It is true..
Content is at the core of inbound marketing and that it’s one of the best and most effective methods of reaching your target audience.
But not just any content.
What you need to create is superb, head-turning content which will educate and entertain your readers, and help them solve some of their issues and pain points.
Easier said than done…
And what if you have invested a lot of time and energy into your content, and still, no traffic is pouring in?
This can be really frustrating, so let’s see what you can do to improve the visibility of your blog and produce shareable content.
#1 Analyze your competition
Competitive research should be your starting point.
By keeping an eye on what your competitors are doing, you’ll be able to identify what works for them and what doesn’t, and subsequently adapt and implement your findings to your content.
First of all, make a list of your top competitors and see what social media channels they’re using.
After you’ve completed this simple task, get ready for some serious snooping.
What you have to do is analyze at least 6 months’ worth of their content, take notes, and establish what the most shared and liked posts are.
This useful tactic will be of tremendous help when you’re creating your content and social media strategies, as you’ll be able to see how every piece of content performed.
What’s even more important, this research can provide you with you a lot of ideas for the topics that you can write about. Pick the most popular ones and give them a new twist by making them more relevant and useful to your audience.
#2 SEO
Search engine optimization is something that you shouldn’t ignore.
It’s true that social media contributes to popularity and virality of content, but in order to help your target audience, as well as search engines, find your content, you need to optimize it.
SEO goes hand in hand with content marketing, and if you want to create a piece of content that your audience actually wants to read, the first thing to do is keyword research.
This will give you an insight into what searchers that you want to attract to your blog are interested in. By using the right keywords, you will also improve your Google rankings.
If we bear in mind that results on the first page get 92% of all traffic, it’s clear why it’s important to do keyword research.
Another way of improving the visibility of your blog and shareability of your content is by means of link building. This practice will expand your reach, but only if you do it properly.
Getting authority links for your blog will show Google that your content is relevant, which will catapult your rankings and bring the right crowd to your blog.
Since link building is a complex activity, you can start by leveling up your knowledge about backlinks.
Recommended: 5+ Premium SEO Tools you should know for best rank and traffic
#3 Create visually oriented content
These days people are suffering from information overload.
To be more precise, our brains are bombarded with and have to process 34GB of information every day. Your audience doesn’t always have enough time or energy to read your blog posts, and so you need to find a way to get your message through.
That’s how video has become one of the most popular types of content. For example, 4 times as many consumers prefer to watch a video about a product than to read about it.
Once you capture your visitors’ attention, they will tune in and listen to what you have to say.
If you aren’t sure how to create your very first video, it’s a good idea to use some handy tools which can convert your already existing blog posts into videos and offer your visitors highly engaging content.
Recommended: Make videos like the PROS with the MOST powerful Video creation software
According to a study, infographics are 3 times more shared on social media than any other content type, which is why you should create and post them frequently.
Since blog posts with aesthetically pleasing graphics are more likely to be shared, it’s important to optimize your images for every social media channel on which you intend to post them.
#4 Make your content digestible
Although videos and infographics are attention grabbers, you still need to produce a lot of traditional, written content.
In order to make it more shareable, it’s important to structure it in a visually appealing and organized manner.
Nobody wants to read chunky paragraphs consisting of a number of complex sentences. Instead of that, break your blog posts into a lot of smaller segments consisting of 3-4 sentences.
You can use images, gifs, charts, or infographics to add a dynamic touch to your content. Headlines are the element which can be a make-it-or-break-it factor for the popularity of your content.
80% of people will read only headlines, which is why you need to do your best to attract them to read the rest of your article too.
Catchy subject lines, especially those which contain numbers, will prompt your readers to click on your article and read on.
If there are some quotes and stats in your blog post, single them out, and make sure that they’re tweetable.
Related Article: 3 Content Marketing Tips Your Virtual Assistant Can Execute For You
#5 Make your content shareable
If you’ve done everything contentwise to make your blog posts worth reading, it’s equally important to make them easy to share.
This means that your blog needs to have social media sharing buttons displayed on every single web page. No matter how much your readers like your content, they won’t share it if they have to spend more than a couple of seconds to do that.
Make these buttons obvious, and encourage your visitors to share your content. It’s also a good idea to include shareable links throughout your content so that it’s easy to share bits of useful and interesting information.
Finally, incentivize your audience to share your content, and reward them for their loyalty by offering freebies.
Related article: 5 tips to Become An Instagram Influencer
If you combine all these tactics, your blog will be able to reach the right audience very easily and it will soon experience a surge in traffic.
Author:
Nate Vickery is a marketing consultant and author mostly engaged in researching the latest marketing technology trends and practices applicable to startups and SMBs. He is also the editor at Bizzmark Blog and an author on The Next Web.
