Boost the Relevance of Your Content with Benefits and Features

One cool thing about being a content marketer is that you tend to become an expert in your topic. You probably know an awful lot about your business, your project, or your subject matter.

In fact, you might actually know too much about it.

It’s called the curse of knowledge. Because we research our topics deeply and spend so much time writing about them, we tend to understand the technical specs inside and out. We have a great grasp of the under-the-hood details that make the thing work. And we think customers want to know all about those details.

But most of your potential buyers? They don’t care.

What have you done for me lately?

To be effective, marketing needs to show exactly what the offering does for the person buying it.

The features of your offer are what make it work. The benefits are the results it creates for the customer.

What transformation does your product or service empower? What does it allow the customer to become that she isn’t today?

Jimmy Choo high heels aren’t coveted because they’re comfortable or well-made. (Even though devotees believe they are.) Women buy them to feel confident and gorgeous.

Hybrid cars aren’t popular because they’re fuel-efficient, money-saving, or environmentally friendly. The real benefits are feeling virtuous and smart, with the warm, fuzzy glow that comes from believing you’re saving the world.

Your content and copy will never be truly relevant to your audience until you translate your features into customer-focused benefits.

The five-minute feature check

Quick, take a look through the last persuasive piece you wrote (blog post, sales page, podcast script) and take note of all of the features you talk about.

• The process
• Your qualifications
• The patented mechanism
• The policy
• The dimensions
• The speed
• The materials

Copy and paste them all into a fresh document. Then, after each feature, add the words:

so you can …

The final results will be phrases like:

• I have 10 years of experience helping clients exactly like you, so you can feel confident that together we can solve even your trickiest widget problems.
• Our course is the most rigorous on the market, so you can leapfrog ahead of your competitors.
• Our grape jam has 50% less sugar and no weird additives, so you can enjoy it guilt-free.

In about five minutes, you’ll uncover the weak spots in your persuasive content — the places where you were thinking about you and what you offer, and not about them and what they get out of it.

You might not use the words “so you can” over and over again in your final copy — but you will be writing with an understanding of your audience benefits.

Not all benefits are equal

The curse of knowledge can also lead you to focus too much on what some copywriters call fake benefits.

These are the benefits of your product or service that you think are important. And you might be absolutely right. They could be critical to delivering the results your audience wants.

The trouble is, the customer doesn’t particularly care.

These could be things like:

• Stabilizing blood chemistry levels
• Improving efficiency of project delivery and implementation
• Mastering the ability to write a college entrance essay

But that doesn’t tell us what the buyer gets to have, do, be, feel, or become by moving forward with this purchase.

What those customers might actually want could be to:

• Get slim without feeling hungry
• Pull off a great project and look like a hero to their boss
• Feel like brilliant parents because their teenager got into a great college

Features do matter

Features are the specific, convincing details that demonstrate why your solution is effective. As long as they’re tied directly to customer-focused benefits, your buyer will stay interested.

Here are some features that have been translated into benefits and presented as a set:

This nutritional program stabilizes your blood chemistry so you can finally lose weight … without getting hungry.

Our proven process makes you more efficient … and that makes you look like a hero when you deliver your next project in half the time and under budget.

This quick course teaches your teenager how to write a masterful college entrance essay … which could be the deciding factor in whether they get into their first-choice school.

Take another look at your five-minute benefit check. Any fake benefits in there?

Wants, not needs

You’ve got one more check to make before you call it good.

Are the benefits you’ve identified things your audience genuinely wants, or are they things you think they need?

Paying for things we need is boring. Spending money on things we want is a lot more fun. That’s why it’s easier to sell big-screen TVs than life insurance.

When you’re translating your features into benefits, make sure those benefits are driven by wants. Look for emotional drivers like pleasure, comfort, status, and self-image. You can also seek to put a stop to pain, either physical or emotional.

It’s not only hedonistic emotions that can drive behavior — values like patriotism, justice, and fairness can play powerful roles with the right audience. It’s still a pretty good idea, though, to pair them with a little self-interested hedonism if you can. Fair-trade coffee wouldn’t sell nearly as well if those arabica beans didn’t taste so good.

We like to think that logical drivers like efficiency, physical health, preventing future problems, and scientific evidence influence our decisions, but, they typically don’t have much impact. But those “rational” benefits are helpful when they’re used to justify an emotional decision that’s already been made.

The customer who already wants the beautiful high-heeled shoes tells herself that Jimmy Choos will last longer and feel better than a cheaper brand.

The customer who already wants to feel enlightened and virtuous tells himself that the fuel economy of the Prius clearly makes it a sensible choice.

Marketing vs. manipulation

There’s an important difference between putting your best foot forward and crossing the line into manipulation.

The key lies in making two promises:

1. Don’t say things that aren’t true.
2. Don’t omit significant things that are true.

The impression you create with your marketing needs to be realistic and truthful. If it isn’t, you’re a con artist and a creep — and your audience will rightly shun you when they figure that out.

If you liked this Quick Copy Tip, click here to read other posts in the series.

The post Boost the Relevance of Your Content with Benefits and Features appeared first on Copyblogger.

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July Algorithm Updates, New AdSense Rule, GSC Data Anomoly & RIP Flash: Weekly Forum Update

Over the last couple weeks there has been extensive discussion around potential algorithm updates in July.

Webmasters were reporting issues with Bing Webmaster Tools and Google Search Console reported a data anomaly in search analytics data.

We also say good bye (or good riddance depending on your point of view) to Adobe Flash, and more.

July Algorithm Changes

Read full discussion here

This months Google update thread on Webmaster World reported a number of possible updates, starting late June. Webmaster reported shifts in early July.

Some webmasters reported increases around June 25th

EditorialGuy: “We gained from the update (if it was an update), with a fairly significant jump in Google traffic on June 25, followed by day-over-day improvements during the rest of the week. Some of the gains appear to be sticking. It’ll be easier to tell next week when the effects of the July 4 holiday in the U.S. are over.”

Other webmasters reported a drop around July 10th.

Ionguy reported on July 3rd
“another drop in traffic since ‘not an update’ update
about 40% down; nice; may i keep my shoes guys?”

Barry Shwartz of Search Engine Roundtable also noted unusual activity,

“There are some early signs of a Google search algorithm update over the weekend, around Saturday and Sunday. The chatter is still very quiet but it was the weekend and that might kick up over the next day or so. Plus, pretty much all the tools are on fire, showing huge volatility around June 9th.”

Shwartz added that he attempted to analyze over 70 websites that may have been potentially affected but could find any meaningful patterns.

Increased Domain Crowding

Webmasters also noted increased domain crowding, multiple listings of a single domain,  in results.

Samewest: “wow! is Pinterest the new flavor of the month? or is Google about to buy them? They now dominate every SERP in my niche. Page one is ads, ads, ads, pinterest, pinterest, pinterest, 1st organic well below the fold. With all due respect, anyone who contends there was no update recently is off their rocker.”

Google recinds confirmation of Fred Update? Hard to say.

A member shared a post that in a Webmaster Central Office Hours Hangout, John Mueller, denied that a Fred update occured after an abeit indirect conformation at a conference by Gary Illyres.

According to Mueller, “How did the Fred update impact the e-commerce websites? Why did so many e-commerce sites see a drop in ranking? What can we do to kind of recover that loss?

So from our point of view there was no Fred update.

This is a name that was given externally to a bunch of updates that we’ve been doing over time. So it’s not the case that there’s this one thing that is changing in search. We make changes in search all the time and we’re always working on trying to find ways to bring more relevant, more high-quality content to users, and that can be affecting a variety of websites. And variety of areas where we show content and search.”

From what was shared regarding Illyres statement, there was only an implied confirmation during an Ask Me Anything session at SMX. Attendees shared on twitter:

Google talked to the leads up Fred, and we decided to not talk about this update. said methode #smx

— Ben Schmaderer (@muc_webdesigner) March 23, 2017

 

No More Pop-Up and Pop Under with Adsense – New Rule

Read full discussion here

In a recent announcement to simplify policies, Google stated that pop overs and pop unders were no longer permitted using AdSense. Ken b did note a non-trivial point by highlighting the aspect of the new policy that Google is passing the mandate for websites to also enforce this on ad networks and for affiliates.

Google Search Console Data Change

Read full discussion here

If you have seen a lower average position or increased impressions around July 13th or 14th in Google Search Console, it is possible that it may be due to a Data Anomaly reported in Google Search Console that changed values. Webmasters were pleased overall to have better data.

Bing Webmaster Tools Broken?

Read full discussion here

Shared on Threadwatch, was speculation that was shut down, since its returning a broken page. When we tested it on our end, it seemed to be working. Users also chimed in on the general usefulness of Bing Webmaster Tools, a couple years after it was made available. The over-arching sentiment seemed to be the interface is not the greatest but webmasters are grateful to have additional data.

RIP Adobe Flash

Read full discussion here

It was announced that Microsoft, Google, and Mozilla will stop supporting Flash in 2020. Member wiser3 commented that it may seem like a long time from not but it is recommended to apply necessary changes early, since browsers will stop supporting it prior to 2020.

Has Spammy Content From Others in Google Ruined a Webmaster’s Livelihood

Read full discussion here

As reported on Threadwatch, a Webmaster World member reported that they lost their livelihood after 15 years of investment  in a web property

“I sit here right now having just told my child we are going to lose our house and we need to find homes for our pets. I fought so hard to keep going, it’s a good site, the content is great, but now 120 word articles outrank mine. My husband is yelling at me, my daughter has just run into her bedroom. This is how it is. My site is 15 years old, I always put the user first, and we are now facing bankruptcy. My whole family hates me for the failure of my site.

We’ve lost it all :(”

Members offered many kind words and some wisdom. I highlight just a few here

From member jori: “whatever you do from now on, don’t unplug your site. Maybe, just maybe, in a near future, Google put things back to “normal”.
It’s all a matter of “user satisfaction” and money earned by G. If user is not satisfied, and less money are earned, Google will change things.

And for now, I don’t see how in the world users can get satisfied with current results, at least on my niche. Or how Google can earn more revenues this way. Let’s wait.”

SamWest Added, “ I feel your pain, however, my longtime saying is “enjoy it while it lasts, because it never lasts” It’s the same in the brick and mortar business and jobs world. Things change. The bottom line is that they moved your cheese. Giving in is not the solution. Waiting for the cheese to return is not the solution. Reinvention and realignment with the current trends may help.. After 17 years online, my six figure site has also died the same slow death (since 2010). I myself had to take a part time J.O.B. and I’m still barely able to keep above water.
Probably like you, my site looks fine in the SERPS, but nowhere near the user interaction as before. Is it by design or is it just that trends have changed? I suspect a little of both. I will say this, in my niche the current “flavor of the month” Pinterest crowding is really pushing a lot of valuable content down below the fold or to the page two graveyard, especially on long tail. I am wondering if this crowding is intended to push users to explore page two and beyond. If so, it’s not working.”

Google Pays Professors As Part Of Academic Influence Campaign

Read full discussion here

Found on Threadwatch was a discussion surrounding a story from the Wall Street Journal that Google is paying professors as part of an Academic Influence Campaign to get research created supporting various strategic public policy positions that favor Google.

The post July Algorithm Updates, New AdSense Rule, GSC Data Anomoly & RIP Flash: Weekly Forum Update appeared first on Internet Marketing Ninjas Blog.

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37 Ways to Rock Your Content

Sometimes, content marketing is a numbers game. And this week on Copyblogger, we have lots of ideas for well-defined, specific actions you can take to improve your website and create some excellent content.

Specifically, we have 37 ideas.

On Monday, Stefanie kick-started our week with a nifty little process to turn one lonely content idea into four strong posts. (These could, of course, be blog posts, podcast episodes, videos, or whatever content form rocks your world.)

On Tuesday, Jerod contributed three steps you should take right away to improve your site’s SEO.

And on Wednesday, I added 10 ideas for bringing the sizzle back when you’ve lost that loving feeling for your content. Because it happens, my friends, it happens.

Over on Copyblogger FM, we published an encore presentation of my podcast episode on the 10 quality signals that search engines look for on your site. These not only make your site look better, they actually … make your site better.

Jerod wrapped up our list on the Sites podcast, with 10 goals that make content marketing meaningful.

There you have it: 37 specific steps you can take to have more fun, create better content, and reach more people. Which one are you going to try first?

That’s it for this week — have a great weekend, and we’ll see you Monday.

— Sonia Simone
Chief Content Officer, Rainmaker Digital

Catch up on this week’s content

---

How to Turn One Content Idea into a Fascinating Four-Part Series

by Stefanie Flaxman

---

3 Important SEO Steps to Take Right Away

by Jerod Morris

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Bored with Your Blog? These 10 Tips Will Make You Fall in Love Again

by Sonia Simone

---

Bonus: I want your website questions!

by Jerod Morris

---

10 Quality Factors Search Engines Need to See on Your Site

by Sonia Simone

---

10 Goals that Make Content Marketing Meaningful

by Jerod Morris

---

Busting the Myth of the Starving Artist with Jeff Goins: Part Two

by Kelton Reid

---

From Side Hustle to Digital Domination, with Nathan Chan

by Brian Clark

---

How Do I Create a Call-In Show?

by Jerod Morris & Jon Nastor

---

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Bored with Your Blog? These 10 Tips Will Make You Fall in Love Again

Content marketing is a long game.

In one way, that’s excellent — because all of your lazy or undisciplined competitors are going to drop out.

In another way, it sucks, because we all have days when we’re lazy and undisciplined.

In the early days, we can get by on adrenaline and enthusiasm. But as the months pass, we need some strategies to stay in love with that blog, video channel, or podcast.

Here are 10 strategies I’ve found helpful when you don’t want to quit, but you need to get a little bit of the magic back.

1. Read outside your topic

When you’re mastering a new subject, it’s only natural to immerse yourself in it. You’ll read, watch, and listen to content obsessively while you pick up nuances and new ideas.

It’s a bit of a honeymoon with your topic … you can’t keep your hands off of it.

But honeymoons don’t last forever, and an obsessive focus on only your topic will quickly become boring for you … and for your audience.

Recognize when it’s time to turn your attention outside your topic. In the past year, I got a bit obsessed with urban sketching — and that sparked hundreds of insights about creativity and the artist’s mindset.

We recently decided to add a puppy to our household, and my obsessive immersion in research on puppy training is already giving me ideas about persuasion and shaping audience behavior.

Focusing outside your topic will make you smarter inside your topic.

It will also keep you interested and engaged.

2. Incorporate a new medium

Reading outside your primary topic will give you all kinds of new ideas to create content around.

But you can also create content in a new medium or format. If you’re a terrific writer, have you ever thought about launching a podcast or video channel?

Shaping your ideas to a new format will make you look at your topic with fresh eyes — and that keeps things more interesting for everyone.

3. Keep a “sketchbook”

Remember my urban sketching obsession?

Lots of visual artists keep sketchbooks handy all the time. They can capture a compelling face or gesture, an entrancing cityscape, or just an interesting collection of shapes and lines in a group of coffee pots.

I’d advise any content marketer to keep a journal for capturing ideas on the fly, scraps of dialogue, names or URLs of content you want to check out, and even the occasional doodle.

It’s our job as creative people to “make something out of nothing.” And that, of course, is an illusion. We create content out of our observations and the connections we make between them.

It’s a lot easier to do that when you make a consistent habit of capturing those observations.

4. Get a new outfit

For most of us, our site design should be clean and classic … but that doesn’t mean (at all) that it needs to be boring.

Sometimes, sprucing up your site with a new design can make you see it with completely fresh eyes.

If your site design is looking a little tired, or you just want to spice things up, a new premium WordPress theme can give you the fun of a makeover, without draining your bank account or taking up every minute of your free time to make the switch.

5. Let go of the tedious stuff

Sometimes it’s not your topic you’re tired of … it’s all of the boring work that goes into keeping your site running.

WordPress updates, security patches, theme updates, plugin updates … every one of those offers that wonderful combination of stressful and boring.

Once you’ve been spoiled by the ease of a solution like StudioPress Sites to handle that stuff for you, you won’t want to go back. Fortunately, StudioPress Sites includes a lot of functional power for a super reasonable price, so you won’t have to.

6. Hold a Q&A session

One of my favorite content energizers is a simple Q&A session.

An audience Q&A can make all the difference if you’re:

• Bored with your topic
• Struggling with impostor syndrome
• Not sure what your next (or first) product or service should be
• Trying to find topics to write about
• Unsure about a big decision for your business or website

Holding them is easy. Make a broadcast to every channel you can reach — your Twitter following, your email list, your Facebook page, all of them. Let your people know that you’re going to be answering their questions about your topic.

Collect the questions in advance. That gives you time to research the ones you’re not 100 percent sure about and weed out any that just aren’t relevant to most of your audience.

Deliver the answers during a webinar, or a conference call, or a series of podcast episodes, or a series of blog posts, or a video series … you get the idea.

Collecting questions and answering them is an efficient way to get a lot smarter about your topic. It also lets you know exactly what your audience is having problems with.

And it’s a fabulous confidence booster to realize that you actually can help people who are struggling with your subject.

7. Connect

So much creative work is about putting your head down and getting it done. Doing the writing, the scripting, the recording.

Focus is a beautiful thing. But you need to interleave your focused time with a wider view.

How could you spend some social time in your space? Is there a live event you’ve been meaning to go to? A monthly Meetup in your town? A group of content creators or business owners you could join for coffee every couple of weeks?

If face-to-face is impossible, try to put together a small group that gets together over Skype, Google Hangouts, or a group call.

Humans need other humans. Look for ways to connect more meaningfully with folks who do what you do.

8. Highlight your community

Along with making time to connect regularly with your fellow humans, it’s also energizing to make time to celebrate them.

Are there folks in your audience doing amazing things? Write about them! Give them a platform to share their successes.

Who are the key players you admire in your topic? Highlight their work, link to their content, invite them on your podcast.

Telling your community’s stories is a time-honored way to remember why you loved your topic in the first place.

9. Play to your strengths

Maybe you’re gifted with words, but your design sense leaves a lot to be desired. Or the other way around — your design skills are great, but the word-put-togethering isn’t so hot.

We’re all good at some things and lousy at others. Getting good isn’t usually a matter of innate talent — it’s a question of putting the time in to go far beyond the ordinary.

But we don’t have enough time to be wonderful at everything — and there are always tasks we just don’t particularly like.

When you can, try to focus your site around your strengths. If writing is your strong suit, you might leave video content for later. If you have a great speaking voice, or you can draw well, or you’re fantastic at creating systems, leverage those skills on your site.

Figure out where your strengths are, and then figure out how you can use them to craft your competitive advantage.

10. Out yourself

Been trying to play it safe? Maybe you’ve been hiding something that matters deeply to you, because you’re afraid of chasing your audience away.

That’s not how this works.

I’m not a fan of sites where every single post is a rant — but those sites have lots of fans. If that’s who you truly are … rant on.

And even if you aren’t, letting the world know where you stand, talking about some of your most deeply-held values, will bring incredible energy to your work.

Exposing the real stuff is scary. But so is obscurity. Hiding behind a mask of blandness won’t protect you; it will just become your prison.

Bonus: Play

And here’s the one that will make all of the others work better:

Remember to play.

If life’s not a game, you’re doing it wrong.

Have fun with your writing. Challenge yourself with your content. Experiment and noodle. Play around, goof around, try things. Don’t take yourself too seriously.

This isn’t a call to be trivial … far from it. Play can be deep, too.

But we’re intelligent critters, and intelligent critters play. It’s how we get smarter, it’s how we connect to one another, and it’s how we create lives of meaning.

How about you?

Got a favorite way to jump-start your enthusiasm? Let us know about it in the comments!

The post Bored with Your Blog? These 10 Tips Will Make You Fall in Love Again appeared first on Copyblogger.

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3 Important SEO Steps to Take Right Away

What if we’re thinking about SEO all wrong?

You won’t be shocked to see such a question posed on this site — one that harbors posts in its archive with headlines like SEO is Dead and What if You Could Simply Eliminate SEO from Your Life?

Don’t get me wrong: we’re not anti-SEO.

Heck, we were recently awarded a U.S. patent for the Content Optimizer we developed that now powers the SEO tools bundled with our premium WordPress hosting.

We’re just anti some of the misguided notions and incomplete narratives about SEO that masquerade as good advice.

And one of the most fundamental mistakes I see people make is not fully appreciating the full breadth of each of the three terms that comprise S-E-O: Search. Engine. Optimization.

Notice the placement of that first period after “Search.”

It’s time to think beyond traditional notions of “search engines”

It’s easy to group the terms “search” and “engine” together. And for a long, long time, it made sense to do so.

When we used to discuss “search engine optimization,” we were mostly talking about searches typed into Google, perhaps Bing, or (going back further) Yahoo.

But now it’s 2017.

The new search

Gone are the days of only typed searches. People now conduct more and more searches with voice commands. A recent article on Forbes, 2017 Will Be the Year of Voice Search, makes a compelling case.

And who knows what will happen when we all have chips implanted in our brains that can read our thoughts. We might just be able to think our search and get results via the screens on our contact lenses.

Bottom line: our notion of “search” is changing.

The new engine

Gone, too, are the days of Google being the be-all and end-all as an engine for search.

YouTube has long been hailed as “the world’s second-most popular search engine.” If you’re producing videos, they need to surface for relevant searches on YouTube.

The same concept applies to Apple Podcasts (formerly iTunes). You better believe I thought long and hard about my optimization strategy for the world’s most popular podcast search engine when I launched this show recently.

And think about how many searches Facebook must be getting these days. Even Twitter too. Your social posts are one step removed from your website content … but still one step closer than the person searching was a few seconds prior.

Bottom line: our notion of which “engines” are worth our time to target is changing.

And let’s not forget about optimization

It’s still critical:

You need to structure and deliver your content in such a way that all relevant engines will be able to locate it, understand it, and serve it up in that critical moment of high-impulse and action-oriented curiosity when people perform searches for relevant terms.

And while there are always subtle tweaks you can make to improve your chances of ranking higher based on the particular algorithms each engine uses, many of the factors different engines use are generally quite similar.

So your goal, as a content creator, is simply to make your content as optimized for being found in relevant engines for as many different types of search inputs as you can.

That is search engine optimization on the modern and future web.

And if you’re thinking about SEO in any other way, you’re making a critical mistake.

SEO still matters

You’re also making a critical mistake if you’ve started to believe that SEO no longer matters. It does. Perhaps even more so, and in a more wide range of ways than before.

And it will matter for as far out on the horizon of the internet as I can see.

In some form or fashion, it probably always will — which is why continuing to hone your SEO skills is so important.

So, let’s discuss three critical (but pretty simple) steps you can take right away to improve each of the three elements of your SEO practice.

These are steps that will help you maintain a smart, consistent SEO practice that delivers reliable results into the future.

Step #1: Listen (carefully) to your audience

The first step — which relates to search — is to make sure you actively work to understand the language your ideal audience uses.

That is how you ensure your content has as good a chance at surfacing for text-based searches as it does for spoken searches and, eventually, for thought searches.

Certainly, using tools to search Google’s keyword database is helpful.

For example, the Content Optimizer tool that is built into StudioPress Sites, which I mentioned earlier, can help. This type of analysis provides a valuable window into the terms and phrases people actually search for when looking for content related to your topic.

But remember: this is just one context.

What about when people talk about your topic? What about when they ask casual questions?

This is where social media can be a great listening tool. This is where going to meetups and talking to real people in person can be helpful. This is where free-response audience surveys can provide great insights.

True masters of search engine optimization are masters of listening and empathy.

When you know how your ideal audience talks about your topic, and what kinds of questions are most pressing, you have the knowledge you need to create titles, subject lines, and body content that will be relevant for a wide variety of different semantic contexts.

I know you’re a content creator. Starting today, be an even more active listener than you already are.

Step #2: Focus on more engines

The second step you should take is to brainstorm all the different engines where people may be looking for the type of content you create … and then figure out a way to get yourself into a new one.

For example, consider YouTube. Do you have any videos uploaded to YouTube that answer the kinds of questions that a subset of your ideal audience is almost surely typing into YouTube?

If not, get one in there.

Seriously, start with just one. Do it as an experiment.

The production doesn’t need to be complex. Just take a portion of a blog post and turn it into some text and basic imagery that has a voiceover or background music. If you want some help doing this, check out a site like Lumen5.

Then choose your title wisely and provide a useful description, so that YouTube will know what your video is about and display it in results for relevant searches.

Try it out and see what happens. Then keep identifying new engines where you can add your content.

Step #3: Make sure your website is search-friendly

The third step you should take, which will help immensely with your optimization, is to make sure your website has the most solid foundation it possibly can.

Because when it comes to any search context (text or voice), and when it comes to any engine that may deliver your website as a result (think Google or Bing, but also social media), you need to make sure the hosting and design infrastructures of your site have all the basic elements in place:

• Your site needs to load fast — a factor that actually influences several different ranking factors because of how it impacts a visitor’s experience.
• Your site needs to be mobile-responsive (or even mobile-first).
• Your site needs to be safe and secure.
• Your site needs to be coded clearly and cleanly.

I could go on, but I think you get the point.

It’s not just about the words on the page. It’s also about every single element of the page that will impact the experience that search engine robots and real-life visitors will have on that page.

That is why, for example, StudioPress Sites was built to be fast and secure.

And that is why, for example, the Genesis framework was built to be mobile-responsive and as clean as possible, in terms of code.

I chose those as examples because I use them for my personal websites. And sure, I work for the company who makes them, so that’s easy for me to do.

But I am a serious website owner. My side projects are important to me. If I thought I was compromising my site’s optimization just to use Genesis themes or StudioPress for hosting, I wouldn’t.

Take this opportunity to review your current theme framework and hosting. Double-check you aren’t making any optimization tradeoffs either.

A question for you

So there you have it.

We discussed the critical shift in your SEO mindset that you should make right away, which will help you get better results today and well into the future.

And we’ve discussed three steps you can take immediately to put that new mindset into practice:

1. Search: Listen better and empathize more.
2. Engine: Identify new engines where your content should appear.
3. Optimization: Make sure your hosting and website design have a solid foundation.

So, the question is …

Now that you’re motivated by your fresh, new mindset, which step will you implement first?

Comment below.

Perhaps the public proclamation of your intention will inspire you to actually put it into action.

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Announcing: 2017 Click Through Rate Study

IMN is pleased to announce our Summer 2017 Click Through Rate Study, now available in Whitepaper format in the Resources section of our website!

It’s been a while since we’ve last written about this topic, and since last summer, there have been multiple changes to both the algorithms that determine the organic rankings AND the visual presentation of the SERPs.

These changes include:

• Mobile Friendly Update (#2!)
• 4 Pack of Ads
• Penguin 4.0
• Interstitial Penalty
• Fred and other un-named or un-confirmed core algorithmic updates
  

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Because of these changes, along with all the other changes seen in the last 12 months, IMN wanted to know: What’s the actual click through rate for a #1 ranking look like these days? How about a #10? A Page 2 Ranking? In that spirit, IMN conduced our own internal Click-Through Rate (CTR) study for Summer 2017.

A more detailed breakdown of our methodology, including data sources, sizes, date ranges, and cohort segmentation can be found in the actual Whitepaper, but to summarize, we used 90 days’ worth of data from Google Search Console from a well-curated list of our own clients.

We analyzed 20,000 queries, which in a 3 month period saw over 64 Million Impressions and saw over 4 Million clicks. The sites were fairly evenly divided between Business to Consumer (B2C) and Business to Business (B2B) websites. IMN also distinguished between Branded Queries and Non-Branded Queries as well.

So, what did we find?

Overall, the CTR for a #1 ranking for All Queries in our study was just over 21%. This is lower than reported in prior CTR studies released in the past, including the AWR Study from 2014, the Chitika study from 2013, and others. Data sets, sizes and methodologies differ greatly for CTR studies, so we invite you to compare these methodologies and how these might impact results.

A #2 ranking secured just over 10% of the clicks and a #3 ranking was the last position to be above 5%, at just above a 7.5% CTR. Rankings at Positions 4-8 were in the 5% to 3% range, and then CTRs leveled off for the most part.

Surprisingly (at least to us!), the CTRs for All Queries did not drop below 1% for any position within the Top 20 spots of Google, and there is a slight dip UPWARDS in CTR on the top half of Page 2 compared to the bottom of Page 1. The changes to the algorithms and SERPs may not have dramatically altered total Impressions on Page 2, BUT there were definitely more Page 2 Clicks, in aggregate, than we expected.

Another interesting trend we found was just how many Impressions for Queries on Pages 1 and 2 of Google result in No Clicks at all – between 25% and 30% of them! With the introduction of the Knowledge Box, the other Rich Card formats, all of the various carousels and blended universal result types, and of course the expanded 4 pack of Paid Ads, this isn’t too surprising to us, but it’s good to see our suspicions confirmed – between 1 out of 3 and 1 out of 4 Google searches end with No Clicks!

IMN also differentiated between rankings for B2B and B2C sites:

The overall CTRs for them were fairly comparable, but the main differences were that B2B sites saw higher CTRs on the top half of Page 1, but slightly lower CTRs on Page 2, in aggregate.

And finally, IMN also distinguished between Branded and Non-Branded queries:

Our main findings were that Branded Queries see MUCH higher CTRs on the top half of Page 1, but that 99% of all Branded Query clicks came from the Top 3 spots.

Frankly, our data set size for Branded queries past Position 5 was quite limited, but we suspect that despite whatever visibility a Branded Query might see past Position 5, it’s not likely to see many clicks.

Our highest-level findings for the Summer 2017 CTR Study include:

• On average, a #1 ranking in the SERPs had a CTR in the low 20% range. IMN found that less than half (~40%) of the #1 rankings saw a CTR at or above 30%.

Less than half (~40%) of the #1 rankings saw a CTR at or above 30%.Click To Tweet

• A #2 ranking was usually about half of a what a #1 ranking secured – in the 10% range.

A #2 ranking is usually about half of a what a #1 ranking secures: ~10% CTRClick To Tweet

• CTRs continued to lower, albeit more slowly, to about the 1% to 2% range by the bottom of Page 1, but Page 2 CTRs were not that far removed from bottom of Page 1 CTRs.
• 28% of All Queries did not see a Page 1 or Page 2 Click at all.
• Branded queries saw higher CTRs by far than non-branded queries for the top half of Page 1, but 99% of the clicks went to the first 3 positions for Branded queries. Data size and reliability past Position 5 for Branded queries was limited in our data sets.

Branded queries have higher CTRs than non-branded queriesClick To Tweet

• B2B sites tended to have higher CTRs on the top half of Page 1 compared to B2C sites, about equal CTRs on the bottom half of Page 1, and then slightly lower CTRs on Page 2 compared to B2C sites.

B2B sites tend to have higher CTRs on the top half of Google's Page 1 compared to B2C sitesClick To Tweet

To see our full CTR Study, click here. Please drop any questions or thoughts in the Comments below and we’ll do our best to answer them!

The post Announcing: 2017 Click Through Rate Study appeared first on Internet Marketing Ninjas Blog.

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How to Turn One Content Idea into a Fascinating Four-Part Series

Sometimes it’s really helpful to prepare multiple pieces of content in advance.

You might be:

• Launching your website and need to have articles already published on your blog
• Taking a vacation and need to have your content scheduled before you leave
• Looking for new ways to execute your content marketing strategy

But how do you plan your content, create it, and meet your publishing deadlines without getting overwhelmed?

Let’s start with a simple, small task: selecting one content idea.

Then we’ll break down that one idea into a fascinating four-part series. The process I’m going to share is a straightforward way to communicate your expertise, in a format that is easy for your audience to consume and share.

Shift from publishing content to building anticipation for your next installment

The example I’m going to give will demonstrate how to produce a four-part blog series, but you can adapt the guidance to produce podcast episodes or videos as well.

When you do, you shift from merely publishing content to actively building anticipation for your next installment.

Content marketing and copywriting work so well together because copywriting helps you stir something in your audience so that they’re invested in the content you produce.

If you produce one piece of content a week, the installments below will give you four weeks of content, but they could also publish four consecutive days in a row or every other day. See what works for you.

Installment #1: Establish your authority

Here’s where you select your content idea.

Let’s pretend you run a health-conscious, organic bakery that serves tasty desserts.

Your customers love your grape jam, so you want to give your blog readers a recipe for grape jam with natural ingredients and no added sugar.

Start with a basic “how to ___” to generate your content idea. “How to ___” might not be your final headline, but filling in that blank with details helps narrow your focus.

How to Make Mouth-Watering Grape Jam (with Less Sugar than Grocery-Store Brands)

In this first installment, you’ll establish your authority by:

• Introducing the topic in a unique way
• Explaining your interest in writing about it
• Describing your organic bakery’s philosophy

The motivation behind the information you share should be: why someone should listen to your advice about the topic.

Then outline what you’ll cover in upcoming installments, weaving in anecdotes about how your tutorial will be more beneficial than other grape jam recipes.

And that’s it for your first post.

At the end of the content

• Write a call to action (CTA) for readers to subscribe to your blog to get the next piece of content via email.

Installment #2: Educate with a simple, relevant background lesson

The goal of this post is to make readers feel ready to follow your advice.

Link to installment #1 in your introduction and then write more background information about making your grape jam.

What types of kitchen tools will they need? Where are the best places to buy the ingredients you’ll recommend? What is your issue with grape jams that have added sugar? How did you discover this recipe?

You build trust as you educate your audience and offer useful suggestions that prepare them for the next installment.

At the end of the content

• Provide an “Additional Reading” section, with a link to installment #1.
• Write a CTA for readers to subscribe to your blog to get the next piece of content via email.

Installment #3: Share your tutorial

The big moment has arrived.

In this post, you’ll show how to make your grape jam, step by step. You could also discuss the type of container you like to store the jam in and how long it will stay fresh.

The tutorial should make sense to anyone, even if they didn’t read the previous two installments. But there will likely be opportunities throughout the text to link to the other installments you’ve already published.

When you edit your first draft, look for ways to engage and entertain. Give readers an experience they won’t have on other bakery blogs.

At the end of the content

• Provide an “Additional Reading” section, with links to installment #1 and installment #2.
• Write a CTA for readers to subscribe to your blog to get the next piece of content via email.

Installment #4: Add extra value and advanced tips

Encourage readers to experiment with your recipe and inspire them to learn more about organic desserts.

What types of bread complement the grape jam? Can they easily alter the recipe to make strawberry, blueberry, or raspberry jam? Is the grape jam an ingredient in other recipes you’ll publish in the future?

If you plan to create additional four-part series, you can tease upcoming tutorials that will cover related topics.

At the end of the content

• Provide an “Additional Reading” section, with links to installment #1, installment #2, and installment #3.
• Write a CTA for readers to subscribe to your blog to get your content via email.

Bring it all together

Once you’ve published all the installments:

• Edit the “Additional Reading” section at the end of installment #1 so that it has links to installment #2, installment #3, and installment #4.
• Add links to installment #3 and installment #4 in the “Additional Reading” section at the end of installment #2.
• Add a link to installment #4 in the “Additional Reading” section at the end of installment #3.

Ready to write your next content series?

In the comment section below, let us know about the topic you’ll tackle with this method.

The post How to Turn One Content Idea into a Fascinating Four-Part Series appeared first on Copyblogger.

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Life without Google, News App Gets AI in Feed, Long-Term Impact of Link Buys: Weekly Forum Update

This week Webmaster World challenges marketers to think about how they would generate traffic without Google as a thought experiment. Cre8asiteforums members discuss if link buys in the past paid off long term.

SEOChat members discuss ways to get new SEO clients, if you’re just starting your SEO consulting practice.

Over on Threadwatch, a question is posed on decentralized search engines and if they can really disrupt the search market.

What would you do if Google SERPs just disappeared?

Goodroi challenges members to think about how their business would respond if Google SERPs just disappeared, as a thought experiment to uncover potentially profitable traffic sources that ma be over looked. Members respond with a variety of perspectives

Lucy24 started with,

“Guest posts or articles on other people’s sites, with a link to mine. One-on-one link exchanges with sites that have overlapping target audience. If a forum or discussion thread includes an option for linking to a webpage (most do), use it. In each case, the motive is not to game the search engine by making it look as if lots of people link to me–but to make myself visible to more humans.”

keyplyer discusses the importance of building referral sources,

“Approx 45% [of my traffic] come[s] from backlinks, schools and research (albeit some of those do use SEs.)

Considering so many other sites rely so strongly on SE traffic, they would suffer much more than my sites -so- comparatively, I would benefit.”

Shepherd adds to Lucy24s comment to go back to advertising.

glitterball added,

“Directories have been collateral damage in Google’s war on web spam. Their demise is a great shame and one that has not garnered enough attention.

It is also my belief that the demise of human-classified directories has had an extremely negative effect on Google’s search results, which now rely on returning huge mega-authority sites in the results rather than specialized websites, that were previously endorsed by DMOZ, Yahoo Directory and others.”

iamlost spoke to the power of referrals,

“So many seem to think of back links only as Google ‘juice’ that the idea of them as traffic referrers seems to have all but vanished. Strange as the right back links convert at multiples of what SE traffic does. G has truly warped the natural web especially in the mindset of many webdevs.”

Google Search Apps to Get AI for News Feed

Google is releasing updates to its apps on iOS and Android. The objective is to learn about you interests and provide even more relevant news results for users.

Can decentralized search engines disrupt search?

Surfaced on threadwatch is discussion on decentralized search engines. Decentralized search engines use a decentralized architecture to provide results for users. Also, unlike traditional search engines, ad serving is also decentralized, so companies pay users directly to check out their products.

Did Buying Links Work For Webmasters That Bought Them In The Long Term

Over on cre8asiteforums, members discuss the huge cost of paid links in the past, often at the expense of content creation and UX related website improvements. Some members did not do paid linking at all, citing the potential risk exposure at the time, while other conceded that having good links at the outset was helpful.

What is your favorite way of getting clients?

Members discuss best methods to get new SEO clients, if you’re just starting your practice out. The most popular methods among members are participating in forums and writing high quality in-depth articles. It was also recommended to specialized in a specific industry or in a specific area of SEO.

Google pays professors as part of an academic influence campaign

The Wall Street Journal reported that Google has conducted an academic influence campaign as part of broader efforts to influence public policy and that they have a wish list of topics complete with working titles and abstracts for which they seek willing researchers.

The post Life without Google, News App Gets AI in Feed, Long-Term Impact of Link Buys: Weekly Forum Update appeared first on Internet Marketing Ninjas Blog.

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