So, how do you control content generated by your prospective and current customers and clients?

By not giving them a reason to write content with negative sentiments. Provide them exceptional quality products and services then follow with great service.

It’s been observed that people leave negative feedback more easily than positive feedback. If someone has a lousy experience with your business there is a greater chance of him or her venting it out than someone having a good experience and going to the extra length of putting in some good words about your business.

Hence, publish high-quality content and then follow it up with a great business proposition. You will maintain a positive sentiment around your business.

The Ultimate Guide to Customizing Digital Signage Content for Effective Brand Promotion

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Customizing Digital signage content

Image source: Pexels.

One of the most up-and-coming ways of promoting your brand is through digital signage, instead of the traditional billboards-and-poster advertising. Digital signage involves using LED and LCD display systems to display audio-visual and interactive content. Think of touch-friendly digital maps in parks or short clips in large LED monitors in malls. Digital signage not only attracts customers with its various displays, it also adds to the glittering night skyline (just see a photo of Tokyo and you will know what we mean!)

You can easily get interactive custom signs and displays to promote your brand or organization. Here’s all you need to know:

Decide on the Display

Hardware is never as significant as it is to digital signage. Before you get set to design your very own display, find out what the dimensions of the prospective LCD or LED projection will be, and adjust and customize your design accordingly. Also find out what software the projection supports, and how your content will be displayed. Your content strategy depends on your display style, so only after all this information can you decide on it. For example, if your display only promotes visual and no sound, you need to design graphics and subtitles keeping in mind that there will be no audio. If you want to use a single static image on display, get a good designer who can ensure your custom signs will be of a good quality.

Tips for Design

Regardless of what content you use: video, image or an interactive board, there are some standard design tips. As with posters, do not overload your display with text or graphic. The simpler the poster, the more effective the message. A smart example of digital signage were these advertisements for Netflix in Paris. With reaction gifs from the shows offered by the media company, the displays responded to the current weather. This minimalistic effect was immediately relevant. No wonder, this campaign attracted a lot of attention!

Good Editing

Key to any advertising good content production is editing. After creating the content you like, make sure that it is grammatically sound and visually clean. No matter how attractive your display, having poor quality editing (like grammatical errors, poor graphics, misspelling) can be immensely off-putting for any onlooker. It gets quite cumbersome and expensive to have to redo the final version after its display in digital signage (not to mention, embarrassing). Before uploading the final draft, have it looked over by proofreaders and designers.

Time is of Essence

The Netflix campaign we mentioned also embodied another vital idea: timing. It is a bad idea to run a full-length advertisement because most digital signage displays are spread across malls, bus stops or parks: places where people are unlikely to hang around for long. Keeping your presentation short and simple is more likely to attract onlookers and get your brand message across. Keeping it short means you can even use these short advertisements on social media!

Draw Effective Links

One of the best ways of creating brand recognition is through multi-ad campaigns. By maintaining similar style, theme and message through different content, connected advertisements make the customer eager to find variations of the advertisement. Thereby, they keep a lookout for the brand. In digital signage, this is especially easy because you can rotate content and display multiple messages over time. For example, in Singapore, Pixar displayed different digital signage advertisements based on the weather for their film Inside Out! People even made videos documenting these switches. You can design custom signs based on seasons, weather and the time of the day. You can even evolve them around sale timings or different coupon codes!

Besides Advertising

Remember, your digital signs do not simply have to be used for advertising: you can use them for a variety of purposes. Many NGOs use digital signage alongside donation sign-ups or boxes. Take The Melanoma Institute Australia, which displayed a massive melanoma alongside a credit card projection for paying towards cancer research. Each successful donation would reduce the size of the melanoma! Plus, the versatility of the display means that with some technological modification, you can even increase the efficiency of your company. For example, if you own a restaurant or shop, you can use digital signage to accept orders through interactive screens.

If you have a brand that needs promoting, it isn’t enough to merely come up with innovative content, you also need to keep up with the latest trends in advertising. Digital signage is the rising trend in business promotion. Switch over to this new avenue, and get custom signs made to draw instant attention towards your brand!