Our clients often ask questions about content creation for SEO: Is there an optimal length for content in terms of SEO? Should I update my old content? One of our partners wrote a blog post about us, is that helpful for SEO? Yes, yes, and yes.

In this article, we’ve done our best to offer approachable and actionable recommendations for content creators and site administrators to write and post content that will accrue search engine rankings over time. But first, what are you writing? When you’re blogging for SEO, new content should match the voice of the website and be aimed at a specific target audience. Not sure who your target audience is? Put in the simplest terms: it is the person who searched for your keyword. Create your content for them. As you write, ask yourself, what do they want to know and why do they want to know it? Write content that gives your user answers to those questions.

At the end of your piece, lead the user to the next step of the sales funnel or customer journey. 

Writing Content for SEO

Varying lengths of content are ideal.

How long should a blog post or other piece of content be? It depends! One post could be 300 words, another 1,000. Note: a minimum of 250 words is recommended. Check out this blog post about writing for a digital audience.

Use keywords throughout your content.

Each piece of SEO content should have its own target keywords, such as “Papaya Smoothie Recipe” and “Pawpaw Smoothie with Mango” so each can stand out to search engines as the best page for each topic.

Keywords work best word-for-word. However, to support readability in the body of the text, changing around the wording and using occasional synonyms instead also boosts keyword relevance.

Break up content with headers, AKA section titles.

This is great for search engines to better understand what your content is about and easier for readers to skim and do the same. 

Include at least one internal link.

Link to relevant related content on your own site to boost your SEO efforts even more. This is particularly beneficial if the anchor text of the internal link is contextually similar to the content being bridged together.

Bonus if you can also link to an outside source (this is great when it comes to sharing content on social).

Include an image and use applicable alt text.

At least one image should be included. Apply alt text to images. Bonus if you can use some of your target keywords.

Images and media files used in the content should be as small as can adequately perform its intended illustrative role. Try to avoid uploading high resolution images and then scaling them down with JS, for example.

Set a goal for producing new content

The sky’s the limit. One new unique blog or page per month keeps a website fresh, four per month can generate significant keyword growth. 

Optimize Your Metadata

Metadata primarily refers to two elements: meta title and meta description. The metadata for a page features the top priority keywords that the page is targeting.