So you’ve got a company website. You spent hours writing content to add to the site and hated every minute of it. And now I’m about to tell you to write more. A lot more.
You see, there’s an old (and incredibly accurate) cliche about web marketing stating that ‘content is king’. The more relevant, fresh and well-written the content on your website, the more pages search engines will index. As a result, your company’s online visibility will increase, and you’ll start to see a lot more people visiting and returning to your website to get their weekly fix. And if you can keep these people interested for long enough, some of them are going to turn into paying customers. It’s
Of course, the fact still remains that nobody really likes writing fresh website content, so I’ve listed 7 places I go to when I need to find ideas for my own website and those of my clients. Try a few of these, and I guarantee you’ll never run out of good ideas again:
- Look inside your organization. Ask your customer support people to take notes whenever they deal with a customer. Same goes for your sales reps. If you get enough of these notes together you’ll start to see a pattern in the questions people ask. If you’ve got a good answer, write about it. You can also write about recent projects you’ve worked on and how they’ve helped solve your customers’ problems. As long as you keep thinking about your writing in terms of ‘what’s in it for the customer’, you should be able to write something truly useful. You can also try asking your staff to write articles. You may find a couple of budding journalists on your staff and more than one viewpoint is a great asset.
- Ask your customers. This is my favorite way to find content. Ask your customers what they’d like to read about on your website. You’ll be surprised to find that they’ve got a lot of valid questions. And if one customer has a question, the chances are more customers will also want to know. This may seem like a similar idea to the one above, but it’s totally different because this time you’re getting it straight from the customer with no filtering of information from your staff.
- Steal from your competitors. Your competitors’ websites can be a great source of information. See what they’ve written about and ask your customers if they’d find similar content useful. If they like the idea, write your own (original) content around the same topic.
- Read trade journals. There are probably at least 2 trade magazines or journals specifically targeted at your market. Personally, I find trade journals really boring, but at times, they provide me with a few golden nuggets. If you agree with an article in a trade publication, write a complimentary piece, adding context to what has already been written. If you disagree with the article, write about that too. There’s no harm in disagreeing with a journalist as long as your argument is valid and you keep it professional. In fact, you might want to get in touch with the magazine’s editor with a copy of your piece. Maybe you can get it published in print as well.
- Visit trade shows. I recommend you visit at least one trade show a month, irrespective of the industry. Apart from all the free stuff you can get, there’s a wealth of information that could help you find content ideas. And because a lot of people in your market aren’t going to get a chance to visit the show, there are a number of opportunities for content, photos and other supporting media. Write about who attended, the best products you saw, innovative ideas people used to get their message across, things you didn’t like, conversations you had or conversations you overheard. The list goes on.
- Read blogs. Whether or not you understand the theory behind blogging, blogs are the new news media. If anything happens anywhere in the world and it’s even remotely interesting, someone will blog about it. I recommend using Google’s blog search or Technorati to search for blog posts on your chosen topic. Once you’ve found something interesting, you could take the easy way out and link to that article from your website, or do some hard work and research the topic further, writing your own article. Once again, you’re entitled to agree with a blogger or start a debate if you disagree.
- Join a forum. Trolling forums that are specific to your industry is a fantastic way to find content ideas. People visit forums to find solutions. If you find a problem you can help solve, write a quick article and post a link on the forum. This not only helps you to pick up organic search engine traffic in the future, but it also helps to build valuable incoming links to your website.
I realize that until you develop the habit of writing fresh content for your website, it’s going to feel like hard work. I still haven’t quite got to grips with posting new blog articles twice a week, but with practice, I’m getting better. I can promise you that it gets easier with time, and the benefits speak for themselves.
Give it a try and see what happens. What have you got to lose?