Develop a user-enriched, strategic approach to content

Fabio says: “Now, more than ever, you need to be strategic with your content.

I was at BrightonSEO not too long ago and approximately 80% of all the talks were about AI. Everyone is macro-focused on creating as much content as possible with these new tools that allow you to create 200 articles a month. We’re forgetting that the most important aspect of a website is to provide real value to your potential visitors.

That strategy shouldn’t go anywhere; it should always be at the forefront. It shouldn’t be about quantity, and it should be always about quality. A lot of SEOs out there focus on having as much content as possible on their sites, but I’ve always disagreed. I’ve worked on websites with less than 50% of the pages their competitors have, and outranked them greatly, just through quality, strategic content.

You need to be more strategic than ever before. Home in on what the user needs and what they want to be reading about, rather than creating as much content as possible using the power of AI.”

What does an effective, user-led content strategy look like?

“I was talking about this with a client a few hours ago. He is a business owner with an e-commerce shop, and he is very passionate about the products that he sells. He receives new products and he believes that, because he’s the first one in the market to have them, he’s going to be able to sell them easily. However, three months down the line, there might not be enough demand for that product. If that is the case, it almost doesn’t matter how good the strategy is and what sort of product we’re trying to sell.

From an SEO perspective, demand is important. We can always try and target those long-tail keywords with less search volume behind them and less keyword difficulty, but demand is so important. When it comes to preparing a user-enriched strategy, we have a lot of tools at our disposal. I find Google Search Console extremely helpful for all of this. It’s so interesting to marry up your performance over the course of six months and understand what’s bringing impressions onto your site, what’s bringing clicks to your site, what is dropping, and why.

Normally, when you look at it, it’s not dropping because the demand is no longer there. It’s normally dropping because competitors have created something new, in terms of content, that is more recent than what you have – which has overtaken your content. As I was telling my client today, you can instantly tell that the demand is there. Your competitors are writing about it, and you can see the traffic that those competitors are getting, so the demand is certainly still there.

That can help dictate your strategy moving forward. A lot of your clients will come to you with demands on what they think is best for their own websites, but you need to be making data-driven decisions. Making decisions based on that data, and your content, will be key going forward.”

How do you determine what’s going to be successful in the future and what you need to focus on from a content perspective?

“Understanding whatever market you’re serving is key. The client I was just speaking about has been a client of ours for about three years now, so we understand the industry really well. We understand what the future trends will be based on what’s going on today.

Having conversations with the client will always help because they are ingrained in the industry. If they’re a business owner, more often than not, they will know more about the industry than you do. The collaboration element is important

At the same time, the more that you’re working on an account the more you get to find out about that industry. You are constantly analysing the competition and you’re constantly reading about what’s going on in that specific industry, so your future strategies are based on real-life trends that you are identifying through your research.

The collaboration side of things is important because I could easily come up with some ideas based on the competitors I’ve analysed and the articles I’ve read. However, the client may have an insight that I don’t.

If you’re trying to define something for the future without quite knowing the demand that may generate, or without really having the data, sometimes it’s important to take risks. You can identify something that you predict will work, based on past experiences – for example, a product that improves on a previous product that has recently come into the market. That allows you to go ahead and create that strategy and those articles without waiting 3-6 months to see if it will work or not. Taking the risk and being the first to put something out there is often a good way of doing it.”

How will SGE impact content strategy and should SEOs be taking risks in order to rank for questions that will likely be popular for their industry?

“Understanding user behaviour will be important when it comes to those sorts of questions. The way content is going to be presented on Google is going to change completely in a lot of industries. Based on my experience testing it so far, it doesn’t look like it’s going to affect all industries. For those industries where SGE is present, the way content is presented will be completely different.

It places complete emphasis on user experience and engagement with the articles on your website, as well as how relevant it is for the user. The introduction of SGE means that traditional SEO techniques need to be adapted to align with the evolving search landscape.

When you have an AI writing tons of content, you will always miss the user experience aspect and the human side of things. SGE will really account for that, which is why we’ve had so many updates like the helpful content update and the EEAT update. Everything is placing emphasis on the user experience, and the human experience. SGE will home in on that. For that, we need to adapt and change the way we do things in the SEO industry.”

What sort of metrics will demonstrate to SGE that your content offers a great user experience?

“I am actually not sure that Google themselves know the answer to that yet. Right now, based on my experience, it still gives some answers that don’t feel very relevant.

However, going forward, things like the trustworthiness behind whatever you’re writing on your site will be important. Having things like reviews on specific products will become ever more significant than they were before because it adds a level of credibility to the product that you are describing on your site. Things like case studies and quotes within the specific articles that you’re writing are also going to be important.

If you are writing an article about the best restaurants in London, having quotes from real people for those specific articles will really help. We need to start thinking outside the box, and AI will always miss the mark with that. Bring real-life experiences into the articles that you’re writing, whether it’s through quotes or videos that you’re creating to get their point across.

Right now, a lot of case studies feel disingenuous, so we may need to change the way we create those case studies. Perhaps it needs to be a lot more interactive, with a quick 30-second video plus the text, to add that level of credibility to the article that you’re writing. I think things like that are what Google will be looking for when they are taking their answers for SGE.”

Would you ever advise a client to block AI from accessing and using their content?

“Right now, I want to say no because I always want my clients to come across as the thought leaders in their space. I’m just hoping that Google takes a leaf out of Bing’s book and starts giving credit and citing sources more. It’s important to give props to those who they’re getting the information from. So far, they’re not doing that. They’re doing it in some instances, but it’s not good enough. They really should cite where they’re getting that information from because then no SEO would ever advise a client to block it.

If they don’t give more credit, we’re likely going to be heading that way. Everyone works extremely hard to create what we believe is really good, quality content – just for Google to then come in with an extremely powerful and expensive robot, steal the content away from you, and get all the clicks for themselves. It’s not fair to what we’re trying to do, but things aren’t always fair when it comes to Google, are they?”

If an SEO is struggling for time, what should they stop doing right now so they can spend more time doing what you suggest in 2024?

“Stop doing the little things and focus on what’s to come. It’s very easy for us to focus on the present and then, when we have something new in front of us, we try to scramble and adapt to it.

We should be proactive. We know it’s here. We know it’s coming. We’re living in it right now. Let’s ensure that we’re proactive about it, we’re learning as much as possible about it, and we are starting to adapt our strategies ahead of it right now – rather than waiting until it’s in front of our faces and all our competitors who have done their homework are beating us on the SERPs.”

Fabio Embalo is Chief Executive Officer at Viaduct Generation, and you can find him over at SEO.ViaductGen.com.