What worked in SEO copywriting last year may not work again this year. Because of how fast things change in the world of digital marketing, it’s no surprise that SEO strategists have to constantly tweak their techniques.
Search engine optimization is no longer all about keyword density and keyword stuffing. In recent years, the changes in Google’s algorithm have led content creators to shift the priority from merely becoming visible in search results to providing valuable content.
If you want to improve or maintain your web presence in 2019, here are some of the best article writing practices you need to follow:
SEO basic: Prioritize value over visibility
In 2019, online article writing isn’t about formulas or keywords. Nowadays, the core of any successful digital marketing is great content.
While you should also always optimize your content for visibility, you shouldn’t focus on that aspect of your content alone. Given how fast and how often Google alters its algorithm, it’s practically impossible to stay ahead of those algorithm changes. Optimizing for visibility may be futile.
What you can do instead is focus on the quality of your content. Don’t write your content for the sake of ranking high in Google’s search results. If you focus on that, your articles could turn out sounding stiff or uninteresting.
Make sure that every piece of writing you publish offers value. Think about what you can offer that others can’t and how you can share knowledge in a way that hasn’t already been done.
Make your content useful and engaging
Contrary to popular belief, when users do a Google search, they don’t always click on the topmost result. It depends on what answer the user is looking for.
If you can offer content that answers the user’s question or offers more information than the web pages that are higher up in the rankings, it won’t matter that you are further down the list. The user will click on your article.
If your article is engaging, they will stay on your webpage and keep reading. When this happens, Google’s algorithm takes note and will bump you up in its search results page.
In 2019, SEO copywriting isn’t just about making yourself visible. One of its main goals is to keep visitors around long enough that they read your article all the way through. To do that, you have to figure out what your potential visitors are looking for and write about that.
Write mobile-friendly copy
Write in short or “mobile-friendly” sentences. There are a couple of reasons for this. First, the majority of Google searches are done on mobile phones.
A paragraph that seems short when you’re reading it from your laptop will look twice as long (and tedious) on a mobile phone. When visitors give up on your article and move on, your bounce rate will go up. Google does not like this.
Second, the average attention span of a human is just seconds long. If it takes more than, say, 10 seconds to read a sentence, do you think your reader will read through to the end?
Use links
When you’re trying to explain something that can’t be contained in a sentence or two, link to it instead. When you link to authoritative sources, your Google ranking gets a boost. Hey, you just killed two birds with one stone!
Know other tricks to good SEO in 2019? Share your two cents in the comments below!