Gone are the days of relying entirely on web content saturated with popular keywords as a means of optimizing search listing rankings. Search engines still comb title tags, headers, text bodies, and alt image attributes for relevant keywords to grade pages for their search listing rankings, but recent developments in search engine sophistication have lessened the influence of this keyword-centric approach. Now, a transition is underway from an antiquated reliance on keyword density and placement to a more advanced topic-targeting strategy. Fortunately, generating competitive content in this sophisticated new SEO climate does not require fluency in “semantic relationships” or “entity occurrences.” The following four tips will save you the hassle as you fight your way towards a strong search engine ranking.
- Keep crafting high-quality keywords. Though keyword density is no longer the end-all be-all of search engine optimization, it should still make up an important part of your strategic foundation. You should still aim to include keywords that people are likely to use in their queries.
- No more tunnel-vision. Don’t let your keyword creation fall victim to tunnel vision by focusing on singular terms. Instead, expand your thinking towards keyword themes that include secondary terms that are related to the core word. Try to imagine a conversation about your topic, or the thought process of a querying user; what would they say about your topic, and specifically, what words would they use aside from the explicit term in question? Predicting these terms and crafting relevant “keyword themes” will draw more attention to your central topic
- Focus on conversational language. Crafting content is about drawing eyes and attention, not impressing lingual academics. Connecting with the user is about getting inside their head and playing off of the way they think. This means that content creation is not the time to showcase your big-ticket vocabulary. You don’t need to be an expert in semantic keyword research; you simply need to write using the same conversational language that users will be searching for you with.
- Good content provides quality answers. Part of your content creation process should involve systematically trying to answer every question you can imagine the user needing to ask, and then trying to provide concise and accurate answers to those questions. Answers the questions your users bring to the table ensures that you deserve your top-ranking position.