Content is king they say. This has never been so true as it is when you are talking about web content. There is so much information available on the web these days that people expect information to be unique, timely and relevant. The content needs to be fast loading, clean and easy to read, easy to navigate and especially easy for the search engines to index.
This is the recipe for successful web content in a nutshell but getting from theory to reality is the part that most web sites miss. Going beyond the obvious — Good grammar, spelling and choosing a clean, clear typeface — there are many things that you can do to write quality content for your website. Here are a few to consider:
1) Make your content interesting. Don't just provide dry information and facts. Make it lively and entertaining whenever possible. Sell yourself, your services or your product. Use humor and make yourself likable. Put yourself into your clients shoes and try to write your content as if you were trying to convince yourself to buy, sign-up, or request your own service. What would make you buy your product?
2) Write about things and provide information that you know well. Do it quickly and efficiently so you get your message across fast but also make quality use of the time someone is spending reading your site. If you try to cover a large topic in a mediocre or unconvincing way, people will probably not bookmark and return or even worse they many not even finish reading and move on.
3) Keep your content short and sweet when possible. The first paragraph of your article is critical. If it's dull, boring and lifeless, your reader will surely move on. You must keep their interest right from the start and drive them to pick up the phone or pull out their credit card. On the web people like to get information fast and it better be good. Don't drone on for pages trying to sell and convince people. Give it to them straight and to the point and then if you feel that it might be beneficial to expand on your topic then do so. But never drag out a sales pitch. Allow your visitors to get the information they need and then if they want more you can always provide it.
Article comments
1 - Aaman
Great guide - ty - one for constant reference.
2 - DrPat
Good recommendations, especially #13; correct grammar and spelling are essential to readability.
3 - mary
ty for your site. its a big help ill be changing my site soon and adding more content and getting rid of alot of links and crap lol. again ty..
4 - hadeel
Thanks a lot. It is really good job.
5 - Ramesh Kommana
After the content of the above page fully read. But I am not statisfied of it. describe more....
6 - vanibala rambothu
Good recommendations.
7 - Website Content
Nice post. Producing interesting, relevant content not only encourages the search engines to position a website highly in the search results but also helps gain visitor loyalty with people visiting time and time again.
8 - Cr8ivebug
I had written an post on my blog regarding "Why Content is King" and this post complements the post very well. In fact anyone who wants a more detailed write up on what I started definitely must read this. I will try to link this to this post for my readers.
Thanks Chris
Pratheesh
9 - Writezilla
#3 - Kepp content short
SEO rules nowadays require your content to be "the more, the better", e.g. your blog post would rank better if you make it longer. Am I right or am I right?
10 - Martin Mosch
Very well written list of tips.
11 - Russ Aubrey
You have covered it like a blanket. A treasure trove of good advice.
12 - Writing expert
Very well written, Christopher. I would add, Make It Visually Scannable. Being Digg/Reddit/the like surfers, we these days don't have time to read looooong pieces
13 - college dude
Infographics are on the verge of great web content writing these days. Illustrious images along with catchy writing will surely gain you thousands of pageviews in a matter of hours.
14 - John
I hate website that make you click from page to page in order to read an article.
15 - qontent
"SEO rules nowadays require your content to be "the more, the better", e.g. your blog post would rank better if you make it longer. Am I right or am I right?"
actualy it is not a matter of length. it is more for relevance between title and article's keyword. it has no mean at all if you write 50 feets long if your article has no matching word with title.
16 - Greg @ essay writing blog
Qontent, you're damn right. SEO is pretty hard these days.
John, â€"me tooooo! And, you know, distributing your article between multiple pages doesn't really make your blog more attractive to the big G.
17 - qontent
greg, yea...it's somehow like "lucky strike". someday it could index you in couple of hours. but then when we try to apply the right same method to another site it has different in result, it takes days.
18 - Lisa
You are right, forcing music, flash ads and unsolicited excessive animation is very annoying. For me, it's the most irritating part of the website and I tend to leave such aggressive pages. Breaking text into small paragraphs also helps to scan the text and get the main idea really fast.
19 - Monkeywebster
Writezilla "the more content the better" is only true if it is great content and most with more are not. Usually people tend to ramble when they use the motto "the more content the better" just saying
20 - grave situation
hey guys....do you think it is ever worth outsourcing your content? i am a writer myself but i am just one man and have a lot to write about. I am currently using a content farm called independdent publishing for some articles and they are coming back great, but do you think this is a good long term solution?
21 - Pensioner
Great information Christopher. I think it is more difficult that just saying "Use humor and make yourself likable"-- creating a likable, humorous and authorative writing styles escapes the majority of bloggers. I've got to admit: I pay more attention to information which has a real personality behind it.
One thing you can control though, is your audience. You've got to research your demographic and write for them, not for yourself. Answer all their possible questions, and go the extra mile to make your content more informative than your competitors-- people will notice, and see you as an authority in your field.
Remember, quality is a relative and comparative term; benchmarking your competitors, taking all the great points they make, combine them and add your own to create an post which says to the user: 'You don't need to go anywhere else for information in this field'.
22 - Michael Cordova
Thanks for the advice. I didnt originally write the content for my site, but Ive been investing more time in SEO efforts. Ill use this as a starting ground for making some tweaks.