Post by lizaseo11 on Nov 9, 2024 20:22:45 GMT -8
Welcome back to our readers! The topic of our article today will be the question of quality content.
What is quality content and how do you know if it is quality? Are you creating quality content? What is an indicator of quality?
There are enough of these questions that we have accumulated for us to write a separate article.
We will try to answer these questions from different points of view and we will be glad if you join the discussion of this article in the comments. So, let's go.
Quality Content from Google's Perspective
Google's Hummingbird update (content quality rating) has been controversial. On the one hand, it helps users navigate the search engine and get more accurate answers. On the other hand, it makes life much more difficult for marketers and other promotion specialists.
There is no point in describing the Kolibri algorithm in detail - you can refer to Wikipedia for that . We will give a small example of its operation:
If earlier, when you searched for “anti-nausea pills,” you could see websites with a list of medications in the search results, now for such a request you will receive additional information, for example - indications for use, types of nausea, etc. In other words, the search engine tries to provide you with a comprehensive answer.
Serp
What does this mean? It means that Google pays attention not only to the link mass, not only to the keywords, but also to the general intent of the page.
The overall message here is clear: focus on quality, not keywords.
Let's see what Google says about content quality:
Pages should be created for users, not search engines;
Do not mislead users;
Avoid ranking tricks;
Look for ways to create a site that is attractive to users.
At the same time, the guideline also mentions “poor quality” content, in particular scrapped content (content created from duplicate “pieces” of text from other sources), generated content, non-unique content, as well as content that has no value for users.
Quality content from a user perspective
In this case, everything is simpler and more complicated at the same time.
On the one hand, the user shopify website design cannot check the uniqueness of the content or find out that the content is collected “piece by piece” from different sources, cannot find out about the high nausea of the text, about the low quality of the rewrite….
On the other hand, the user understands the value of the content and its quality much better than search engines.
In this case, quality indicators can include metrics such as natural social signals, page view time and depth, bounce rate, etc.
In turn, these indicators are evidence of what site visitors like, what, how, how much and in what style the material is presented.
Your materials are 100% unique, but boring? They are of poor quality for the reader.
Are you giving 10,000 character answers to questions that no one is interested in? The user won't appreciate it.
You uploaded pictures of kittens, added emoji for every 100 characters, the text was proofread by an editor 7 times, but you get 1-2 views? Readers think that they don’t need it, it’s not interesting, it’s not useful (underline what’s necessary, cross out what’s unnecessary), in a word – they think your content is of low quality.
So what is quality content?
Content is not just a blog post or an article you post online. It is information you provide to search engines so that it can be shown to users in the future.
So quality content is when a search engine evaluates it and decides that it should be shown to its users.
These are real and reliable answers to questions from real people.
This is information that helps, inspires, answers questions, guides, or coordinates readers.
These are the stories that make readers share them on social media.
This is what people love to read and what they love to share.
All this is quality content.
Now let's move on to a direct consideration of the points on how to create material that will meet all or most of the above requirements.
1. Quality = trust
This is why social signals mean a lot to search engines. In addition, user trust directly correlates with behavioral indicators on the site, which we wrote about in our article .
It is very easy to check this hypothesis - to do this, look at examples of the most popular articles in BuzzSumo. In the example below, you can see the level of popularity of articles - you will agree that only high-quality content can get 400-500 thousand "shares" in social networks.
Buzzfeed
2. Don't forget about relevance
Low relevance of the text leads to deterioration of behavioral metrics and negatively affects the site as a whole. Thus, low relevance can negatively affect the bounce rate and, accordingly, reduce the site's indicators as a whole.
That's why we recommend following the 5 rules of relevance that are mandatory for any type of content.
3. Adhere to technical requirements
Unfortunately, there is no way around this, and therefore compliance with Google's content quality requirements should be mandatory.
In particular, we recommend creating the correct technical specifications for copywriters and monitoring compliance with technical indicators of the text - nausea, uniqueness, keywords, meta tags, etc.
4. Quality content requires a lot of investment
Conducting research on a topic is much more difficult than rewriting a text.
Finding unique photos or creating unique and interesting surveys is much more difficult than copying them from competitors.
Accordingly, quality content requires a lot of investment, be it time, knowledge, money, etc. Despite this, if you meet quality requirements, your materials can become viral, which in turn will fully pay off the investment.
5. Learn more about your readers
Your articles, posts or research are not promotional materials for a specific product or service. They are a way to interact with new users and find points of intersection with existing ones.
Remember that for Google, as for any other search engine, quality content is content that answers users' questions. So answer the questions your users may have, in every sense.
6. Create a content strategy
A quality content strategy allows you to create materials that will attract more and more readers.
Your content strategy should include such aspects as positioning of products/services on the market, interests and “pains” of potential clients, average portrait of the reader (age, gender, preferences, etc.), appropriate language of communication, communication channels, etc.
Conclusion
Is there anything important we missed, in your opinion? What does quality content include? Join the discussion, we would love to hear your opinion!
What is quality content and how do you know if it is quality? Are you creating quality content? What is an indicator of quality?
There are enough of these questions that we have accumulated for us to write a separate article.
We will try to answer these questions from different points of view and we will be glad if you join the discussion of this article in the comments. So, let's go.
Quality Content from Google's Perspective
Google's Hummingbird update (content quality rating) has been controversial. On the one hand, it helps users navigate the search engine and get more accurate answers. On the other hand, it makes life much more difficult for marketers and other promotion specialists.
There is no point in describing the Kolibri algorithm in detail - you can refer to Wikipedia for that . We will give a small example of its operation:
If earlier, when you searched for “anti-nausea pills,” you could see websites with a list of medications in the search results, now for such a request you will receive additional information, for example - indications for use, types of nausea, etc. In other words, the search engine tries to provide you with a comprehensive answer.
Serp
What does this mean? It means that Google pays attention not only to the link mass, not only to the keywords, but also to the general intent of the page.
The overall message here is clear: focus on quality, not keywords.
Let's see what Google says about content quality:
Pages should be created for users, not search engines;
Do not mislead users;
Avoid ranking tricks;
Look for ways to create a site that is attractive to users.
At the same time, the guideline also mentions “poor quality” content, in particular scrapped content (content created from duplicate “pieces” of text from other sources), generated content, non-unique content, as well as content that has no value for users.
Quality content from a user perspective
In this case, everything is simpler and more complicated at the same time.
On the one hand, the user shopify website design cannot check the uniqueness of the content or find out that the content is collected “piece by piece” from different sources, cannot find out about the high nausea of the text, about the low quality of the rewrite….
On the other hand, the user understands the value of the content and its quality much better than search engines.
In this case, quality indicators can include metrics such as natural social signals, page view time and depth, bounce rate, etc.
In turn, these indicators are evidence of what site visitors like, what, how, how much and in what style the material is presented.
Your materials are 100% unique, but boring? They are of poor quality for the reader.
Are you giving 10,000 character answers to questions that no one is interested in? The user won't appreciate it.
You uploaded pictures of kittens, added emoji for every 100 characters, the text was proofread by an editor 7 times, but you get 1-2 views? Readers think that they don’t need it, it’s not interesting, it’s not useful (underline what’s necessary, cross out what’s unnecessary), in a word – they think your content is of low quality.
So what is quality content?
Content is not just a blog post or an article you post online. It is information you provide to search engines so that it can be shown to users in the future.
So quality content is when a search engine evaluates it and decides that it should be shown to its users.
These are real and reliable answers to questions from real people.
This is information that helps, inspires, answers questions, guides, or coordinates readers.
These are the stories that make readers share them on social media.
This is what people love to read and what they love to share.
All this is quality content.
Now let's move on to a direct consideration of the points on how to create material that will meet all or most of the above requirements.
1. Quality = trust
This is why social signals mean a lot to search engines. In addition, user trust directly correlates with behavioral indicators on the site, which we wrote about in our article .
It is very easy to check this hypothesis - to do this, look at examples of the most popular articles in BuzzSumo. In the example below, you can see the level of popularity of articles - you will agree that only high-quality content can get 400-500 thousand "shares" in social networks.
Buzzfeed
2. Don't forget about relevance
Low relevance of the text leads to deterioration of behavioral metrics and negatively affects the site as a whole. Thus, low relevance can negatively affect the bounce rate and, accordingly, reduce the site's indicators as a whole.
That's why we recommend following the 5 rules of relevance that are mandatory for any type of content.
3. Adhere to technical requirements
Unfortunately, there is no way around this, and therefore compliance with Google's content quality requirements should be mandatory.
In particular, we recommend creating the correct technical specifications for copywriters and monitoring compliance with technical indicators of the text - nausea, uniqueness, keywords, meta tags, etc.
4. Quality content requires a lot of investment
Conducting research on a topic is much more difficult than rewriting a text.
Finding unique photos or creating unique and interesting surveys is much more difficult than copying them from competitors.
Accordingly, quality content requires a lot of investment, be it time, knowledge, money, etc. Despite this, if you meet quality requirements, your materials can become viral, which in turn will fully pay off the investment.
5. Learn more about your readers
Your articles, posts or research are not promotional materials for a specific product or service. They are a way to interact with new users and find points of intersection with existing ones.
Remember that for Google, as for any other search engine, quality content is content that answers users' questions. So answer the questions your users may have, in every sense.
6. Create a content strategy
A quality content strategy allows you to create materials that will attract more and more readers.
Your content strategy should include such aspects as positioning of products/services on the market, interests and “pains” of potential clients, average portrait of the reader (age, gender, preferences, etc.), appropriate language of communication, communication channels, etc.
Conclusion
Is there anything important we missed, in your opinion? What does quality content include? Join the discussion, we would love to hear your opinion!