Use these five basic steps for setting a blog content strategy to write content that your customers want to read. And content that has a chance at ranking in Google organically - good SEO begins with a content strategy. And content that other people want to share so you can get more exposure. These steps will get you going.
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1
Start by profiling your ideal customers. Create customer avatar worksheet
Any good strategy starts with the customer.
Why this step is essential:
Starting here ensures you write customer-focused content that matters to your future customers and in a tone they want to read. You don't want to write about content they do not care about. And this all comes from understanding the various customer types you have and each segment's unique needs and wants.
Here's how to profile your customers.
Write a descriptive customer outline for various types of customers. This document is referred to as a customer avatar. The outline for each customer segment would contain the following info:
Example Customer Avatar Worksheet
2
Utilize keyword/topic research. Identify what types of content your customer is searching for.
How do you find what questions, issues your customers have?
Here's a related post on a streamlined WordPress blog post workflow to help you rank better, and another on how to use Google Trends for Market Research.
3
Narrow your topics down and prioritize your content based on which topics/keywords have the most economic value.
Some topics are merely informational vs. transactional.
The Google Keyword planner can be an excellent place to start to generate ideas and to understand which topics/keywords are most economically valuable (higher cost-per-click typically means more economic value since others are willing to bid up the price per keyword)
Here's a related SEO case study of a site that created a lot of content and ranked 750 keywords on the first page of Google and another post answering the question, does blogging help SEO?
4
Develop your blog promotional strategy. How will you promote your content?
5
Set a blog content calendar of topics and publish regularly
Set a reasonable content publishing frequency and stick to it. A content calendar will keep you on track. Publishing content regularly help build your SEO momentum and shows your customers you're a though leader. Plus, with regular content you have a reason to reach out to people with your newsletter or via paid social ads.