More Related Content More from Jonathon Colman (20) SEO From a Content Strategy Perspective1. SEO from a
Content
Strategy
Perspective
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6. This made me wonder…
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7. How should Content Strategy and SEO work together?
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8. We both serve as advocates for people and their goals
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9. We both use technologies that constantly evolve
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10. We both manage, measure, audit, and govern content
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11. We both treat content as a core business asset
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12. We both have to argue just to do our jobs
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13. We both must constantly negotiate to “Yes!”
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14. And we both seek to change the organization from within
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15. How do the core tenants of Content Strategy fit into SEO?
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16. Content
Strategy
Creation
Delivery
Governance
Information architecture
Editorial strategy
Web writing
Metadata strategy
Content management
Distribution
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18. Quality content draws
people from search
engines to a web site
based on their queries.
Human visitors use
content to make
decisions and create an
impression of a web site
and its brand.
Search engine robots
and crawlers also
consume content to build
their indices.
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20. We don’t just drive
traffic; that’s just a tactic!
SEOs build brand
awareness, positive
perception, and market
share by shaping content
and experiences to be
found and used by
people.
We measure this in
traffic, sales, conversion,
pages crawled/indexed,
links, mentions, fans,
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followers, feedback…
22. SEOs help search engines
find, consume, index,
and direct the right
people to the right
content.
So SEOs want to be
involved throughout the
creative lifecycle, from
conception to archival.
We can offer insights
that ease the creation
process and drive more
business value.
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24. If you’ve ever had to go
back to your content to
“fix it for SEO”, that’s a
sign of workflow failure.
SEO doesn’t have to be
hard and it works best
when it’s built into the
process.
SEOs can work with you
to make content
launches easy, efficient,
and effective.
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26. SEOs can play a core role
in content standards,
requirements, policies,
maintenance, and
archival.
We ensure that search
engines understand what
content to consume at
what point in time in
order to direct users to
the best experiences that
meet their needs.
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28. SEOs (and search
engines) know that
content lives within an
ecosystem of structures.
That includes on-page,
on-site, and off-site
factors, interfaces, and
structures.
SEOs seek to align these
to create the best user
experience and the best
crawler understanding of
relevancy and authority.
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30. SEOs aid in the editorial
process and standards
development by focusing
on a human audience
based on their specific
use of language.
But we also keep an eye
toward the search engine
robots and crawlers.
We help remind the
organization that people
use language with
robots as wayfinding
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apps and utilities.
32. This is likely the single
most misunderstood
point of SEO. We’ve all
seen the impact of poor
writing labeled as “SEO”.
SEO is not keyword spam.
It’s not link spam. It’s not
“writing for robots”.
SEOs seek clear,
meaningful content to be
used by people.
Why? Because robots
don’t buy anything.
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34. Metadata is more than
<meta> content, which is
erroneously associated
with SEO.
Good SEOs know that
metadata standards and
policies influence both
taxonomy and usability.
Great metadata allows
for interoperability and
findability throughout
the information
ecosystem.
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36. SEOs are focused just as
much on back-end
systems, processes, and
policies as they are on
front-end code, IA, UX
and content.
SEOs can work with CMS
tools, workflows,
migrations, and policies
so that content is single-
sourced, defined
semantically, and
managed efficiently as a
core business asset
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38. SEOs know that content
doesn’t just live on our
pages or sites.
Content is part of an
experiential ecosystem
involving other
publishers and their
platforms.
SEOs help build brand
awareness, positive
perception, and
findability by earning
attention from these
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external venues.
39. What do good content strategy and SEO (CS/SEO) look like?
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40. CS/SEO makes tacit knowledge explicit, findable, and useful
Example: http://www.rei.com/expertadvice/articles/backpack.html
44. That’s what Content Strategy and SEO did for REI
They amazed and delighted the people we care about most
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45. What will they do for you?
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46. Thank you!
Jonathon Colman
Agile SEO for REI
Home: www.jonathoncolman.org
Twitter: @jcolman
E-mail: jcolman@rei.com