One surefire way to boost your online presence is to consistently produce quality content. Doing so creates a positive feedback loop, wherein visitors enjoy the site and share it with others. This prompts search engines to rank the site’s pages higher in relevant search results, bringing in more visitors. This starts the cycle over again. It’s a simple concept that requires a continuous flow of new ideas. Here are some suggestions to prevent your content from becoming stale:
Enlist Freelancers and Guest Bloggers
Diversify your site’s content by enlisting freelancers and guest bloggers. Not only do they have their own style of writing, but they also possess a unique perspective and expertise. As a result, your company can cover material beyond the in-house team’s experience and knowledge base, in turn providing more variety, and value, to visitors.
Attend Conferences
Conferences are where experts in your field share wisdom and information, and your peers gather to talk shop. Attending conferences is an opportunity to hear ideas, learn about breakthroughs in your field, and talk with other people about where your industry is headed. While you will assuredly leave a conference with plenty of thoughts and information to share with your site’s community, the conference itself can serve as a topic. Share content in the form of a written article, a video diary, photo album, or podcast.
Keep it Current
Staying abreast of the latest industry news is important to remain relevant. If your content is far behind, people go elsewhere. Stay informed and try to have something to say about important events when they happen.
Mix Up Content Format
Incorporating audio, video, and graphics into your content mix stimulates your visitors by engaging their other senses. This allows them to enjoy your content in different ways. It also encourages your team to think about new angles that play to a format’s particular strengths.
Write a Case Study
Case studies are a great way of providing an insider’s look into how things work. If your business has recently accomplished something of note or dealt with an interesting problem, producing a play-by-play of what occurred gives site visitors the chance to picture themselves in the same situation, and to benefit from what you learned during the experience.
Bonus Points for the Brave
Another approach is to actually chronicle a process as you work through it. This type of content can take a little more courage. If you do it the right way, with honesty and candor, you are exposing your successes and mistakes in real-time. You may not have the benefit of sugar-coating any missteps, but you will be providing an authenticity that can work wonders for building trust and loyalty.
The common thread through all of these tips is the reminder that people want to gain something valuable from having visited your website. The “freshness” of your content should be a by-product of the consistent intent to deliver value to visitors in an enjoyable way.