Content is King / Queen

Is Your Content Providing Value?

Content is king! I've used that phrase so many times over the years when discussing the value of writing regular articles with my clients. And it's true! Writing regular content is a great way to improve your visibility to search engines. But there's a huge question that must be asked. What kind of king or queen is sitting on the throne? A selfish dictatorial monarch, or a kind and caring servant of the realm? It matters. Good content is a Giving King or Queen! Content is about providing value. Content is a servant of the people.

If you only write content for the sole purpose of being found by search engines, you are missing the point!

Dictator or Servant of The Realm? 

The ultimate aim of being found by search engines is so that you can avail people of your products and services. To provide your customers with the value you provide. So, you can make it all about you and getting your search engine rankings up, or you can make it all about your customers and provide value, value, value! People are who you do business with, not search engines! Search engines are how people find you. Understand this, and stamp it on your brain!

And really, if you are not providing value in your articles, you will ultimately not attract customers to your business anyway. You may attract traffic to your site, but what good is that if they don't convert to sales? This is one of the reasons I recommend to my clients that start their blogging journey with answering questions they are asked about their business every day. It automatically provides value!

Content for Traffic or Sales?

I often hear the term traffic being thrown around like it's the holy grail. It's a nice metric, but it's not the metric that matters most. What use is 1000 visitors to your site a day if they don't convert to sales? Better 10 visitors that are engaged and contacting you for more information, quotes and purchases than 1000 visitors dropping in and leaving because there is nothing there for them, except the bitter taste of being tricked into wasting time on your site. I know which I would take any day of the week! The aim is to engage and inspire interaction.

Also, why I'm at it, I hate the term user. It's the term used by the industry when talking about visitors to your site. They are visitors, customers, potential customers, not users. So rather than User Experience, think of Customer Experience. And treat them like customers. Giver them a reason to buy, or at least give them a reason to stay engaged with you. You never know where someone is in the buying cycle. It may take years before they are ready, but at least you are on their radar!

So, when setting out to write, ask yourself why you are writing and who you are writing for. Whats the purpose in your article? Where's the value to your audience? If you were reading your article on your site, would it inspire you to engage, to learn more, to connect? Go for that, go for connection not search engine rankings!

Let's Reframe Content

It's time to reframe content and stop worrying so much about search engine rankings and start thinking in terms of the information, value and experience we are bringing to our audience, our potential and existing customers.