Content Strategy: You Need It. Now.

If the thought of creating content for your site makes you shudder, don’t worry, you’re not the only website owner that feels that way. Unfortunately, though, it’s kind of like taking your car in for maintenance or going to the Dentist. You don’t want to, it’s inconvenient, but everyone is better off when you’re regular about it, because not doing it will affect more than just health of your car or your teeth: productivity, focus and effectiveness also fall behind when things go to hell unexpectedly.

The same can be said about content for your website. You don’t want to do it, you don’t like it when you are creating it, but there are some vital benefits to having good content on your site and not having it will affect it’s over all health.

Reason #1: Content Builds Credibility

A sales site without content is just a sales site. If there is no content, visitors will quickly forget your site along with the hundreds of other sites that are selling the same thing you are. Real content has to be distinguished from promotional material. Infomercials and sales letters may be information-rich, but they are not the type of content we are talking about here. Good site content is valuable information but it keeps the promotional information to a minimum. Good site content can be articles, blog posts, videos, infographics, pictures or podcasts, just to name a few popular types of content.

A site with interesting content about the product or service that you are selling will establish you as an expert about your little area of the web. This will not only help you stand out when someone is ready to make a purchase; people are more likely to buy something from an expert on a product or service rather than from an anonymous online provider.

Let’s go back to the mechanic analogy: A small town mechanic with no competition doesn’t need a content-rich site to dominate their market. But the moment a competitor hangs a shingle, the game’s afoot. At that point, online differentiation is required and content is how to do it.

Reason #2: Content Brings Unplanned Sales

Having good content out there can also generate sales from searchers that had no idea that they needed what you had for sale.
For example, say that you sell dog kennels. Normally, only people that had dogs would seek out your product. But, if you write a piece of content on how you can also use a dog kennel to keep chickens, or to protect your garden in the woods from wild animals, then you have just created a new market for your dog kennels. This also means that when someone does a search on how to protect their garden from deer, your content will bring your website up in the search result, even though you sell dog kennels.

Reason #3: Good Content Brings Traffic

Now when I say good content, I mean content that provides value to the reader. This does not mean content that is so stuffed with keywords that it doesn’t make sense. Create content for your site on subjects that people don’t know about or that touch on popular subjects that people are looking for answers to, as related to your area of expertise. It doesn’t make sense to write pages and pages on dog kennels if you’re selling mechanic services. Create content that people will want to read, and is so interesting that they will want to share it with their friends.

Good content will bring traffic to your site in two ways: First, the search engines will pick up the keywords that you will naturally use in your content because its related to the subject matter you’re writing about. The more relevant your content is to a person’s search, the higher you are going to rank on the search results. Second, really good content gets shared. So when someone finds a good piece of content on your site they send it to a friend, and then they send it to a friend; pretty soon your website starts getting traffic just from your content being passed around.

Reason #3 ½: You Don’t Need to Do It All Yourself

This is less of a reason and more of a tip. Content makes web go ‘round, but you don’t have to be Hemingway to enjoy the benefits.
That’s what writers are for. If you still can’t stand the thought of writing blog posts or posting videos, you can hire a professional to do it for you. It can be as affordable as an Elance contractor or as expensive as a professional copywriter. There’s a writer and videographer to fit every budget. The important thing is that creating it becomes a priority- know that if it’s not someone’s job, it won’t get done.