Content Strategy, How to Create for online marketing and public relations

1. How To Create
A Content Strategy
Presented by:
Expansion Plus
© 2009 Expansion Plus Inc All Rights Reserved.

2. Purpose of the Exercise
To prepare an
Internet marketing
strategy to maximize
your web site's search
visibility and
conversion rate

3. Content Is King
Top ranking sites
consistently have
well writing content
as a feature in
common. The old
saying “content is
king” has never
been more true
than it is today.

4. Copywriting
Good copywriting
can help change
your website focus
to address your
visitors’ concerns
and help you out-
perform your
competitors’
websites.

5. Generate Content
• Thus a major effort
must be made to
generate and
syndicate content that
contains links back to
your web site.
• Searchers believe
natural search
results produce the
most relevant
information.

6. Think Like A Publisher
• Successful online marketers must now ‘think like
a publisher’.
• SEO is more than making a few adjustments to
the site’s page copy, or adding some extra code.
It is an ongoing process that helps your site
evolve over time into a viable competitor in your
industry.

7. Search Visibility & Brand Value
Being found on the
first half of a search
results page
increases your
brand value.

8. Google Golden Triangle

9. Internet Ad Spending
• Set To Overtake All
Other Media By 2011
• Will reach $61.98
billion, and will
surpass newspapers to
become the nation's
leading ad medium
- 21st Communications Industry
Forecast.

10. What is Influencing Consumers and
Business Buyers?
“A Person Like Me”
Now The Most Credible Spokesperson
for Companies
Global opinion leaders say their most
credible source of information about a
company is now “a person like me.”
Edelman Trust Barometer

12. Consumer Reviews

13. Influencing Purchases
58% of consumers
prefer websites with
peer-written product
reviews.
- MarketingSherpa

14. Control of Consumer Spending?
Women represent just
over 50 percent of the
US population but
account for 80
percent of consumer
spending, making
women top candidates
for word-of-mouth
marketing.
- Trendwatching brief

15. Word Of Mouth
Over 25 million
US adults
regularly share
advice on
products or
services online.
- eMarketer

16. Social Media
1 in 20 internet
visits go to social
networking sites.
- Hitwise

17. Seniors
• Internet Growth
Driven by Senior
Citizens
• The fastest growth in
Internet use is being
driven by the older
age groups, starting
at 55.
The Media Audit

18. Top 5 Media Influencers on
Consumers Buying a Car
1. Word of Mouth 30.4%
2. TV Broadcast 24.1%
3. Read Article 21.3%
4. Newspaper 20.2%
5. Magazine 17.5%
Source: Ad Age Domestic Spending by
Category and BIGresearch, 2007

19. Top 5 Media Influencers for Consumers
Buying Electronic/Home
Furnishing/Appliances
1. Word of Mouth 42.6%
2. Read Article 34.1%
3. TV Broadcast 32.3%
4. Newspaper Inserts 32.0%
5. In-Store Promo 27.2%
- BIGresearch, 2007

20. Organic Search
• Although social media
has become important,
being found on the
major search engines
is still vitally important.
• Aim to own the ‘above
the fold’ real estate

21. Audit Your Site
• Locate search
visibility
problems and
usability issues
with the current
site
• Review content for
persuasive
function and
conversion

22. Check the Competition
Compare your
site to the
competition and
other websites
that have page
one ranking on
your keywords

23. Persuasive Content
• Studies show that the
average website
loses over 60% of
the visitors right off
the home page due to
usability issues and a
lack of relevant
content.
• 50% of visitors spend
less than eight
seconds on a site.

24. SEO Basics
• SEO (Search Engine
Optimization) done
well results in high
rankings with the
search engines
• Most people find
content through
search with Google
leading the pack

25. Back Links Are Vital
• The site must
be optimized
• The site must
have volumes
of links to it
(Called back
links or one way
inbound links)

26. Keyword Research
• The objective is to
find a viable number
of keywords that
your target audience
is using to find your
site or your
products/services.
• Then use the
keywords on the site
and in the content

27. Keyword Research
• Look at the titles of the web pages and
look for keywords
• Go to ‘View’ and click ‘Source’ and see if
there are keywords in the meta tags
• Note the ones that you find
• Open a browser and go to
http://www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion/

28. Keyword Research (cont’d)
• Look up any words that relate to the site
and see which ones have the highest
search numbers.
• Then look down the list and find ‘long tail’
words with smaller search numbers but a
more specific description of your activity or
service.

29. Long Tail
Long Tail: low-demand products/services
can make up a market share that equals or
exceeds high-demand products -- if the
distribution channel is large enough.

30. Sample Camera Keywords
• Digital camera
• Digital camera
accessories
• Photographic
equipment
• Point and shoot
camera
• Medium format
camera

31. Keywords
• Find all the words that you think can
bring good visibility and traffic
• Open another browser in Google so
you can do a search on the words
you pick and see the number of
competing pages

32. Start of the Strategy
• Note the words you will
go after first.
• With correct
optimization, there are
several terms which
can be taken
advantage of that have
high searches, but
relatively low
competition.

33. Home & Interior Pages
• The homepage &
interior page content
needs to be rewritten
to utilize these
keywords to the best
advantage

34. Content Items
Note phrases
that can be used
in content
syndication –
news releases,
articles and blog
posts.

35. Competition
• Take each major
keyword or phrase
picked for the
strategy and do a
Google search on
that
keyword/phrase.
• See who shows up
at #1, 2 and 3

36. Eye Track: Web Page
• This is the normal
eye pattern on a
webpage – where it
is red 100% of the
people looked.
• You can increase
the way people read
the site by using
chunk of content
and sub headings
on the content.

37. Top Five Errors
• Too much motion – animation
• Slow downloads, too many graphics
• Confusing navigation
• Not enough content or outdated content
• Technology that will hurt Search results
(Frames – no keywords in text – text in a
image)

38. Optimized Press Releases
• Optimized (making full use of keywords
and links) press releases are an excellent
tool to generate leads.
• An important benefit of optimized press
releases is that they create volumes of links
back to your site, which is critical for search
engine rankings - especially Google - and
they work very quickly

39. Press Releases Online
News Engines
Search Engines
Journalists
Buyers

40. RSS Feeds
It’s the ability to
access content any
time of the day
that’s attracting the
audiences--a
perfect match for
RSS (really simple
syndication) feeds.

41. News Aggregators
The blog and feed
search sites - called
news aggregators -
gather syndicated
content and have
growing audiences
who visit their sites
to find new content.

42. Blogs
• Use blogs to help tell
your story
• Brings a face to your
organization
• Can provide feedback
to a specific question or
topic
• Search engines
love them
• Cross linking in your
site

43. Strategy Elements
• Upgrade the site
• Undertake ongoing SEO (search engine
optimization) especially link building
• Issue optimized press releases
• Add RSS feeds for press releases, articles,
video, etc
• Utilize social media sites where appropriate

44. Recommended Reading
THE POWER OF A
CONTENT STRATEGY
By Sally Falkow
www.falkowinc.com/inc/ebooks.html

45. Contact Details
Robin Shereshevsky
Robins@expansionplus.com
Expansion Plus Inc
626-793-4911
www.expansionplus.com