As 2015 comes to an end, many of us want to start the New Year feeling fresh and renewed. You clean out last year’s out-of-fashion clothes and gear up for a great new start. Why not set a resolution for your digital content creation strategy?
A Renewed Digital Content Creation Strategy
There’s nothing more gratifying (well for a Content Manager) than digging up your worst performing blog posts and transforming them into articles that grab attention, raise awareness, and uncontrollably delight your readers.
If you are regularly looking at your blog statistics, there might be some blogs that are falling through the cracks or just flopping. These are the blogs that have low or no conversions and very few views. Instead of leaving them for dead, follow our Content Refresh Strategy to clean out the bad and bring in the renewed digital content creation strategy. Your readers will thank you and your blog will continue providing quality content which shows your company as an expert or thought leader in your industry.
Content Refresh Strategy
Here is a detailed plan for executing your Content Refresh. There are quite a few steps but the results will be worth it. After your refresh, you will be able to pin point which type of blog article and which keywords drive the most traffic to your site.
Review Your Content Analytics & Find Your Worst Performing Blog Posts
First you need to export your blog statistics from your Marketing Automation Platform. Be sure you export ALL of your blog posts. This way you can see everything and not just your posts on a monthly or yearly basis, and you can stay on top of blog performance with your renewed content creation strategy.
Now it’s time to decide how to filter this long list of data. Focus on three main areas while filtering your posts:
Filter Your List
- First filter by the number of views. This will give you a quick look at which blogs were most popular and which didn’t grab attention. You want to focus on the posts that have not received many views.
- Next check to see if the keyword for each blog post is ranking. If your keyword is ranking, you have a great opportunity to help increase this URL rank.
- Lastly, filter by the number of CTA clicks. Again, you want to work on the blogs that did not receive a high number of CTA clicks. The goal is to boost this number with your blog post revival.
Check For Ranking Keywords
The next step in your renewed digital content creation strategy is to see if your post is ranking for any keywords. You can check for ranking keywords inside many Marketing Automation Platforms such as HubSpot. To do so, click on your published blog post, then click on the Optimization tab. From there, you click on “Ranked Keywords” in the left hand drop down. This will display any keywords that your post is ranking for.
If you are using a platform that does not show keyword ranking, you can always use a keyword research tool like SEMrush. For SEMrush, you copy and paste in your blog URL. Be sure to include the beginning “http://”. On the bottom of the next screen, you will see your ranking keywords for that particular blog post.
Lower Bounce Rates
Google Analytics is the perfect place to check your bounce rates. Google defines a bounce rate as “the percentage of single-page sessions (i.e. sessions in which the person left your site from the entrance page without interacting with the page).” This means, if a person opens up your blog but then does not navigate to one of your links or to your CTA, then your page will receive a high bounce rate. One goal of your renewed digital content strategy is to lower your bounce rates. You want to engage your readers and then give them additional actions or links to learn more about your topic.
Extend Time On Site
Time on site goes hand and hand with bounce rates, and this is where your renewed digital content creation strategy comes in. If your readers are engaged while reading your post and then clicking on your links to learn more, your time on site will increase. One way to increase time on site is to lengthen your blog post. Think about how much longer it takes to read a 2,000 word post verses a 350 word post. Longer, but still engaging blog posts will help extend your time on site.
Inspect The Title
Take a break from the analytical side and really investigate your titles. You may find that the majority of your poor performing blogs have bad titles. If the title didn’t engage the reader, then they’re probably not going to read the article. That’s a sign it’s time to get back to that renewed digital content creation strategy with your titles.
Here are some great ways to update your poor performing titles:
- Make your title short, sweet, and to the point title.
- Long, drawn out titles are too much to digest at a first glance.
- Remember to add your keyword in your title but make sure it makes sense and fits naturally.
- The title must be extremely related to the blog content.
- If your title tells the reader they’re going to learn how to get the highest score on Guitar Hero but the content of the article only discusses the history of the game – that turns off the reader.
- Are you promising something people want to read about?
- If you promise the reader the 5 ways to get free drinks at the club and you end up talking about the 5 types of girls that go to bars, well… I’d bet most of the people reading this blog are going to be disappointed. Be sure you fulfill your promise and then provide a next step.
- Do NOT make the title sound “sales-y”.
- We all know the reason you’re writing is to gain more leads and make more sales but that’s not the kind of content that your followers will want to read. They want to learn something or find the solution to their problem. No one wants to be sold.
Analyze The Content
- Engage readers by focusing on one Buyer Persona
- Ask yourself “who cares?” or “who would want to read this?”
- If you’re bored writing it, chances are they’ll be bored reading it
- Focus on one stage of the buying cycle and stick to it
- Follow our handy Content Stages plan to target your writing to one phase of the buying cycle.
- Follow our handy Content Stages plan to target your writing to one phase of the buying cycle.
- Have enough content to avoid being redundant
- If your blog post starts to feel like an old college paper, where you keep finding new ways to say the same thing, it’s time to do more research.
Add Videos When Possible
One of the most engaging ways to update your post is to add in a video, and this is key to your digital content creation strategy. A video spices up your content and helps humanize your product. Your readers will love seeing you in action as you explain or teach them how to do something.
You don’t have to be a film guru to record a video blog. Be sure you have ample lighting and high quality sound. And don’t forget to use your imagination. If you’re explaining something complicated, try using a whiteboard or a big piece of blank paper to draw sketches. Or think of a creative setting that would help the content of your video.
Swapping Out Calls-To-Action
Towards the bottom of your post, you should have a Call-To-Action (CTA). If this post has zero CTA clicks, try swapping it for a congruent offer. Also, be sure your offer is closely related to your digital content creation. This is key to gathering conversions.
URLs – When To Change And When To Keep The Same
When it comes to the URL of the post, you have two options. You can change the URL or you can keep it the same. You would want to keep the URL the same if your keywords are ranking for a particular landing page and therefor driving traffic to your website. If your blog post has zero traffic and no rankings, scrap the URL for something better.
There you have it, simple plans for your 2016 Content Refresh Strategy. The hardest part about starting the New Year is sticking to your resolution. We can’t wait to see how many blogs you’re able to revitalize next year.
