Is any old web site content good enough?
Statistically speaking, almost 50% of search engine
queries go unanswered.
That is to say that searchers have to refine their query
before getting the information they were looking for,
so any old content is not likely to get very far. The content of your site should reflect your company’s
image and provide genuine value to your visitors; which
brings us to the second point.
Should you provide plenty of information about your
business?
Information about your company, its standing within
your industry and its expertise is a vital part of building
a level of trust with potential customers, so a certain
amount of self-praise is called for to convince your
visitors that you are worth contacting. By the same token, if your web site content does nothing
but exalt your company, its visitors will soon get bored
and go in search of a site which tells them how they
stand to benefit from making a purchase.
Should you consider your visitor’s need for
information? This may seem like a silly question, but consider it
for a moment:”What is it your visitor actually wants?”
The bulk of visitors to commercial web sites are either
ready to make a purchase, or looking for information
to help them decide what to buy and who to buy from. If you are selling BBQs, rather than simply listing
the different models and their features, provide a section
about maintenance tips, recipes, and other information
which adds value from your visitor’s perspective. The more your web site content caters for your visitor’s
needs, the easier your task of converting them into
customers.
Should you include content of limited relevance to
your site?
Always try to look at your site through its visitor’s
eyes and use the rule of thumb; “If it doesn’t
add value, don’t include it”. Your visitor is looking for the most concise answer
to his or her search; if you send them on an endless
journey through your site, they are likely to get bored
and look elsewhere.
Take this article archive for instance; every single piece written, and published here during the past few years pertains to either web design, or web promotion. Sure, there are one or two articles about grapgics, but these too fall into the above categories, since they're invariably about web optimization. Had I chosen to, I could cheerfully have included some random pieces about computer hardware, or how to set up a home network, just to bulk-up this website's content. But although Google might have perceived this to be in some way relevant, it wouldn't have done our visitors any good at all, because that's simply not what IceGiant is about.
What does it all mean then?
Ultimately it means that “High-Quality, Visitor Orientated, Relevant, Unique Content is King” would be a far
better way to phrase it, although this does not roll off
the tongue so easily, and is not in itself ideal buzzword material.
The fact is that many commercial web sites are so busy
praising themselves and their superiority, they find little
or no time to actually figure out just what it is their visitors
actually want.
Remember that your website content should
always put the visitor first.
