By Andrew Oziemblo, Founder & CEO of Chicago SEO Geeks, the digital marketing & SEO agency helping businesses achieve long-term growth goals.
One thing we all love about the Internet is convenience. We love the fact that we can log onto our online bank accounts and pay a bill in a matter of minutes, rather than having to make the journey to a local branch. We love the fact that we can order an entire outfit online and get it delivered the next day.
Because of this, we are getting incredibly impatient. We expect things now. Our attention spans are getting shorter and shorter. So, taking that into account, is content still the most important form of marketing? We have said ‘content is king’ for many years now, but is it really?
Long-form content performs well
Well, if the statistics are anything to go by, then content is definitely still king. There has been a lot of research conducted regarding content shares and other important factors like this. In research that was carried out by Moz, it was revealed that blog posts over 1,000 words are much more likely to be shared via social platforms when compared with shorter blog posts. And, as the word count gets longer and longer, this is a trend that grows and grows. In addition to this, long-form content also performs well in the search engine result pages. For the coveted number one spot, the average word count for a post is 1,890 words.
If this was not enough to convince you that content is still performing well today, long-form content is also proven to be more effective in terms of conversions. While there are a number of different objectives in place regarding content marketing, there is no denying that increased conversions are one of the main goals. A number of different studies have been carried out regarding the impact of word count on conversions. It has been found that conversion rates increase by between 30 and 50 percent when the word count is long for a post. It is quite clear to see that people prefer having more information at their disposal in order to make a decision.
So, how do you make sure that you do long-form content the right way?
As you can see, there are many benefits that are associated with long-form content. It is quite clear that this is a method of advertising that has a vital role to play today. In fact, you could argue that it is even more important than it has ever been. However, in order to leverage this power, you need to craft your content the right way and you need to have an effective SEO marketing strategy in place. Here are some tips to help you…
- Don’t waffle – One of the biggest mistakes people make when it comes to long-form content is writing words for the sake of meeting a word count. It is important to remember that your goal here is to create content that people are going to enjoy and appreciate enough so that they will share it with others and trust your brand in the long term. This is why quality always needs to come first. If you only have enough content to meet 750 words, don’t stretch it to 1,500 words just for the sake of it. If you find that you never feel like you have enough content to write long-form, then you need to consider your approach. There are a number of things that you can do to change this. This includes devoting more time to research, going deeper into subject topics, and getting specific. In regards to the latter, it can often be hard to say anything of value when you are writing about something on such a broad level. If you provide step-by-step instructions or specific examples, for instance, you are going to make your blog post a lot more valuable to those reading it.
- Break up your content with formatting – You also need to make sure that your content is broken up so that you do not lose people’s attention. As mentioned, we have shorter attention spans today. This does not mean that content is no longer king. However, it does mean that you need to adapt your approach in order to keep people engaged. One of the best ways to do this is by breaking up your content effectively. You want to make your content skimmable in case someone does not want to read through it all word-for-word. So, how can you make sure this is the case? Firstly, you should break your content up into sections with clear headings. Aside from this, include images, as well as a lot of white space and make the most of bullet points and numbered lists.
- Promote your content – The final ingredient when it comes to getting your content marketing strategy right is making sure that you are promoting it correctly. You should promote it on your social media accounts. Make sure that it is easy for readers to share your content if they wish to do so. Furthermore, you can to optimise your content marketing for search engines and you should share content with everyone on your mailing list as well. After all, you can create an incredibly interesting blog post, but if no one sees it, what’s the point?
All things considered, there is no denying that content marketing still plays an incredibly important role today. However, we cannot deny the fact that people’s attention spans are getting shorter and shorter, and this is something that we need to account for and consider when it comes to our content marketing campaigns. This is why it is important to align with an experienced and reputable marketing SEO company like Chicago SEO Geeks. They will help you to take your business to the next level and ensure that you are developing content in the right format and structure for Internet users today.
