Category Archives: Content Writing

SEO through conversational content writing

Leave a reply

Conversational content writing is very important for SEO these days. What is conversational content writing?

It is not as mystical as it may sound, it simply means writing in a manner people speak. This is because when people are searching for information, they are mostly speaking into their mobile phones. Many SEO experts also term it as writing for “conversational search”.

Defining conversational search and conversational content writing

As mentioned above, when people use search these days, they speak into their mobile phones (or even in the microphone of their desktop browsers) complete sentences and phrases. All modern search queries are of this nature.

In the past, people mostly used shorter search queries, something like “hairdresser” or “content writer”. This was mostly because people were writing queries into the search bar. Writing is always a bit difficult compared to speaking into a microphone.

When people use a microphone, they also use syntactical and grammatical patterns that resemble the way people speak. Someone is more likely to search for “looking for a content writer for my accounting website” rather than “content writer”. Or something like, “looking for a writer for my business emails”.

If you’re using Google Home or Amazon Echo, you are more likely to say “find steamed vegetarian dumplings near me”, or even “I would like to order steamed vegetarian dumplings”.

How to write content for conversational search?

Anticipate all possible queries people may use to do business with you. Write as many sentences as people may use to be able to find your business on Google.

Then write content dedicated to these queries. You can cover multiple queries on a single web page or blog post, or you can create dedicated web pages and blog posts to individual conversational queries. Just make sure you don’t end up publishing lots of duplicate content in the process.

Use natural language., Something like “how does content writing improve my SEO?”.

Is it fine to copy someone else’s content?

Leave a reply

Is it fine to copy content for SEO?

Is it fine to copy content for SEO?

You need to know whether it is an ethical question, an SEO-related question or a practical one.

Recently I was brainstorming a client’s content strategy on a Zoom meeting and SEO guy had also joined. I know there are many reputed SEO companies that are doing great work, but I’m quite wary of SEO people who want to manipulate content to improve search engine rankings instead of following the quality and relevance of the content itself to automatically improve rankings.

During the conversation he very casually said that I should copy content from other websites and then shuffle it and change a few words here and there and it would be great for SEO. He said that it’s good to copy content from high-ranking websites because they have already improved their search engine rankings with that particular content format.

I was like, WTF? I mean, I didn’t verbally object because the client is quite enamored with the SEO guy, but inside my mind, I was already figuring how not to butt in and remain focused on the core topic – how to write valuable content that will organically improve the clients search engine rankings.

Let’s put aside the fact that Google may realize that you have copied the content from another website and therefore, you should be penalized, for a while.

Let’s focus on the ethical issue here. But before that, let’s also be realistic.

As a content writer, how do I define “copying content from another website or blog”? When does it become plagiarism?

Difference between plagiarism and ideation

I think we all know the meaning of plagiarism – picking content as it is and then using it as your own, verbatim mostly.

Even if you pick content and then change a few words here and there but more or less keep the entire thing intact without changing even the sentence structure, still it is plagiarism.

Plagiarism is a very serious issue in academics, research papers, scientific journals, journalistic writing and books and novels. As a student you can be expelled from a course. As a scientist you can be debarred and humiliated. As a journalist you invite contamination and ridicule. As an author you can be sued, and you may have to pay damages.

As a content writer, although it may be difficult for the aggrieved party to take action against you, if someone is hellbent upon taking action, he or she can. For example, an aggrieved party can approach your web hosting company if your web hosting company has a policy against plagiarism and copyright violation. They can take down your website. If you’re in the same country legal action can also be initiated.

It’s mostly Google penalization that deters people from plagiarizing content. Google can blacklist your website if you are a repeat offender.

But what about rewriting something completely in your own style, in your own language? Many bloggers do that. I have written tips on content writing and hundreds of other websites and blogs have published tips on content writing. Similarly, websites telling you how to improve your search engine rankings are everywhere. They have the same information, it’s just that, they have rewritten the information with slight changes, and with their own take.

Just because Wikipedia has an article on what is blockchain doesn’t mean I cannot publish a blog post on the topic of what is blockchain. Similarly, just because Investopedia has explained what is bookkeeping, another website cannot explain it. This is not copying. This is not plagiarism. It is because you’re presenting the information in your own language, in your own writing, in your own style. It becomes plagiarism when you directly pick the Investopedia article and publish it under your own domain name as your own article.

What about creating a famous story? Many authors have done that. Mary Shelley’s stories have been rewritten. Greek mythologies have been rewritten. Ramayana and Mahabharata have been rewritten. Sherlock Holmes novels have been rewritten. The main stress is on originality vis-à-vis your style. You can tell the same story in a different matter.

Should you copy content from another website to improve your SEO?

Now that we know what plagiarism is and what is not plagiarism even when you are writing the same thing, let’s come to the ethical issue.

Frankly, to an average client it does not matter how, as a content writer, I write content that improves his or her search engine rankings. The client is not worried about legal issues or even with the prospect of someone accosting him or her and complaining about plagiarism. The client is majorly worried about the SEO implications – Google may penalize the website, or even blacklist it, which would be disastrous. As long as Google is fine, most of the clients are fine.

As a content writer, I’m not.

Almost every client hires me to write original content, even if Google is the only reason. Like pirated software, pretty much everyone is okay with picking content from other websites as long as it is safe to do so.

But I have been hired to write original content. If I’m not writing original content, am I not cheating my client?

You may say that the client is hiring me less for the originality of my content and more for my ability to create content that improves his or her search engine rankings, no matter what.

He or she is not bothered with originality. He or she is bothered with search engine rankings.

If I copy the content from somewhere else, if Google does not penalize the website and if Google improves the website’s search engine rankings, who the hell is the client to complain?

No matter how bad it sounds, I can understand this point of view. Nonetheless, I am a writer first, and then I am a content writer. As a writer, I take pride in my writing. If I copy content from another website, even if someone doesn’t detect that, I know that it reeks of my inability to write effectively. It shows that the other writer whose content I’m copying is better than me as a writer. He or she was able to write that beautiful piece of content that I’m shamelessly copying. He or she is a better writer. I’m just a pretender. I’m just an impostor.

No, I don’t expect clients to understand this.

 

Does your website’s content affect your SEO?

Leave a reply

Note: someone asked this question on Quora but when I tried to post it there, it generated an error. After that, I couldn’t find the question. Since I have already prepared an answer, I’m publishing it here.

To genuinely understand the answer to this question, you first need to understand what Google indexes and ranks? It’s content.

Now, since there may be thousands of web pages, blog posts and social media updates offerings similar type of content, Google uses an algorithm to decide which content it has indexed to rank higher than the other content it has indexed.

Now, Google cannot solely depend on its algorithm because software can always be tricked into believing something that does not exist. That’s why, people were always “hacking” their way into higher search engine rankings. Google also analyzes how people interact with and react to your content. This is called human validation. If humans don’t appreciate your content well or don’t react to it positively, you can forget about getting higher search engine rankings.

So yes, a website’s content definitely affects SEO because one, after analyzing your content, the Google algorithm should be able to make out what the content is about and for which keywords and key phrases it should be ranked in what manner, and two, it should be able to gauge how people are reacting to your content.

What does interacting and reacting mean here? Right now your content (a particular web page or a particular blog post) may be ranking on the fifth page and by some fluke, search engine users reach the fifth place and click your link. If your bounce rate is low – that is, people go to your link and spend some time reading it because it contains useful information – Google takes it as a positive attribute. It thinks that since people are spending more time on the link, the link must be useful and hence, it deserves higher search engine rankings. Your ranking improves a few notches. Conversely, after clicking the link when people immediately come back to Google and explore other links, your rankings go down.

Therefore, to improve your SEO with your website’s content, make sure that the Google crawler can rank your content easily, the algorithm can make sense of your content, and your content is appreciated by your visitors. All these attributes affect your SEO.

How to write targeted content?

Leave a reply

Writing targeted content

Writing targeted content.

Writing and publishing targeted content is important for attracting meaningful traffic to your website. It also helps you convert better.

What is targeted content?

It is the content that is created targeting a niche for a business segment. I will give you my own example.

I am a writer. I am a content writer. I’m also a copywriter.

Being a writer, I can write for multiple mediums. Mind you, not all content writers can write for websites. Most of the content writers write for blogs, social media updates and information articles.

To be able to write for a business website, you need to be a writer as well as a copywriter.

Since I can write for multiple mediums, I need to target multiple sections. I can write content for

  • Main website pages
  • Blogs
  • Social media updates
  • Regular email communication
  • Email marketing campaigns
  • Landing page copy
  • Copy for funnel pages
  • Press releases

and pretty much every section that requires a writer.

Even in these sections, I can easily write for healthcare businesses, technology businesses and a slew of other businesses.

If I simply promote myself as a content writer, as a copywriter, or merely as a writer, it will be difficult for my prospective clients to find me for their particular needs.

This is where targeted content writing comes in.

I need to write separate pages and blog posts targeting these segments.

For example, if someone needs a content writer for her website, she is not just going to search for “I need a content writer”, she is going to search for “I need a content writer for my website pages”. Further, she may also search for “I need a content writer for my healthcare business website”.

Better targeting through writing content on longtail phrases and keywords

Targeting longtail keywords and phrases achieves exactly that. The more specific you can become, the more targeted your content becomes.

Consequently, I have separate pages for explaining my web page content writing services, blog writing services, email writing services, email copywriting services, SEO copywriting services, and so on.

Why can’t I club all the services into a single page? Wouldn’t it be better?

Longer pages with multiple topics, especially when they are business pages, tend to confuse people, especially when they are browsing your website on their mobile phones.

Just imagine going through a long list of services just to read about a particular service. If I provide content writing and copywriting services for 25 sections, the person looking for a content writer or a copywriter for just one section will feel overwhelmed and may leave the website.

Can you write targeted content for different sections without writing lots of duplicate content?

Yes, you can. You need to be truly enthusiastic about your offering. You need to know a lot. Even if you don’t, you need to collect lots of information to weave a narrative around that particular segment.

Ideally, yes, you should be able to club all the services on a single page but since people search for very targeted keywords and queries, it is better to write content targeting those keywords and queries. And anyway, on the homepage of your website, you usually mention all your products and services.

There is a better chance of ranking high for “content writer for email marketing” if I create a dedicated page on “content writer for email marketing” than creating a generic page for “content writer” and then somewhere mentioning that I provide content writing services for email marketing too.

Writing targeted content

Among many clients I have observed this tendency that they want to create a generic page and then shuffle a few words here and there to create multiple pages. The Google algorithm is too smart for that. It can recognize patterns that the human brain cannot. In fact, it can recognize millions of patterns in nanoseconds.

The best way of writing targeted content without duplicating content is to target longtail keywords and phrases. I’m pretty sure a web page about writing content on regular emails is going to be different from writing content for email marketing campaigns.

Similarly, if I want to target the healthcare industry the content on the web page is obviously going to be a lot different from the blockchain industry or the fashion industry web page. There is so much information I can share about the healthcare industry.

If I want to target the hospitality industry, so much information is available on how my content writing and copywriting services can benefit the hospitality industry website.

Publishing case studies would be a good example of writing targeted content. Case studies for different customers and clients are always going to be unique because you will be talking about select customers and clients. Therefore, when you get a chance, publish a new case study on your website.

Blogging can also help. A good thing about publishing blog posts is that you can let your guards loose and use creativity. You can use storytelling. You can use anecdotes. You can go on and on and people won’t accuse you of boring them.

One of the biggest benefits of writing targeted content is that you can cover hundreds of topics without publishing duplicate content.

Why is the title tag so important when writing content?

Leave a reply

There are many SEO experts who discount the importance of the title tag when writing content or at least when publishing new web pages and blog posts, directly or indirectly, your title tag has an impact on your search engine rankings. Why is it so?

First, what is the title tag and how is it different from the heading?

The heading is the big text that you see when you visit a blog post or an article. It appears on the top. It tells you what you’re going to read. A heading can be used anywhere. It can be used with a blog post. It can be used with a YouTube video. It can be used with a landing page or a general information web page on your website. Here is how a heading looks:

Screenshot of a heading

Screenshot of a heading.

In most of the cases – at least in the case of my blog – the heading and the web page/blog post title are the same, but they don’t have to be. You can have a different title and a different heading.

What is the title tag?

The title tag appears in the <head> </head> section of your web page. It appears in the form of <title> </title>.

Here is the title tag screenshot of the same blog post above from where I have taken the heading screenshot:

Screenshot of the title tag

Screenshot of the title tag.

Your web page title is the string of text that appears between <title> and </title>.

Why is the text that you use with your title tag so important for your SEO? As I have written above, there are many SEO experts who say that the title tag may not have any significance vis-à-vis your search engine rankings, but I personally feel that your title tag is one of the most important aspects of your web page or blog post in terms of usability as well as search engine rankings.

Above you have seen how the heading appears in the blog post and how the title tag looks like. You can view the title tag by viewing the source code of any web page.

How does the same blog posts appear in the search results? Below is a screenshot of the search engine listings are the same blog post:

Screenshot of the search engine listings of the title tag

Screenshot of the search engine listings of the title tag.

As you can see, the string of text that appears between <title> and </title> also appears as an enlarged hypertext in the search engine result pages. Is it appearing because of the keywords I included – “blogging roadmap” and “improve SEO”? Could be.

Personally I don’t know if the Google ranking algorithm takes the title tag into account while ranking websites, but there is a logical reason why the title tag is important when you are writing content.

Research by various SEO and digital marketing companies has shown that if the words used in the search string also appear in the listing as hypertext, a greater number of users click the link. Therefore, if someone has used both “blogging roadmap” and “improve SEO” in the search query and both these keywords or words appear in the search result as hypertext, there is a probability that a greater number of people will click the link.

This is called the CTR – click through ratio. If you have a better click through ratio, your search engine rankings improve.

When more people click the link, Google thinks that the link must be important to the search query being used, and hence, it should appear higher. As you can see, for the search term in the screenshot, the link to my blog post appears at the top.