Spam Vs Shareable Content – It’s War

Jessie Rasmussen 11 years ago

We are all looking to create the ultimate content marketing strategy. It’s like a game of war - positioning all of your troops in the right places in order to beat your opponent and conquer the land. Sounds simple right? Wrong! There are so many different tactics and different types of software to help you on your travels, so what’s the right route to go down? I am not here to tell you right from wrong, good from evil, I am here to advise, guide and assist...

This tale will follow a content marketing executive on her journey in to the deep unknown... A journey of strife, adventure and self-discovery, her name...  Julia Caesar.

The Beginning: The Fellowship

Julia Caesar had always had a passion for writing, and was great at creating strong working relationships with a whole host of website owners. For a long time she was able to bring people round in to her way of thinking by “telling” them stuff. The only problem was that in recent times she struggled to keep their full attention on her... There was always something better around the corner. With this in mind Julia decided to bring on an all out writing war.

After churning out article after article that was focussed on the same topic, she began to run out of steam, and she was still seeing dropping numbers of hits to her website. Her tactic was not working!

Julia began an investigation and realised that the god Google, who controlled the world we live in was in fact looking of ways to bring more creative, innovative and insightful content to its followers. The key… Creative content! Easy!

In order to reach a wider audience, Julia began to utilise every page on her site, by creating key creative content types:

-       Screen Experiences: like that of CycleMon. Using the whole screen to grab the attention of the audience. Even creating personalised pages that welcome visitors on their return back to your site. Reward them and stop telling them what to do and get them to interact with what you do.

-       Videos and Slide shows: For example our recent Zazzle blog post which used a method to grab the attention of the audience, feeding their thirst for knowledge by using interaction to delve deeper in to the world of marketing.

-       Trendy Apps: Mobile phones are being used more and more and it is important to jump on this trend. Create an app that will get people thinking or laughing, or even gives the end user a benefit.

-       In-depth articles: We all crave knowledge, and sometimes a simple and general blog post just doesn’t cut it. Google is now looking in to in-depth articles that can give the reader more information and act as a study.

The middle: The Two Towers

The Google god is a blessing, as well as a curse. If you are guest posting or creating content on your own site, it must be relevant or else you will be punished. Google sees all. To avoid spam content Julia began to practice the following in order to please Google:

Avoid:

-       Duplicate content. It may not affect you, but it sure isn’t going to do you any favours.

-       Sites not relevant to the content you have created.

-       Keyword stuffing.

-       Spam sites. Always check the trust flow of sites using MajesticSeo along with Wayback Machine to see whether the site has recently been bought for guest posting purposes.

-       Short non-informative blog posts. Since Google’s Panda update, the bounce rate is being closely monitored. If a site has a high bounce rate over a period of time they are likely to have their site penalised.

Practice:

-       Trending content. Stuck for ideas? Do some research and write about what interests you. If you enjoy writing your article, readers will be more inclined to enjoy reading your work.

-       Put some personality in to it! People don’t want to read boring nonsensical pieces, they want emotion, they want drama, they want real life… So put your back in to it! Plus you’re more likely to get social shares. Bonus!

-       Get social. How can you expect someone to share your work if you refuse to connect with them in any way, shape or form. Share articles that you think are interesting… Be interesting and people will become more interested in you.

-       Clean yourself up. Google wants you to succeed, which is why they created the Disavow tool to help you clean up your reputation and ignore low quality spam links.

The end: The Return of the King

Julia realised that times were changing and it was time we move with it, after all, we are a digital world, so why stick to written articles, whitepapers and pdfs. Be brave and be heroic and your name will be remembered. Learn from Julia, and practice this mantra:

“I will set up my name in the place where the names of famous men are written, and where no man’s name is written yet I will raise a monument to the gods.” The epic of Gilgamesh.

It may take time and effort in order to get those higher placements and to build the content you desire, but it is well worth it... Shares will come.

 

Stay in touch with the Zazzle Media family

Sign up for our monthly newsletter and follow us on social media for the latest news.

Our website uses cookies for various purposes and to enhance the site’s functionality. This helps us understand how you use and interact with the website.

Settings Accept Cookies