Anyone who’s heard of SEO (search engine optimization) knows that it includes SEO writing. As much of an art as it is a science, SEO writing is a core piece to the never-ending puzzle of showing up in search results. If you’re a beginner to SEO writing, you may consider checking out our beginner’s guide to SEO writing before starting here.
Beginners often think that it’s as simple as placing all of your keywords into a passable article, but even experts know that SEO writing requires constant improvement.
No matter what your level of expertise is, this guide has something for you. Learn more about how to create search-engine-optimized content that generates results.
Contents
- What’s SEO Writing Anyway?
- Should I Start a Website Blog?
- Key Principles of SEO
- Keywords for SEO Writing
- Choosing SEO Writing Topics
- SEO Writing Strategies
- Organizing a Website Blog
- Frequently Asked Questions About SEO Writing
What’s SEO Writing Anyway?
The experienced SEO masters may already know the answer, but it’s always worth a quick refresh. Google crawls web pages to determine how to rank them for a given search. It’s looking for pages that best match the searcher’s query intent. If Google determines that a page is relevant, they’ll rank it.
SEO content writing is all about writing content that shows up on the first page of search engines. It requires careful implementation of SEO best practices while providing true value for the searcher. Consistently creating content that adheres to SEO requirements will help it generate organic traffic, provide useful information to readers, and attract new audiences to your brand. Failing to write SEO-friendly content is a surefire way to never have it seen, yikes!
Should I Start a Website Blog?
If you don’t already have a website blog, that’s a critical step to take. While there are some other elements to nail down first, a website blog is an important SEO tool that can help boost the visibility of your website.
Blogging is an important SEO activity that can help position your website higher for relevant searches. While it’s important to optimize service pages and other web pages, you can leverage a blog for more opportunities to rank in search engines.
Ultimately, a sound blogging strategy allows you to answer common customer questions and makes your site more valuable to visitors. Some of the most critical benefits of SEO writing include:
- Build trust with your audience by answering their questions.
- Increase online visibility by addressing relevant topics in your industry.
- Drive traffic to your website.
- Help your website rank for certain keywords.
- Improve the chances of acquiring backlinks.
- Boost internal linking.
- Create fresh content.
- Offer a better user experience.
You can start a blog in a number of ways, we’ve broken down how to start a blog on five different website platforms here.
Key Principles of SEO
SEO is all about ensuring your content is visible to people through search engines. Before you can dive into SEO writing, revisit the core principles of SEO. And if you aren’t up to date on SEO, check out this article on the latest SEO techniques.
Contents:
- About Google’s Ranking System
- When is SEO Blogging Important?
- EAT SEO Concept
About Google’s Ranking System
SEO is about “winning” in Google’s ranking system to get your page to show up for the relevant terms in your industry. There are several ranking factors that search engines consider directly and indirectly when determining the position of search results.
Google frequently updates its ranking factors and algorithm. However, they do also provide helpful details on how they determine search results.
Here is some information about how Google’s algorithm generates results to consider in 2023:
- Content relevance – does the content contain information the searcher is looking for? Keywords and interactions play a role.
- Quality – Content that seems the most helpful. The EAT principle (expertise, authoritativeness, trustworthiness) is what they’re after here.
- Usability– The accessibility of the content. Is it mobile-friendly? Does it load quickly?
For each of those main concepts, Google has specific ranking factors or signals. For example, to determine content relevance, it considers keyword usage as one of the signals. Some other ranking factors include:
- Backlinks
- Search intent
- Website structure
- Website security
- On-page experience
- Keyword optimization
- Mobile-friendliness
- Domain authority
- Website loading speed
When is SEO Blogging Important?
It’s easy to think that blogging is “always” important, but the truth is that you can’t blog without a sound website. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs has been crudely applied to SEO so that we can better understand when blogging is most critical.
While there are multiple variations of the said pyramid, they all place website accessibility and architecture at the bottom. Before you can worry about blogging, you need a structurally-sound website that search engines can crawl.
But after you’ve nailed down crawl accessibility, blogging steps up to bat. “Content” is next on the pyramid. Content includes your images, web pages, meta tags, and (you guessed it) blogs.
Simply put, as soon as your website architecture is sound, content is next up next. Arguably, getting your web pages (like service pages) up should come before regular blogging. But then, it’s time to blog, baby.
EAT SEO Concept
EAT, or Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness is a critical part of Google’s algorithm. The Search Quality Raters use this principle to determine how relevant the results for a given search query are.
The EAT principle is vital for blogging. For Google, and its quality raters, to see your content as “high-quality, it must add value to your audience. All this SEO talk can make it seem like ranking is THE factor, but in reality, helpful content is the most important thing for SEO writing.
Keywords for SEO Writing
Keywords are a core part of SEO writing, and they shouldn’t be an afterthought. Designing your content around the right keywords is a core part of the recipe to success. But choosing keywords and implementing keywords is not always clear-cut.
In this section, we dive into keyword planning and execution strategies for your SEO writing.
- How to Choose Keywords
- Beginner Keyword Selection
- Intermediate Keyword Selection
- Advanced keyword Selection strategies
- Keyword Metrics to Assess
- Tips for Using Keywords in Content Writing
How to Choose Keywords for SEO Writing
There are many different ways to choose keywords, from common sense to elaborate tools. No matter what your level of experience is, there are some keyword selection strategies to consider.
Beginner Keyword Selection
- Intuition: Common sense is actually a helpful strategy for choosing keywords, especially when you’re just starting out. Think about your audience and your main offers. What questions may they have? Which topics are they likely to look for? Use intuition to come up with some preliminary keywords.
- Trending Topics: Evaluate the current global and industry news. Choose relevant trending topics that you can relate back to your company. Pay attention to trending terms that you can combine with other industry concepts. Examples for a clothing brand could be “inclusive fashion brand” or “gender-neutral flair leggings”.
- Check Out the Competition: What are successful brands in your industry writing about? Start by checking out their websites and blog sections. If multiple brands in your space cover a topic, there’s a good chance you should too.
- Questions From Your Audience: What common questions to prospects and customers ask you? Do you already have a FAQ page? Turn those questions into keywords and then into distinct blog topics.
Intermediate Keyword Selection
- People Also Ask: One helpful tool to use right from Google is the “People Also Ask” section. This area has questions related to a primary keyword that you search. The more questions you expand, the more will show up. These can serve as more ideas for keywords or topics.
- Related Searches: When you search for something on Google, Google provides suggestions in the form of related searches. These related searches are a great way to find other highly-searched keywords related to a broader one. Check out the options that Google suggests in the search bar, but also at the bottom of the first page in the “Related Searches” section.
- Expanding on Existing Content: You don’t have to reinvent the wheel to find new keywords for your content. If you’ve already started blogging, then take a closer look at your existing content. Oftentimes, you can take one smaller section and focus on the relevant keyword there for a different piece.
- Seasonal Keywords: Seasonal keywords can be helpful even if your business offer does not depend on the season. Holiday-related and seasonal keywords increase in search volume during certain times of the year. Capitalizing on this increased interest can help you create relevant content that brings in more site visitors.
Advanced keyword Selection strategies
- SEO Tool: There are endless SEO and keyword tools on the market. These tools offer many powerful features to help you research keywords. We use SEMRush here at Content Cucumber.
- Official Competitor Analysis: For a more in-depth and detailed analysis of competitors, use an SEO tool like SEMRush. These tools allow you to enter several domains, and then directly compare them. You can see objectively which keywords your competitors rank for and how you stack up. Any keywords that your competitors rank for that you are missing present an important opportunity.
Here’s an example of how I use SEMRush to find keywords. I have a main keyword idea, dog food because I am a pet food retailer (let’s just pretend). When I search that main, basic keyword, SEMRush provides multiple variations and related questions that I can consider.
Keyword Metrics to Assess
The more advanced you get with your strategy, the more intentional you can be about keyword metrics. Here are three keyword metrics to watch:
Volume: The volume is how many times per month a keyword is searched for in a specific location.
CPC: CPC stands for cost-per-click. This is not necessarily relevant to organic SEO strategies. However, if you’re using ads then CPC tells you how much it will cost to pay for each click on the ad with that keyword.
Competitiveness: Competition defines how hard it is to rank for that keyword. As you may guess, the more popular it is, typically the harder it is to rank for.
Most keyword tools will tell you ample details about keyword metrics. But even if you’re using basic research via Google, you can get an idea of the volume and competition in a general sense. When I search “dog food”, Google says there are about 2,190,000,000 results. However, when I look for “the best dog food for small dogs” Google only has 424,000,000 results (a much lower volume).
Choosing which keywords to target is a balancing act between these various metrics. High volume means a lot of people search for that term, but the competition is also typically much higher. Therefore, it’ll be much more difficult to rank for those keywords. However, if you only target very low-competition words, you may not get as much traffic.
When just starting out, it’s helpful to target lower-volume keywords that are low in competition as well. As you grow the authority of your site and improve your SEO writing, you can begin targeting a bit more competitive keywords. Just keep in mind that ranking for those will be tougher and requires a more elaborate strategy.
Tips for Using Keywords in Content Writing
- Include the primary keyword in the article’s title.
- The keyword should appear in the first 200 words of the article (ideally the first sentence/paragraph).
- Naturally imbed keywords into SEO writing. They should not disconnect or distract the reader.
- The primary keyword should account for about .5% to 1% of words. So, about 40 times for a 4,000-word piece.
- Add content keywords into article headers.
- Use keywords as anchor text, or text that you link to another page on your site about that topic.
Choosing SEO Writing Topics
Think of keywords like ingredients (peanut butter, jelly, ham, cheese, etc) and topics as the meal. A peanut-butter jelly sandwich is a meal that’s basically just the ingredients, but ravioli is more than cheese and noodles. SEO keywords can directly be topics, but oftentimes choosing a blog topic is a bit different than choosing the keywords. Check out this article, for a in-depth breakdown of SEO blog topics.
Learn everything you need to know about choosing and planning SEO blog topics below.
- SEO Blog Topic Selection Strategies
- Beginner Strategies
- Intermediate Strategies
- Advanced Strategies
- Planning Topics in a Content Calendar
SEO Blog Topic Selection Strategies
Beginner Strategies
- Check the competition: Check out your competitor’s websites. What are their latest blog topics? Do any connect with the keywords you have on your list? Look through the blogs, social media, whitepapers, and other content of competitors to pick out some helpful topic ideas.
- “How to _”: One of the simplest ways to generate topics is to create “how to” question statements from your keywords. If one of your keywords is “healthy dog food” you may consider topics like “how to find affordable healthy dog food” or “how to get your dog to eat healthy dog food.”
- Refresh existing content: Posting a blog about something once does not mean you can never cover the topic again. You may choose to refresh an old blog by updating the statistics, adding details, improving its SEO qualities, and more.
Intermediate Strategies
- Evergreen topics: Evergreen topics stay relevant to your audience for the foreseeable future. They don’t depend on the seasons or current events and aren’t time sensitive. Research your industry, including thought leaders and competitors, to come up with some evergreen topic ideas. For the dog food biz example, something like “the best dog food ingredients” could work as a strong evergreen topic.
- Research Trends: In the same way that trends can guide keywords, they can also guide your overarching topics. Study your industry for trending concepts and topics and turn them into your own content. A dog food retailer may want to hit on topics related to “enrichment feeding” and “grain-free dog food” since these are trending topics in space.
- Ask your audience: Once you’ve established a basic online presence, use it to your advantage. The best way to find out what people want to read is to ask them (shocking, right?). Use social media, brief surveys, and other tools to ask your audience what they want more information on.
- FAQs: What are customers already asking you (or competitors) about? A simple way to generate new topics is to examine industry FAQs. Don’t forget about the “People Also Ask” section on Google, as this is filled with valuable questions to turn into topics.
Advanced Strategies
- SEO Tools: Many SEO tools also contain features that help you generate topics. They can help you turn basic keywords into exciting blog headlines. In SEMRush, for example, you can enter your keyword and subtopic to get a whole list of potential headlines and related questions.
Planning Topics in a Content Calendar
Getting out a list of blog topics and basic keywords is great, but that’s just one part of the process. A topic calendar is a simple way to stay on track and plan out your topics logically.
There are endless templates and options for content calendars online. You can use anything from paper and pen (not recommended unless you’re a one-man team that hates tech) to advanced marketing software.
We opt for something in-between when it comes to planning SEO topics for our clients here at Content Cucumber- a good ole spreadsheet. The setup below works well for two blogs per week, but you can easily add to it or remove a column to plan out one per week.
I like to add a new tab for each month to keep everything clear and organized. Additionally, I recommend including an ongoing list of all of your SEO blogs for future reference. As you write or publish more content, keeping a centralized list can help you streamline future planning.
SEO Writing Strategies
- Write for the Reader, Not the Search Engine
- How to Write Valuable Content
- SEO Elements to Consider
- Content Formatting
- Structuring a Blog
- SEO Blog Links
- Readability of SEO Writing
- Writing Clarity
Write for the Reader, Not the Search Engine
Have you ever found a blog online that felt more like a formula? That means you found a great example of what NOT to do with SEO writing.
It’s tempting to focus on SEO, as you want your blogs to gain visibility and attract your audience. But before worrying about all that “SEO stuff” you need to worry about your content. Write for the reader, not the search engine.
Funnily enough, search engines don’t like when you try to write for them. They want to show users the most helpful, valuable content. If you write like a math equation, nobody will want to see it.
Let’s break it down:
Don’ts of SEO Writing:
- Overstuff content with keywords
- Include keywords unnaturally
- Write boring, low-quality content
- Copy everything else everyone else says.
Do’s of SEO Writing:
- Focus on delivering value to the reader
- Organize the content logically
- Make skimmable content
- Incorporate personality and brand voice
How to Write Valuable Content
Okay “writing for the reader” makes plenty of sense, but what does that even mean for SEO writing? Some tips for crafting relevant, valuable content include:
- Use breakout sections (like we have in this article) to highlight important parts
- Link to various sections with a table of contents so the article is easy to navigate
- Include helpful visuals, videos, or infographics to illustrate complex ideas
- Keep paragraphs short and the writing level accessible
- Write skimmable content (use bullets, headings, etc.)
SEO Elements to Consider
Keywords might be given when it comes to SEO writing, but there are plenty of other elements you have to keep in mind. Let’s break down some important aspects of SEO writing to remember:
Meta Descriptions
Do you know the quick snippets that authors use to entice you into reading their book? Meta descriptions are kinda like these. They’re mini summaries telling people (and search engines) what the content is about.
Meta description best practices:
- Every page on your site needs a unique one (no copy and pasting!)
- Keep it under 155 characters. Concise and punchy.
- Include your primary keyword in the meta description.
- The description should be…descriptive. Make sure it tells people what your content is actually about.
Title Tags
The title tag is what users see in the search results. They then click this blue text to head to your content. Note that they can be different from your H1. People only see your H1 title when they navigate to your page. The title tag appears on the search engines, and therefore can be different from your H1.
Essentially, the title tag labels your page. The headline should tell people what your content is about. Make sure it’s informative and unique. Here are some examples of first-page title tags for the search “healthy dog food tips.”
Title tag tips to note:
- Keep them between 50-60 characters.
- Ensure that it includes your primary keyword.
- Represent your content clearly with the title tag.
- Make it original, and stand out from similar content.
- Include a hook to captivate people.
- Use numbers in the title tag when applicable (5 tips, 10, myths, 2023 trends).
Content Formatting for SEO Writing
Formatting plays a huge role in SEO writing. Good formatting can make the difference between top-quality, first-page content and content Google (and readers) hate.
Paragraph Length
First, the golden blog formatting rule: keep paragraphs short. Remember, a lot of people view content on mobile devices. Regardless, even with a desktop, huge blocks of text are *yawn* boring and unattractive.
Headings
Short paragraphs are great, but if there are ten of them in sequence the blog will still look incredibly dull and unfocused. Include headers throughout your blog. Headers break up text and inform the reader where to look for the information they need.
Headings are also stellar for SEO, as including your keywords in H2 and H3 headings will alert search engines to what you’re writing about. Readers love ‘em, search engines love ‘em, and headers are a win-win for SEO writing.
Bullets/ Lists
Another helpful formatting tip for SEO blog writing is to leverage bullets and lists. Not everything needs a block of text. Numbered lists and bulleted sections are visually appealing and help you concisely share information.
Bolding/ Italics
Your former English teacher may not love this advice, but use bolding and italicizing to help certain points stand out. There are a few examples of how to do this nestled right in this blog here! Like, literally, in the sentences above as well as some of the bulleted sections.
Structuring a Blog
Structure your blog post in a way that’s most helpful for the reader. Think about how your elementary-school teachers taught you how to structure a research paper. Introduction, main point 1, main point 2, main point 3, conclusion.
Now, blogs won’t all work this way, but this basic idea is still helpful. The introduction should provide a clear overview of why someone should read the blog. Then you want to share your most important point first with an explanation, and so on. The conclusion should wrap up the key points and typically end with a relevant call to action.
Other helpful tips for structuring your blogs include:
- Choose an appropriate length for the subject matter. This chunky guide we’re writing here is on a very expansive topic. It would not make sense to tackle SEO blog writing in 400 words.
- Add elements that make the content easy to navigate. Include break-out summaries, pull-out quotes, numbered lists, etc.
- Each main point should have its own header. Separate your main ideas from the content formatting ideas above.
SEO Blog Links
SEO blog posts also need links. Include both external links (links to outside sources) and internal links to increase the value and relevance of your content.
External Links
Why include links to other websites? While you obviously don’t want to link to direct competitors, external links help your content. Linking to authoritative websites increases the credibility of your content. It helps it appear more authoritative to people and search engines.
A few best practices to keep in mind for external links:
- Do not link to competitors.
- Do not link to someone else’s blog on the same topic.
- Include 2-5 external links at most.
- Link to any studies you reference.
- Link to industry thought leaders.
- Include external links to more of your content (LinkedIn posts, social media content, books you wrote, etc).
Internal Links
Internal links lead to any other content on your website. Again, they help your reader get the information they need. Including them correctly also helps make your entire website more valuable.
Internal linking best practices to note include:
- Spread them out evenly throughout your content.
- Use keywords for anchor text (the text you highlight and add the link to).
- Only link relevant content- don’t add links just for the sake of it!
- Prioritize linking your most important pages (like service pages).
- Audit your crawl profile and ensure all links work.
- Place links in the page content (body of the article).
Backlinks
Including links in your content is important, but getting other people to link back to it is another critical linking strategy. Backlinks are when another site includes a link to back to your content. These are incredibly important for SEO because they tell search engines that your content is an authority on the topic. Generating high-quality backlinks helps you rank higher, especially for competitive keywords.
But it’s not as easy to control when someone links to you. Even so, there are some helpful backlink strategies to consider:
- Guest blog on other sites and include links back to your content as the guidelines permit.
- Focus on creating shareable content.
- Build a strong network online with thought leaders.
- Send personalized messages to others that you backlink to.
- Collaborate on a blog series or other creative projects.
- Reach out to “top X” list makers to feature your content, services, or products.
Readability of SEO Writing
Readability describes how easy to read your text is. While that might be a given for some, mastering this isn’t always. Still, readability is extremely important for your overall SEO. Content with a high readability score can keep viewers on it longer, which signals to Google that it’s relevant.
Elements of readability include:
- Active voice – Making active statements rather than passive ones. “SEO writing includes readability” rather than “readability is an important part of SEO writing,”
- Transitions – Words that tie text together. However, furthermore, therefore, etc.
- Sentence and paragraph length– Too many long sentences bring down your score. Longer sentences tend to include more compounds and complexity. This often makes them more difficult to read. Keep the text short and skimmable.
Fortunately, there are some easy ways to assess and improve the readability of your SEO writing. Websites on WordPress and other common platforms often include plugins, apps, or other tools you can add to your site. Yoast SEO is one of the most common, and best, options for improving readability (and overall SEO).
Install and activate the Yoast SEO plugin. Then, when writing an article, it will show you an SEO score and a readability score. The readability checker identifies the most pressing areas of improvement, which you can highlight for review. Make the recommended adjustments until you have a “green” score to ensure high readability.
Even if you don’t have access to Yoast SEO, Grammarly Premium or other tools can help you improve clarity and readability. Keep the aspects of the readability rubric in mind when writing and editing your blog content.
Writing Clarity
Clarity is connected to readability, but it deserves a dedicated section. Why? Because clarity is CRITICAL for SEO blog writing. If your writing is overly complex, it provides as much value, and therefore it won’t rank as high.
Clarity is about how concisely you present your ideas. Think about it this way: the goal is to present your ideas in as few words as possible. Write directly, not in a roundabout way.
Here are a few common examples to improve clarity:
- Used to be = was
- Might be able to = can
- Drank really fast= gulped
Note that passive voice tends to reduce clarity. Stick with the active voice whenever possible.
Organizing a Website Blog
- Ideal Posting Frequency for a Website Blog
- Optimal SEO Blog Article Lengths
Ideal Posting Frequency for a Website Blog
Fresh content is key for your ongoing SEO writing. Based on the many refrigerators I’ve seen, I already know everyone has a different definition of “fresh.”
If you had all of the resources in the world, it could be great to post once a day. In reality, this is not a sustainable goal for most businesses and not even a necessary frequency for seeing good results from SEO writing.
The general consensus is that two to four blogs per week are a strong range for SEO content. That pans out to about eight to 16 blogs per month.
Depending on your resources, that could still be a pretty tough mark to hit. The minimum SEO blogging frequency to hit is about one post per week or four per month.
Ultimately, the ideal frequency of blogging depends on the details of your company, industry, website, and more. Don’t put out low-quality content just to post. Instead, stick to a schedule that you can feasibly handle. The goal is always to put out well-written, high-value content for your target audience.
Optimal SEO Blog Article Lengths
The truth? There’s no golden ticket length for SEO writing. The ideal length of your blog posts depends on numerous factors.
The “how long should an article be” debate is a lot like the chicken vs egg debate. You’ll constantly hear different opinions from various “experts” and the answer seems to change. Remember, SEO writing is a dynamic process, so the best practices can change over time!
Let’s break it down:
- Ranking for more competitive keywords typically requires longer, more in-depth content. Don’t count on a 400-word blog ranking you for “dog food.”
- Quality is always more important than quantity. Focus on being concise and packing the article with value for the reader.
- Pillar content strategy:
- Pillar piece: 2,000-6,000 words
- Supporting blogs: 1,200-2,500 words
- One-off content (seasonal content, news, updates, etc.): 400-1200 words
Frequently Asked Questions About SEO Writing
There’s clearly a LOT that goes into SEO blog writing. If you still have questions, I’m sure you aren’t alone! Before you start feeling overwhelmed, take a look at the commonly-asked questions below.
Why does my website blog matter?
Filling your service/product pages with valuable information is important, but there’s only so much you can say there. Furthermore, search engines prioritize updated information.
A website blog can help you boost your site authority AND target additional keywords without constantly updating your website’s main pages. SEO writing is an excellent way to help your website rank better and attract more visitors.
What should I focus on most with SEO writing?
With so many different SEO considerations to keep in mind, SEO writing can feel overwhelming. Ultimately, one of the most important aspects is keyword optimization. You must use the right keywords and naturally integrate them enough times. Avoid keyword stuffing, and focus heavily on keyword and topic planning.
How can I improve my SEO writing?
Effective SEO writing takes time and practice to master. If you’re not seeing the results you’re looking for, you may need to improve the content. Some quick tips for doing so are:
- Write for the reader- focus on value
- Improve the readability of the content
- Add subheadings with keywords
- Write keyword-infused meta descriptions
- Add alt text to all images
How long does it take to write a 1000 word blog?
The time it takes to effectively write SEO content varies drastically depending on several factors. The amount of research you must do, subject difficulty, keywords, writing experience, and more will all affect the time. You also have to consider the initial keyword planning and the optimization after writing. It takes about 4 hours to research, write, and optimize a 1000 to 1500-word blog.
Is SEO blog writing difficult?
At first, SEO content writing can feel impossible to master. But other people claim it’s super easy. The truth lies in the middle. With diligent learning and commitment, you can improve your writing quality. It’s a manageable skill for many people, but it does take time and effort.
Fortunately, you don’t have to do it alone! *enter the shameless plug* Content Cucumber is here to handle all of your SEO writing for you (we can even plan your keywords and topics too)! Let our experienced writing team take the burden of blogging off your shoulders so you can focus on your core business tasks.
We’ll show you exactly how it works during your free demo! Learn more about our SEO writing services by scheduling your demo call today.