High-quality content is an essential part of SEO and, for many, is considered to be one of the most important ranking factors. But to really reap the reward of great content, you’re going to need a plan of action! A clear content strategy will help you create content which is useful, informative, engaging and relevant to your audience. From keyword mapping to content repurposing, content pillars and topic clusters, to detailed knowledge hubs and link-worthy campaign content which scores dreamy AF headlines - in this talk I’ll share some top tips I’ve learned from various roles in the industry, on how to create a killer content strategy.

1. How to devise a content
strategy following a
content audit
Jess Peace | NeoMam Studios
SLIDESHARE.NET/JESSPEACE
@PEACEYYY / #brightonSEO

2. High-quality content is an essential part of
SEO and is often considered to be one of
the most important ranking factors
@PEACEYYY

3. From raising brand awareness to
providing information on your products or
services...
@PEACEYYY

4. Increasing conversions to improving your
discoverability and rankings in SERPS,
or landing dreamy AF links in relevant
publications...
@PEACEYYY

5. But to really reap the reward of great content,
you’re going to need a plan...
@PEACEYYY

7. What is Content Strategy?
@PEACEYYY

8. A content strategy is a documented plan
which takes your business goals, and uses
content to help achieve those goals
@PEACEYYY

9. Simply put - it is the process of planning,
creating, distributing and measuring content
@PEACEYYY

10. Why are content strategies useful?
@PEACEYYY

11. A clear content strategy will help
you create content which is useful,
informative, engaging and relevant
to your audience
@PEACEYYY

12. Think of it like this...
@PEACEYYY

13. You wouldn’t start making technical changes on
a website with no idea of what already works,
what needs fixing, what the aim is or
who/what it will impact
@PEACEYYY

14. So don’t just create content for the sake of it. In
my opinion, no content is better than bad
content...
@PEACEYYY

16. ✨ How to develop a content strategy ✨
@PEACEYYY

17. Whether you are developing a completely new
strategy, or refreshing your current one, here’s
how to get started...
@PEACEYYY

18. #1 - Define your goals
@PEACEYYY

19. What are your business goals?
@PEACEYYY

20. What does your brand stand for?
@PEACEYYY

21. What is your aim for developing a content
strategy?
@PEACEYYY

22. This could look like one or more
of the following...
@PEACEYYY

23. “I want to increase brand awareness…”
“I want to increase leads and conversions…”
“I want to earn high-quality backlinks...”
“I want to improve rankings…”
“I want to close the gap on competitors…”

24. There is no one size fits all approach to
content marketing. Your business goals
should highlight areas of focus, which will
help to set priorities for your content strategy
@PEACEYYY

25. # 2 - Know your audience
@PEACEYYY

26. Before you can define what you’re going to
create, you need to know who you are
creating it for
@PEACEYYY

27. By knowing who your target audience are,
you can produce more relevant and
valuable content for them, improving the
chance of increased engagement
and conversions
@PEACEYYY

28. Ask yourself the following questions...
@PEACEYYY

29. Who do you want to reach?
@PEACEYYY

30. Are you looking to expand your current
audience or target a new one? Are you
targeting a particular demographic?
@PEACEYYY

31. What does your target audience care about?
@PEACEYYY

32. What does your business offer and what
problems do you solve for a consumer?
@PEACEYYY

33. If someone is interested in your business, what
else are they likely to care about?
@PEACEYYY

34. How does this audience consume
information?
@PEACEYYY

35. Does your target audience spend time on
social media, like Reddit or Instagram?
@PEACEYYY

36. Are they likely to listen to a podcast or
subscribe to a newsletter?
@PEACEYYY

37. When do they turn to Google for information,
and what do they search for?
@PEACEYYY

38. TOOL: AnswerThePublic is a free search
listening tool which cranks out every useful
phrase and question people are asking
around a certain keyword
@PEACEYYY

39. TLDR: AnswerThePublic is a GOLDMINE of
consumer insight you can use to create fresh,
ultra-useful content
@PEACEYYY

41. #3 - Assess your current content
@PEACEYYY

42. One of the key pieces of information which will
inform your content strategy, is the
performance of your current content
@PEACEYYY

43. Whichever tools or methods you use for this,
the auditing stage provides valuable insight
into how your content performs and is
consumed by visitors to your site
@PEACEYYY

44. My favourite tools for auditing content are
Ahrefs, Content King, Google Analytics,
HotJar and common sense...
@PEACEYYY

45. One of my favourite techniques during auditing,
is what I call the Snog, Marry, Avoid
Technique
@PEACEYYY

46. This technique literally combs through your
existing pages and content, and highlights
examples of what to do/not to do
@PEACEYYY

47. Let’s say you’ve exported a list of all blog pages
using Google Analytics. In a dream world, we’d
be looking for pages or blogs which drive lots
of traffic, have a super low bounce rate, a
decent time on page etc...
@PEACEYYY

48. TIP: In Sheets, use conditional formatting on
the data as a traffic light system for content
performance
@PEACEYYY

49. Highlight examples which are the greenest
(highest) in terms of traffic and time on
page, and the reddest (lowest) in terms of
bounce rate/exit rate etc.
@PEACEYYY

50. The Snog, Marry, Avoid technique uses these
metrics to identify content which...
@PEACEYYY

51. Works but could be working harder (snog)...
@PEACEYYY

52. Works really well and is a prime example of
the kind of content you should be creating
(marry)...
@PEACEYYY

53. Doesn’t really hold any benefit, drives no
traffic, has low engagement and is outdated etc
(avoid)...
@PEACEYYY

54. By identifying types of content which do/don’t
work well, you can use this information to
strengthen your content strategy AND to
repurpose old content
@PEACEYYY

55. Make your content go further!
@PEACEYYY

56. In addition to your audit findings, ALL OF
THESE THINGS will help to inform...
@PEACEYYY

57. Which pages need some TLC - Your findings
may show that you need to optimise core
pages/product pages before creating “nice to
have” content
@PEACEYYY

58. Which types of content to create - audio,
images, video, long-form blog posts, influencer
or celebrity endorsements etc...
@PEACEYYY

59. Which topics to address and build content
around - this will help establish core content
pillars and topic clusters
@PEACEYYY

60. Which stage of the sales funnel the intended
audience is in (awareness, consideration,
conversion stage)
@PEACEYYY

61. And the delivery channels which make
sense for your content strategy (SEO, PR,
social media, paid search, email, forums, etc…)
@PEACEYYY

62. @PEACEYYY

63. After five years working in content marketing
and specialising in strategy and production, the
most common questions I get asked by clients
and marketers are around...
@PEACEYYY

64. The creation of content hubs,
and content for link-building/Digital PR
@PEACEYYY

65. What is a content hub?
@PEACEYYY

66. A content hub is an area of a website which
houses content, containing various types and
formats, focusing on particular topics which
are intrinsically relevant to the site’s target
audience
@PEACEYYY

67. They can help to drive traffic, increase
rankings, increase leads and conversions,
strengthen your internal linking strategy etc.
@PEACEYYY

68. To create a content hub, you’re going to need to
first establish your core content pillars...
@PEACEYYY

69. A content pillar is a substantive and informative
section of content covering a specific topic or
theme
@PEACEYYY

70. By focusing your attention on creating content
pillars, you demonstrate expertise within
certain areas by building up a wealth of
content around certain subjects
@PEACEYYY

72. Then, linking into the pillar content will be a
range of content which covers individual, more
specific subtopics, otherwise known as
cluster content
@PEACEYYY

73. Each piece of cluster content should provide
more detail on a specific topic/answer a
query/focus on a longer-tail keyword which
relates to the main pillar in some way
@PEACEYYY

74. @PEACEYYY

75. This can work wonders for establishing
authority, improving your rankings and
increasing your chances of owning keywords
at a category level
@PEACEYYY

76. I like to work with clients to create an editorial
content calendar mapping out content for 3-6
months at a time
@PEACEYYY

77. This will include potential guide topics and a
brief description, the content pillar it feeds
into, the stage of the funnel it will appeal to,
and any target keywords
@PEACEYYY

78. TIP: Look for ways to repurpose content to
really make it go further (blog posts, podcast
scripts, case studies, videos, gifs, sound bites,
infographics etc.)
@PEACEYYY

79. Content for link-building/Digital PR
@PEACEYYY

80. Digital PR involves creating content which has a
unique hook, and outreaching to journalists,
publications and influencers in order to get
coverage and build links on relevant
websites
@PEACEYYY

81. It is the creation and sharing of online
content which is intended to raise brand
awareness and stimulate interest in
businesses brands products or services
@PEACEYYY

82. Digital PR helps raise brand awareness and
the link-building aspect of it is an important part
of SEO, helping search engines discover
new web pages and determine how well a
page should rank in the SERPs
@PEACEYYY

83. @PEACEYYY

84. Some questions you might ask when creating
content/digital PR campaigns are:
@PEACEYYY

85. Does it have a unique hook or angle?
@PEACEYYY

86. Does it offer something new or add value to
an existing conversation or topic?
@PEACEYYY

87. Have you used creative assets to support the
content?
@PEACEYYY

88. Can a journalist or website cover this piece
without linking back to you?
@PEACEYYY

89. Is the piece timely? Is it relevant? Is this the
best time to run the campaign?
@PEACEYYY

90. Who will cover the story? Is it tailored to a
specific audience?
@PEACEYYY

91. REMEMBER the real metric you need to
consider when creating any piece of content is
whether it useful, informative, engaging and
relevant to your audience
@PEACEYYY

92. TIP: Type your keyword into Buzzsumo and
see which types of articles have the most
shares and engagement
@PEACEYYY

93. TIP: Monitor search trends! Google Trends
is a free data exploration tool which allows us to
see what people are interested in and are
searching for, in real-time
@PEACEYYY

94. @PEACEYYY

95. TIP: Consume content. Blogs, podcasts,
newsletters, campaigns, artwork, video,
TikToks, OOH, Reddit, follow inspiring
people on social media etc.
@PEACEYYY

96. In such a competitive and, at times,
saturated field, how do you create
campaigns which stand out in order to
get those 🔗🔗🔗 ?
@PEACEYYY

97. At NeoMam, our mission is to produce hero
content campaigns which people will share
for months and years to come...
@PEACEYYY

99. We avoid the “campaign sausage
machine” and go for ideas we genuinely
think are cool, that we want to create, and
that we’re confident will get links...
@PEACEYYY

100. “We want every piece of content we launch
to be educational, entertaining, awe-
inspiring or informative.”
- Gisele Navarro, CEO @ NeoMam
@PEACEYYY

101. The idea here comes right back to user
intent. Is the campaign relevant? Is it
interesting?
@PEACEYYY

102. How do you create campaigns for clients
who aren’t that sexy? Inject their brand into
something fun...
@PEACEYYY

103. Here are just some of our campaigns...
@PEACEYYY

105. ✨ Key takeaways ✨
@PEACEYYY

106. Set goals (but be willing to update them)
Know your audience
Produce quality content with them in mind
Repurpose great content
Get creative with content ideas
Give people a reason to link
REMEMBER if you genuinely believe in your
content, so will your audience!

107. THANK YOU
FOR LISTENING!
SLIDESHARE.NET/JESSPEACE
@PEACEYYY / #brightonSEO