Just a little rant about technical SEO…
Have you ever gone to a website and read some atrocious copy along the lines of:
If you’re looking for a plumber Newcastle, look no further. Our brand offers the best plumbing service Newcastle that you could want for your business or home. Our Newcastle plumbers have the necessary certifications required to provide professional and innovative Newcastle plumbing solutions.
Sounds a bit like a primary student wrote that, or worse! We see stunning examples just like this time and time again. And we’re here to tell you – it needs to stop!
While your SEO agency may be telling you that copywriting like this is necessary for your SEO and will help your business’ website rank higher on Google for “plumber Newcastle” – trust us when we say it does more harm for your business than good. This SEO tactic is called “keyword stuffing,” and it can actually harm your site’s SEO ranking, damage your brand and certainly won’t help with converting that web traffic into customers.
First impressions matter
Terrible SEO content reflects very poorly on your name, your brand, your reputation and your ability to communicate.
Let’s say this plumber is also trying to promote their transparent communication and expert advice. If a customer had a quick read of that blurb above, I think they’d be looking elsewhere. The content is hypocritical and not aligned with the plumber’s brand and mission.
Write for humans, not algorithms!
If you write for a robot, you’re going to sound like a robot. This is not what your customers want, need or deserve.
And like your customers, Google wants good content too! With each algorithm update, Google shows us how they care more about quality content, rather than technical SEO. Google is motivated to reward the pages that are most useful for customers, regardless of the technical tweaks you apply to them. Why? Because that’s what Google’s customers want and it’s what your customers want. Makes sense right?
Write good content
The single best way to ensure that your content is read and shared is to have relevant, quality content on your website that is useful to your customers. Think quality, not fluffery.
When you start thinking about what content to write, go back to your company mission. What passion drives your company? What problems do you solve for your customers? How do your products or services improve your customers’ lives?
Having a clear mission will bring a focus to your content strategy. You should ensure the content you publish is aligned with your mission. It could be something simple like “we ensure each job is done to the very best of our ability and we help our customers make the possible decision for their safety, home and budget”. So when you write content, make sure it’s doing just that.
Don’t forget about SEO, but do it the right way
SEO shouldn’t be the driving force of your content strategy, but it should definitely be used to support your strategy. If SEO is overlooked, your business may wind up being invisible online. Thankfully, with the way Google is changing, SEO is a great opportunity to create more meaningful connections with your customers.
So forget about adding keywords and start adding value. If you’re knowledgeable in your field and willing to share your expertise through your content, your keywords will appear naturally. We promise!
The bottom line:
- Forget algorithms, humans come first.
- Write for your customers, not Google.
