Looking to create awesome social media content to boost engagement?

It’s a given that creating engaging social media content is crucial for building a strong online presence, engaging your audience, and growing leads and sales. 

But how do you get it right?

Here are some tips and examples.

9 Tips To Create Social Media Content That Boosts Engagement

Start by creating professional and compelling social media profiles. Then use these tips when creating content. 

1. Know Your Audience

Knowing your audience is the key to marketing success, whether it’s in email personalization or creating tailored social media content. 

For instance, Canva creates tailored messages for each of its target groups. This is a post for nonprofits.

And here is content created for teachers.

How do you identify your social media target audience?

You can use market research, email survey campaigns, or website forms to find out your customers’ social media preferences.

Here are other ways to gain audience insights:

• Facebook: Facebook Audience Insights gives data about your audience like this.

• Instagram: Click the Insights action button to get details of your existing audience and their engagement with specific content.
• Twitter: Twitter analytics and Tweet activity page give you stats such as key demographics, languages, and interests of your audience.
• LinkedIn: Access the “Analytics” tab where you can see audience insights.

Tools such as Copper CRM also let you sync your contacts with social media accounts to build lookalike audiences and target specific groups.

This Copper CRM review gives you more details on how to use this tool to sync contacts.

2. Define Your Goals and Metrics

While boosting engagement may be the primary goal for creating social media content, you’ll need to go granular when defining your goals. And tie each goal to a specific social media metric that you can track.

Here’s a framework to help you get started:

3. Choose The Right Content Type 

The types of social media content you can experiment with include:

• Blog posts
• User-generated content 
• Live streams/webinars 
• Ebooks and whitepapers  
• Stories and reels
• Contests/giveaways
• Videos
• Infographics
• Polls and surveys

Be sure to link the type of social media content you want to write with:

Your Target Audience’s Interests

As you can see from this image, short-form videos, images, and live videos are the most engaging social media content, as per a 2022 survey.

The Type Of Content Suitable For Each Social Media Platform And Demographic

Here’s a quick summary of the type of social media content to write for each platform/demographic.

Your Niche

The type of social media content you’ll create will also depend on your industry.

For instance, a Gartner study found that educational and user-generated content works best for software marketers. 

4. Create A Mix of Social Media Content

Experiment with different types of content, such as text, images, videos, and live streams. 

Simplilearn uses different types of social media content to boost engagement. This is a post on LinkedIn that promotes its professional certificate program.

And, on YouTube, the brand has multiple informative videos.

Make sure that your content is offering something of value to your audience.

Whether it’s helpful tips, informative articles, or just entertaining videos, give people a reason to stick around and keep coming back for more.

5. Write Compelling Social Media Copy 

Write social media copy that is catchy and easy to understand. And always include a call to action that encourages people to share your post with their followers.

The more shares you get, the wider your reach. 

Are there any formulas for writing catchy copy?

I have these tips for you:

Keep it short: Here are the ideal lengths for each platform:

• Instagram: 138 to 150 characters
• Facebook: 40 characters
• LinkedIn: 220 characters
• TikTok: 300 characters

This is an example of a short and catchy caption on Instagram:

Include action words and adjectives: Experiment with action words such as earn, save, act now, and adjectives such as powerful, awe-Inspiring, brilliant, etc. See this example from TED Talks.

Use numbers: Numbered lists and guides with easy steps can help increase engagement. See how Semrush does it.

Ask questions: Humans are always drawn to questions that spark curiosity like this post.

Write the social media copy by following the Google EAT guidelines so that your social media campaign can also help in getting good results from the search results. Your social media copy should include trustworthy, authentic, and expert facts and information.

6. Use Trending Hashtags

Utilize relevant hashtags and keywords to increase the visibility of your social media content. 

For example, if you are a food blogger, you may want to use hashtags such as #foodie, #yum, and #foodporn.

You can search for trending hashtags by typing your keyword on social media platforms’ search bars. 

Platforms like Twitter also have an Advanced Search feature where you can search for specific tweets and hashtags.

You can also use the right software to generate hashtags in your industry. These software can help you to create and how to use hashtags for your social media campaigns.

7. Post At The Right Time

Timing is crucial when it comes to social media. Post your content when your audience is most active to increase your reach and engagement.

According to a recent study:

• The best days to post social media content are Tuesdays to Thursdays
• The best time to post social media content is 9 AM and 10 AM.

But, there’re individual variations between each social platform when it comes to the peak engagement time or days. 

For example, posting on Instagram between 10 AM and 1 PM on most weekdays can help you maximize your reach.

8. Use Visual Elements

High-quality visual elements, such as images and videos, can make your content more engaging.

Be creative with how you present them. 

One way to stylize your photos and images is to use photo filters. You’ll create stunning visuals in minutes.

See this eye-catching visual from Velvet Spectrum.

9. Encourage Engagement

Encourage your audience to engage with your content by asking questions, starting a conversation, or running a contest. You can also host a giveaway as Fraser Hill Farm has done.

Be sure to show your audience that you value their opinion by responding to their comments.

You can also use lead generation software that allows you to integrate your social media platforms to manage and monitor interactions.

10. Analyze and Improve

Creating powerful social media content isn’t all about just content creation. Studying the content’s effectiveness is equally important. You need to use social media analytics tools to figure out if your social media posts are performing as expected. 

Check whether they’re generating significant engagement, driving sales, and bringing you new followers. 

In the case of blog posts, you can leverage a Google index checker and Google Analytics to check if your social media post helped speed up indexing or improved its rankings on Google.

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Wrapping Up

Remember that social media content doesn’t just have to be about your brand. In fact, some of the most successful social media campaigns focus on providing valuable information or entertainment to users. 

The goal is to get people talking about your business in a positive way!

Use analytics tools to track the performance of your content on each platform and adjust your strategy accordingly.An easy way to master your social media content strategy is by becoming a Certified Social Media expert. Learn how to apply proven strategies and boost social media engagement.

The post From Clicks to Conversions: Create Content that Boosts Engagement appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

As advertisers, we focus a lot of our energy on ensuring our ad campaigns are performing and converting as best as they possibly can.

But that’s only one part of the equation. 

What happens after the click is just as important (if not more important!)

You can have the most incredible ad campaign set-up, but if the funnel you’re sending traffic to doesn’t convert, it doesn’t matter how great your campaign is – you simply won’t see the results you desire.

And so, in this article, I’m going to share 7 ways you can improve the conversion rate of your funnel, leading to better overall performance and results. 

Related Articles

• 2 Ways to Take Back the Power in Your Business: Part 2

• 2 Ways to Take Back the Power in Your Business: Part 1

• Unlocking the Secrets to Recruiting and Retaining Top Talent in Your Agency

1. Include the 3 Argument Types on Each Page

Whenever someone makes a buying decision, they use two different parts of their brain. 

There’s the emotional part (the limbic brain) and the logical part (the frontal lobe). It’s important to understand this because it plays a big role in how we structure the pages in our funnel.

When humans make a purchasing decision, it’s mainly an emotional reaction. A study by a Harvard School of Business Professor, Gerald Zaltman, concluded that 95% of purchase decisions are made by the limbic system (the emotional part).

We see something, like it and decide we want it. Once we’ve decided we want something, the frontal lobe then helps sway us on whether we actually buy the thing by processing it logically. 

Think about someone buying their dream house. 

They go to view the house and fall in love with it instantly and decide they want to buy it – that’s the limbic brain. It’s only when they get home and start looking at things like the area, electricity bills, neighbourhood and all the other bits that they start thinking about the purchase logically. 

And so, when it comes to our marketing (and our funnel specifically), we need to understand this as it impacts how we should structure the pages.

Regardless of the type of page you’re sending people to (whether it’s a lead gen funnel or e-commerce) you need to be making three types of arguments:

Emotional arguments

Logical arguments

Urgency

And we want to make them in this order too – since that’s the order in which someone makes a purchasing decision. 

Have your emotional arguments at the top of the page, above the fold. What are the emotional reasons someone would purchase your product? It can often be as simple as saving time, stress or money. 

As you move down the page, you can start talking about the logical arguments. These are often features and benefits. What would someone need to know/understand in order to purchase the product or service?

And lastly, for good measure – always include urgency in your messaging to further push those people to take action. There are people out there that simply won’t take action unless you give them a reason to take it now. Some good ways to do this are: Give them a certain timeframe, warn them about limited stock or simply talk about why it’s so important they take action now.

By doing this you’re structuring the pages in a way that flows with how we make purchasing decisions as human beings – setting you up for the best chance of success. 

2. Benefits > Features

There’s a common saying in the copywriting world: “features tell, benefits sell.”

However, when most come to write copy for their product/service, they write about all the features without explaining the benefits. 

Features focus on the product/service itself. Such as what you receive, what it does or how it works. 

Some examples of features are:

• Storage up to 1TB
• Access to a free Facebook group
• Latest waterproof technology

Those things are great, but they don’t tell the end consumer the benefit to them, which makes it less compelling. 

Benefits focus on the outcome of the product/service, telling the customer exactly what the feature will mean for them. Bringing it back to the first point – this is how we start to build emotion into our copy.

By telling people what a feature means to them, they start to visualise themselves using it – which creates the emotional reaction we need.

Luckily for you, I’ve got a super simple way to turn your features into benefits.

The “So That” Statement

This is a tactic I use every single time I write copy. 

If you’re like most people and tend to write about the features, simply add the words “so that” to the end of your sentence. This forces you to explain the benefit that’s tied to the feature, making your copy much more hard-hitting.

The formula you can use is: 

If ___ so that you can ___.

Let’s take our examples from above.

• Storage up to 1TB so that you can save all your files without ever worrying about running out of space.
• Get access to our free Facebook group so that you can network with like-minded individuals. 
• The latest waterproof technology so that you can hike out in the rain for longer without getting wet feet.

Review all your copy and ensure every feature is combined with the real benefit. This will make your copy much more emotionally driven and compelling to anyone that’s reading it.

3. Split Test All Pages

The key to success in any advertising campaign is comprehensive testing. Testing images, copy, creative types and audiences. But the importance of testing doesn’t stop at the advertising campaign – it’s just as important to continuously test the pages in your sales funnel. 

You should test at least 2 variants of every page in your sales funnel. Tests can be big or small, from having completely different designs to changing the colours of a button. It doesn’t matter what you test so much. The most important thing is just that you are testing… because that allows you to learn what works and what doesn’t. 

And like all great marketers do: do more of what works and do less of what doesn’t. 

Things You Can Test at Each Stage of the Sales Funnel

• Headline/Subtitle – this is arguably the most important thing to test because it’s the first thing people see and read when they land on a page. Little changes in a headline can have a huge impact on conversion rates. The headline is where you want your biggest emotional argument on the page.
• Main Image/Video – most funnel pages will have imagery or videos on them. This is another key thing to test out. Try different styles of images and videos to see which ones perform better, such as professionally designed images vs iPhone shot photos.
• Sales Copy – try testing different features and benefits. Even testing the order in which you share the features can make a difference. If you’re listing benefits in bullet point format, the first and last bullets are the most important.
• Call to Action – the copy you use on the button can make a huge impact on performance. Try ditching the boring “Learn more” and try something more unique such as “Get Started – See How 97% Lose Weight In Just 30 Days”

Upsells/Cross-sells – test different offers throughout your funnel to see which products/offerings people find more compelling.

Get the Digital Marketing Blueprint…

With a Customer Value Journey that strategically builds a relationship with new prospects and converts them into loyal, repeat customers. Click here

4. Improve Average Order Value with Offers

The success of a campaign isn’t always just based on the conversion rate of the campaigns and funnels. Sometimes it can come down to how much money people are spending on your funnel.

You can have a funnel that converts, but if the money being made isn’t providing good levels of profit on top of ad spend, you have a problem. 

We recently worked with an e-commerce store that sold home gifts. We managed to optimise the campaigns so successfully that we were able to get our cost per sale down to less than £5. However, because the average order value of the site was only £15, the ROAS wasn’t sustainable. 

In order for us to make the campaigns successful overall, we had to improve the conversion rate of the site – specifically focussing on increasing the Average Order Value (how much someone spends per transaction, on averageGavin Bel). 

To do this, we added in what is called order bumps and one-time offers.

An order bump is an offer made at the checkout, right before someone hits the pay button. A common order bump might be to “supersize” the order for a reduced rate or to get another product at a low price. These convert extremely well.

A one-time offer is what it says on the tin.

Once someone has made a purchase, another offer appears on the screen inviting them to purchase a related product at a discounted price.

Adding both of these increased the AOV of our client’s site by 20%, vastly improving the campaign’s overall effectiveness. Even if AOV isn’t a problem for you, look at adding these two tactics to improve it.

By not doing it, you’re essentially leaving money on the table!

5. Improve the Quality of Traffic on the Page

If your funnel isn’t converting, it might simply be because you’re attracting the wrong people in the first place.

You can have the best funnel and offer in the world, but if the people visiting it aren’t relevant, it’ll never convert. This is why it’s so important to ensure you’re performing lots of campaign tests – testing which audiences work and which ones don’t. 

With all of the advertising platforms, it’s very easy to see which audiences are bringing in the best returns. And like I mentioned earlier, simply do more of what’s working and turn off what’s not.

There is one fool-proof way of ensuring you’re only getting the highest quality people to your sales funnel: content creation.

Creating content is one of the most effective ways to attract an audience of people who definitely have an interest in what you offer and it’s something we advise every single client to do – either in written or video format. 

The biggest objection we face is “but I don’t know what to write about?!”

And so if that’s you, I’ve got you covered. 

The simplest way to start creating effective content is to simply answer the questions, objections and queries your customers have. 

Here’s how to approach it:

1. Create a list of all the questions you’re asked as a business (get your team involved in this)
2. Turn those questions into eye-catching headlines
3. Sit down in front of a camera and record the answers (or write them up)

This is so effective for two reasons:

1. Only people who are genuinely interested in what you do will consume the content
2. When you promote the content through advertising, it’s super cheap because you’re not selling anything, you’re providing value. 

Pretty quickly,  you start to build a large audience of people who have an interest in your offering.

Let’s say you’re a physiotherapist. You could film a 60s video titled “5 reasons you have back pain”. You could then set up a basic ad campaign targeting people in your local area (that fit your basic customer avatar).

Who’s going to watch that video? 

People in the local area who have back pain!

Which, for a physiotherapist, is the perfect audience. What’s better is, these people are qualified AND educated. They know who the physiotherapist is already (building trust) and making them much more likely to take action and convert.

And to supercharge this strategy, you could run retargeting ads to the people who watched the video, pushing them to your sales funnel.

6. Increase or Decrease form Friction

When it comes to lead generation funnels, there’s a fine line between lead quantity and lead quality.

It’s not hard to generate lots of leads at a low cost, but it is difficult to generate lots of QUALIFIED leads at a low cost. 

It’s a constant balancing act, ensuring that you have both quality and quantity. 

The best way to strike the balance is to simply increase or decrease the fields you have in the form. 

This increases or decreases the friction that someone has to go through in order to convert. The more questions/fields, the higher the friction. The fewer fields, the lower the friction. 

If you’re struggling with lead quality, try and add some more fields to the form, specifically around the main reason your quality is low. For example, if you find the people you speak to aren’t motivated, add a “how motivated are you?” question. 

If you’re not getting enough leads, try reducing the number of questions in the form and monitor what impact that has. 

Whenever we’re starting a new campaign, we will always start with fewer fields to make sure we generate as many leads as possible. And then if we feel like we need to improve the quality of the leads, we’ll start slowly adding more fields to the form.

7. Include Social Proof Throughout

If there’s one thing that stops people from converting in a funnel, it’s a lack of trust. 

A lack of trust in the people behind the funnel, the offer itself or the promise the funnel is making. 

So, how do you build trust with people? How do you show them that your offer is legitimate and will have an impact on their lives?

Show the results that other people have achieved. 

Everyone in the world has problems. And they have desired results. 

Your job as a marketer is to show people how your product/service is a bridge from their problems to their desired results.

And the most effective way to do that is by showing the stories of others who have successfully achieved that with your product/service.

Social proof can take the form of: case studies, testimonials and even quotes from previous customers and people who have already converted through the funnel. The more you can share, the better. 

Even better – if you can have your social proof cover the main objections you know people have when converting, your social proof will do some of the selling for you!

Wrapping Up…

Improving the funnel conversion rate can have a drastic effect on the performance of your overall campaigns and business. If you’re able to get your funnel and ad campaigns to a point where they are profitable, you can scale your spend quickly. 

Start implementing some of these strategies and I guarantee that you’ll see improvements in your overall results.

Let me know – have you tried any of these? Which was the most effective for you?

The post 7 Ways To Improve The Conversion Rate Of Your Funnel appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

Doubting if your business needs a paid traffic campaign is something most entrepreneurs, freelancers, employees, or marketers go through.

We like to call this, a case of the “comfort zone.”

Not running paid traffic ads is the safe bet. It frees you from failing to get the conversions you wanted from your first campaign and from losing valuable money that could be allocated elsewhere.

It’s safe to keep running the marketing strategies you know work. It’s safe to save your money. It’s safe to keep your profits or income predictable.

But, you know as well as we do, there is no growth in your comfort zone.

The time to start running your paid traffic campaign is NOW…

By not running a paid traffic campaign, you’re missing out on a plethora of new customers that want your product/service, but don’t know it exists.

For example, Molly Pittman, host of DigitalMarketer’s Perpetual Traffic Podcast, talked about how she generated 50,000 leads in 12 days using Facebook advertising (listen to Episode 186 here).

Cory Philip, co-founder of Gulf Coast Aluminum also taps into the power of paid advertising. In 12 months, his advertisements brought him $1.9 million in new business. Fused Hawaii, swimwear brand, generated nearly $2 million in sales by advertising on Facebook.

The time to start running your paid traffic campaign is NOW, as the advertising landscape continues to boom with opportunity. Right now, you can advertise using Google, Facebook, Instagram (posts AND stories), YouTube, Snapchat, and Twitter—and reach millions of people.

Think your demographic isn’t online?

Ezra Firestone, marketing genius behind BOOM!, a cosmetic brand for older women, has been using Facebook ads to drive massive sales for his client.

Ryan’s ToysReview, a YouTube channel dedicated to Ryan playing and reviewing new toys, reportedly brought in $22 million in 2018.

Your demographic is online and they’re ready to be shown your product/service.

Where Do You Start with Paid Traffic?

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by paid traffic, trust us when we say, you’re not alone. There’s a reason DigitalMarketer exists. Because marketing is confusing. We talk to people every single day who don’t know where to start when it comes to their digital marketing strategy.

In fact, we’ve built our entire blog around answering them.

If we look at paid traffic, we can break it up into 2 pieces:

1. The ad
2. The marketing

The ad itself requires knowledge like copywriting and best practices (like having captions on videos). This is the first step in creating ads because no matter how well you position your ad to be seen by the perfect audience, if it doesn’t get their attention, it won’t perform well.

Making a great ad requires knowing your audience, copywriting, the right ad formula, and understanding how to use the audience that you already have.

Here are a few articles to help you get familiar with creating ads:

• How to Create Audience-Engaging Content That Drives Results
• What is Copywriting?
• Billy Gene Shaw’s Million-Dollar Video Ad Formula That Works Again and Again and Again
• 4 Reasons Why You Should Be Retargeting Your Email Subscribers on Facebook
• How to Design Facebook Ad Images Like a Pro (…When You’re Really an Amateur)

The marketing aspect of the ad is how you set up your campaigns on Facebook, Google, Twitter, etc. This is when you choose how much money you’re going to spend per day, how many ads you’ll have per ad set, and how long your ad will run. This is the second step of creating ads because this is when you take your curated ad to the masses.

We have an entire podcast dedicated to Facebook advertising. If you want to dive deep into Facebook paid traffic, here are a few good starting episodes to listen to:

• Episode 190: How Facebook’s Ad Delivery System Works: Part 1
• Episode 191: How Facebook’s Ad Delivery System Works: Part 2
• Episode 218: 5 Facebook Plays Working Best Right Now
• Episode 219: Breaking Down Campaign Budget Optimization with Nehal Kazim

And, here are a few articles about how to set up your profiles and the back end of your advertisements:

• 4 Steps to Grow a Profitable Facebook Page
• Facebook Ad Lessons I Learned That Will Help You Run Better Ad Campaigns in 2019
• 6 Steps to Launch Your First LinkedIn Ads Campaign
• The 7-Step Facebook Ad Plan… Lessons Pulled from the DigitalMarketer Vault
• Unicorn Marketers are Getting Insane Results by Using These 6 Facebook Messenger Bot Tactics

Here’s the thing—when you know what’s on the other side of your comfort zone, it’s so much easier to take the first step out of it. If you’re feeling intimidated by running ads, it’s time to get your learn on.

1. Learn how to create ads.
2. Learn how to put them on platforms like Google, Facebook, Snapchat, etc.

Voila! You’ll realize that running a paid traffic campaign isn’t as scary as it initially seemed. And using these resources, you just might be the agency owner, entrepreneur, or marketer that we highlight in an article showcasing the huge wins marketers are making by running paid traffic campaigns.

The post When Should You Start Your Paid Traffic Campaign? appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

• With organic search, you can get the most targeted traffic
• It’s more affordable than paid advertising (I don’t say it’s free, because SEO may also require some costs)
• Unlike traffic from paid advertising, the organic search usually results in long-term traffic

But even without knowing that stat, it’s likely that you’ve taken efforts to make organic search work for you, and maybe the results have appeared to be impressive: now your page is ranking on the first page of Google search results.

But your ranking is not the final goal. Often, when you are tracking your traffic, you’ll notice it doesn’t always improve with higher search rankings. How’s that possible?

In this post, I’ll tell you 3 possible reasons why your high rankings didn’t result in high traffic and help you fix the issues.

1. Your Content is Ranking for the Wrong Keywords

This is the most common reason. But what does the concept of “wrong keywords” mean? It means that in the process of keyword research, you collected the terms that wouldn’t bring you any profit.

There are 2 ways this could have happened.

1. You selected too specific keywords

Long-tail keywords are trending these days. These phrases are longer and more specific than 1 and 2 keyword phrases. Because they are less generic, long-tail keywords also have lower search volume than “head” terms. However, this is their main advantage. Using these keywords, you avoid competing with niche giants that are unlikely to lose their positions.

That’s why you are focusing on long-tail keywords. But there’s always the flip side of the coin. You might have selected very specific keywords.

Ranking high for keywords almost nobody is searching for is the same as not ranking at all. For instance, showing up on the first page of Google for “black superman t shirt with red logo” is pretty useless.

Solution: Check search volume

When selecting the right keywords, always consider their search volume–a number of searches for a particular keyword in a given period. Most keyword research tools provide this score for every queried keyword.

In case you don’t use any, you can go with Google Trends. This website analyzes the popularity of search queries in Google Search across various regions and languages. Moreover, with this tool, you can compare several terms. If you aren’t sure which topic or keyword is more popular, you can check it with Google Trends:

2. You didn’t consider search intent

Is your page ranking for keywords that don’t match searchers’ intent? To answer this question, let’s look into the concept of search intent.

People conduct searches for different reasons. The ultimate goal of a person searching for a specific keyword is called search intent.

Google has learned to determine the search intent of a queried phrase and show results that meet this search intent. That’s why if you search for “how to shoelace shoes,” you don’t necessarily see the exact keyword match in the results. The search engine understands what kind of information you need and provides you with relevant content:

There are 4 types of search intent:

• Informational: to learn something new. The following modifiers are specific to this type of search intent: how to, what, why, guide, tips, learn, etc.
• Navigational: to find particular information on a specific website. These queries usually contain branded keywords.
• Commercial: to find the best solution. The searcher is going to take action, but he or she is still trying to make a final decision. Commercial queries are followed by such words as best, review, top, vs., etc.
• Transactional: to take action. Transactional intent is the intent of making a purchase. The modifiers are: buy, order, price, purchase, etc.

So if you didn’t denote your page’s intent with keywords, Google could have started to rank your e-commerce website for informational queries (and vice versa). In the result, people seeing your snippet won’t click and your target audience won’t see it in the search results.

Solution: Denote search intent

To make your content rank for the relevant queries, denote the specific intent with your keywords. For instance, if your product page contains a long description, add the modifiers specific to transactional search intent.

To avoid this problem in the future, Google your selected keywords before implementing them. Check every top snippet to understand the majority intent.

2. There are Too Many Special Elements in the Search Results

According to Andy Crestodina, the more features there are on search results pages, the lower the click-through rate is.

If there are too many special elements (featured snippets, ads, “people also ask” box, etc.) in the search results, there’s a chance that users simply don’t scroll down to your number 3 post.

Solution: Adapt to the changes

You shouldn’t despair. Trends are changing, and so should we. There are various techniques to increase your search traffic, and I’ll highlight 2 that work the best:

1. Target keywords with fewer SERP features

You can optimize your content for keywords that result in fewer special elements. Your SEO tool of choice will help you cope with this task. To illustrate the process, I’ll go with Serpstat.

First of all, enter your target keyword into the tool’s search bar and select your country. In the Keyword Selection section, apply filter Special elements in SERP > Does not include > *here you should select any feature you don’t want to appear in search results for your query*. I selected 3 of the most popular (and massive) elements: featured snippets, related questions, and top PPC block.

When you see the list of keywords filtered by the specific criteria, you can either export it or select only the most suitable for your goals.

2. Try to win featured snippets

Featured snippets usually take up a bunch of space in the search results. By winning these snippets, you will increase the visibility of your page significantly (and steal some traffic from #1 ranking page). But how to win them? Although nobody can guarantee winning Google’s featured snippets, you can increase your chances significantly with these simple steps:

• Among all the keywords your page is ranking for, identify those with featured snippets in the search results. If you use Serpstat, the algorithm is pretty much the same as when we were filtering out specific SERP elements. But this time, the condition is just the opposite, and the filter should be: Special elements in SERP > Includes > Featured snippet.
• Analyze your competitors’ featured snippets to have an idea on the most efficient content structure.
• Provide clear content structure with H1–H3 subheads, lists, and bullet points.
• Implement the keywords you selected into your subheads.

Check my recent post to find a detailed guide on optimizing for featured snippets.

3. Your Meta Data Doesn’t Make People Click

Last but not least. What if your meta descriptions simply don’t look appealing enough?

Your meta data is the first thing users judge your page content by. If your headline and meta description don’t provide a clear description of your page content, people don’t see what they should expect. In the result, they give their clicks to your more compelling competitors.

Solution: Improve your meta data

Here are the simple rules for creating efficient meta data:

• Don’t ignore meta tags. Google will build a description for you using some random text abstracts
• Titles should contain no more than 65 characters. Search engines cut long lines. For your potential visitors to see the full title of your page, make sure its length lets them do it
• Place the keywords at the beginning—this will help you attract people’s attention right from the start
• Denote competitive advantage
• Add call to action (CTA). Such invitations as “Learn more,” “Order now,” “Read here,” etc. will help people better understand what your page offers them

Organic search isn’t the only traffic source

Search is a great source of long-term traffic, but it’s not a panacea. Experiment with new potential traffic sources, and you can find channels that also drive a significant number of visits and links to your website. Moreover, diversify your traffic channels to reduce your risks of losing all your traffic when your site is affected by some new Google update.

The post High Rankings & Low Traffic: How to Fix It appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

In this post, we’ve pulled together the 21 articles on the DigitalMarketer blog that got the most organic traffic in 2018 and ranked them based on the number of pageviews, so you can see how they compare.

Yep… this is the stuff you can’t miss out on.

Coming in #1 (by more than twice the amount of traffic) is…

1. DigitalMarketer’s 101 Best Email Subject Lines of 2018 (…And 7 Top-Notch Subject Lines Pulled from the Vault) – 35,547 Pageviews

Every year, we send millions of emails out to our subscribers. In fact, in 2018, we sent 169,434,375 emails! 

And at the end of every year, we like to collect together all our best-performing subject lines from those 169,434,375 emails to give you a swipe file.

This top-performing blog post is at the top for a reason, since it contains now over 600 proven, swipeable email subject lines that are yours for the taking!

It also has a list of 8 winning characteristics that every high-performing subject line has at least 1 of and 7 top-notch subject lines pulled from the author’s own swipe file.

Make sure you check it out before you send your next email!

2. Customer Avatar Worksheet: Finally, Get Clear on WHO You Are Selling To! – 14,525 Pageviews

The customer avatar is the Swiss Army Knife of marketing…

… and we’ve got a writeable PDF version of our Customer Avatar Worksheet (no opt-in required) waiting for you in our #2 blog post.

But why is this post so popular with organic audiences? It could be because the customer avatar can help you with any aspect of digital marketing by giving you information like…

• Content Marketing—What blog posts, videos, podcasts, Lead Magnets, etc. should you create to attract and convert your avatar?
• Paid Traffic—Which ad platforms should you buy traffic from and what targeting options should you use?
• Product Creation—What solutions is your avatar searching for?
• Copywriting—How should you describe offers in your email marketing, ads, and sales letters in a way that compels your avatar to buy?
• Email Marketing—Which avatar should receive a specific email marketing campaign?

Everyone who is selling anything should be using this worksheet, because honestly… there is no higher leverage activity than getting clear on WHO you are selling to.

3. 9 Lead Magnet Ideas and Examples (And ONE That Generated 35,859 Subscribers in 60 Days for DigitalMarketer…) – 11,917 Pageviews

We like to think we know a thing or two about generating leads, which is why we were thrilled to roll out the 2nd edition of one of our most popular post!

Plus, you’ll get the 8-Point Lead Magnet Success Checklist to print out and put your Lead Magnet through the paces with before launching to your audience.

We’ll show you what makes a great Lead Magnet, and what so many have done wrong before.

So make sure to check this post out when you want to get started on your lead generation.

4. Customer Value Optimization: How to Build an Unstoppable Business – 9,695 Pageviews

On January 20th, 2014, Ryan Deiss published (in great detail) the system he used to build ALL of his businesses. And when that post exploded in popularity, getting stats like this…

• read by 375,191 people
• shared almost 37,000 times (36,800 to be exact) on various social networks and…
• received 535 comments

…he decided to update it with even more useful stuff!

So, on August 20th, 2015, Ryan released the second edition of this article with expanded information on…

• Product/Market Fit (Understand why people buy… and why they don’t.)
• Acquiring leads and customers with Lead Magnets and Tripwire offers.
• Maximizing immediate profit so you can pay more than your competition to acquire customers, scale your campaigns or just pocket more cash.

And clearly this was the kind of added benefit that lasts, since the post is #4 in organic pageviews. Check it out to learn more about how the CVO system could help grow your business.

5. 6 Trending Digital Marketing Skills to Put on a Resume – 8,039 Pageviews

Coming in at #5 is another popular post, all about what kinds of skills you should have on your resume.

Skills like…

• Content Marketing
• Social Media Marketing
• Media Buying/Traffic Acquisition

…are as in demand—or arguably more in demand—today as when this post was published back in 2017, which is why it still ranks in our top 5.

Employers are always looking for people that get this digital marketing “stuff.”

In this post, we give you

• Job Description
• Potential salary
• Job titles

…and the personality attributes you need to acquire the 6 hottest skills in the industry.

If you want to future-proof your career—you’ll want to read this guide.

(NOTE: Need a helping hand with your digital marketing efforts? Or maybe you just want proven, actionable marketing tools, tactics, and templates to implement in your business? Check out the latest deal from DigitalMarketer, and you will be on your way to helping your business grow.)

6. Facebook Ad Lessons I Learned That Will Help You Run Better Ad Campaigns in 2019 – 7,268 Pageviews

Here at DM, we’ve run thousands of ads to figure out what works, what doesn’t, and what’s worth continuing to test.

And every year, we have our resident Facebook Advertising expert, Molly Pittman, reflect back on the year and come up with a few lessons and pieces of advice.

But even better than getting to see one year’s reflections, this post is coming in at #6 in our list because it contains 5 years of lessons, ad examples, and other priceless takeaways.

So make sure you check it out before you start on your new year’s ad campaign.

7. 100 Books Every Marketer Should Read – 7,257 Pageviews

Most of the time, this list is full of tried-and-true posts that have been around for a while, or that have several years’ worth of information in a single post.

But our #7 post is one of those new articles that immediately showed its value.

And it isn’t hard to see why it rose the ranks so quickly. With 100 different books covering 14 subject matters—that are all within the realm of marketing—there is something for everyone in this post.

Next time you are looking for some new reading material, check out this post, and see what you can learn.

8. How to Create a Podcast Studio on a Shoestring Budget – 6,486 Pageviews

It seems like every business or entrepreneur now has a podcast. It is becoming a popular (and important) part of content marketing.

So it makes sense that people would want to start one up without breaking the bank. Enter post #8.

DigitalMarketer’s own Podcast Producer breaks down how you can start your own podcast studio without making 2 common, but critical mistakes as a beginner:

• Taking waaay too much time deciding what podcast equipment to buy
• Buying your gear on a whim without doing enough research beforehand

Darren helps you find tools that fit your needs and your budget, so you can rest assured you’re using the right equipment for what you’re actually doing.

9. Facebook’s Comment-to-Messenger Feature: Everything You Need to Know – 6,418 Pageviews

Facebook Messenger ads are all the craze right now.

They’re the most PERSONAL ad type on the market.

But there can be a definitive intimidation factor when it comes to starting your own messenger ads for the average marketer (if you want a detailed post about how to use Messenger ads, just scroll down to post #10).

And, if you want to do any of the additional tricks that help make Messenger ads so useful, that intimidation can skyrocket.

Which is why more than 6,000 people all across the web turned to post #9, again authored by Molly Pittman.

It breaks down—in detail—how you can set up and utilize the comment-to-messenger tool to really take advantage of Messenger ads.

10. Facebook Messenger Ads: How to Use Them in Your Business – 5,431 Pageviews

In the year since post #10 was first published, A LOT has changed.

Messenger marketing has come a long way, and today there are more ways than ever to engage your customers using Facebook Messenger ads.

So Molly decided to update the post so you had the most accurate, up–to–date info to bring back to your own campaigns.

She explains the ins and outs of Facebook Messenger ads and how to strategically deploy them in your business.

Once you read this post, you will be able to reap the benefits of having your own Messenger ads running.

11. What Facebook’s New Group Features Means for Community Managers – 4,592 Pageviews

Facebook Groups have been through tons of changes in the past few years. But if you are a community manager, you don’t have to worry.

In this post, Suzi Nelson (one of our past community managers) goes through the changes from the past few years and gives you all the info you need.

Some of these changes include:

• Group Insights
• Member Request Filtering
• Removed Member Clean-Up
• Scheduled Posts
• Group-To-Group Linking (this is the one I am most excited about, and I’ll tell you why in a moment!)

She explains what these changes mean to other community managers and talks about some real-life examples, so you know how you can implement these tools and tactics.

So you will want to read this post if you use Facebook Groups frequently (and if you are still a beginner, you’ll want to check out our guide on how to start your own group—just check out post #17).

12. How to Build a Marketing Dream Team for Your Brand (Even if You Aren’t a Marketer) – 4,524 Pageviews

Every business should be using digital marketing. But what if you know nothing about marketing? How do you know that you are hiring the right team? Well, if you read this handy little guide, you will be able to figure it out!

We’re showing you the 4-step process we use to bring in new marketing talent… (HINT: We aren’t looking for experienced marketers)

…that immediately contribute to the marketing of the business… (You’ll see our onboarding process)

…at a reasonable salary.

Whether you’re thinking of hiring your 1st marketing team member or your 101st, you need to read this guide.

13. The Most Persuasive Word in the English Language (Plus 3 Sales Letter Formulas That Put It to Work) – 4,003 Pageviews

Imagine making 1 small change to your sales pages to get more people scrolling down the page and reading?

But not just reading.

Rushing to the buy button and purchasing your product or service.

This change hooks your ideal prospects and turns them into customers with less work. You could save time and energy, sell more than you ever imagined, and impress the socks off your family and friends.

This blog post is going to give you the tools to make that change, by explaining specifically how the word imagine triggers the buying response.

The author, Kathryn Aragon, shares 3 formulas for putting this little-known trick to use in your own sales pages, drawing from 3 promotions that do it right. You will not want to miss this post.

14. The Complete Guide to Google Analytics Campaign Tracking – 3,685 Pageviews

Can you imagine being able to track the ROI of traffic from…

• Email
• Social Media
• Paid Ads

… and more?

This blog post will get you there, even if you are a complete Google Analytics Beginner.

You’ll learn …

• How to track where your visitors are coming from
• Creating goals to determine which site visitors are taking action
• Understanding audience insights to figure out who’s opting in (and who’s not), so you can do more of what’s working
• Using segments to evaluate historical performance of a campaign… even if you didn’t set your goals up properly!

So make sure to check out the post the next time you want to know what is really happening with your campaigns.

15. How to Architect the Perfect Conversion Funnel for Your Business – 3,515 Pageviews

Trying to figure out which conversion funnel to build?

DigitalMarketer’s President Richard Lindner was back in July 2015 with the ultimate GIFT for you.

It’s a shortcut.

Simply answer the 3 questions Richard poses in this article and you’ll know how to move forward acquiring leads and converting them into customers.

Seriously… you’ll wish you had this shortcut 10 years ago.

Read this article at least twice and pay very close attention to the section titled “3 Types of Conversion Funnels”—this information could change your life.

(NOTE: Need a helping hand with your digital marketing efforts? Or maybe you just want proven, actionable marketing tools, tactics, and templates to implement in your business? Check out the latest deal from DigitalMarketer, and you will be on your way to helping your business grow.)

16. How Much Can You Afford to Pay to Acquire a Customer? The 5-Step Customer Acquisition Cost Formula – 3,504 Pageviews

Everyone wants to know how much a customer is worth to their business (obviously)! So in March we published Molly Pittman’s own formula to calculate how much you can actually afford to pay for a new customer.

Learning your Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) will give you those crucial insights into your business (we’re talking things like cost per click)!

Molly’s 5-step process shows you exactly how you can spend more money to get more customers… and almost everyone wants more customers, which is why CAC is so important!

If you’re looking for an easy way to acquire customers without accidentally breaking the bank, this post is for you!

17. How to Build and Manage a Private Facebook Group – 3,311 Pageviews

When we originally switched from a private forum to a private Facebook Group, we basically kept our fingers crossed while we waited to see what would happen!

Fortunately, THE Suzi Nelson had our back and built one of the best communities Facebook has ever seen (we’re not bias or anything).

Today, we’re reppin’ 3 core private groups on Facebook for our DigitalMarketer community:

• Engage
• Elite Commons
• Certified Partners

This post walks you through 5 steps to create a thriving community for your business, and the best part is that Suzi updated this post in May, so it’s fresh with good ideas and implementation tactics!

18. The Top 20+ DigitalMarketer Posts of All Time – 3,311 Pageviews

Everyone loves a good old-fashioned roundup, and our readers are no exception!

We’ve published 1,000+ posts since we started our blog. As Garrett Holmes, DM’s own Product Director, likes to point out, that’s equal to a 4000-page college essay or 5.67 copies of A Game of Thrones (nerd alert)!

But the cool thing about this post is that we dove into our historical data and pulled out the best of the best when it comes to our blog.

We also (inadvertently) plucked out most of our pillar posts, so you can easily refer back to this comprehensive list when you’re looking for help on some of our core marketing tactics!

19. The Ultimate List of Blog Post Ideas [2nd Edition] – 2,903 Pageviews

Our Ultimate List includes 200+ blog post ideas, so it’s no surprise that we saw almost 3000 views this year!

In order to help our readers avoid writer’s block, we even broke our 2^nd Edition into 8, easy-to-consume sections that allow you to jump straight to the content you’re searching for!

Not only that, but the various content types in this post have kept readers coming back for more, which is a great reminder to allow your audience to consume your material in different ways!

In this post we include:

1. A downloadable infographic of blog post ideas
2. Instructional videos
3. Screenshots
4. Plenty of internal links to direct readers to other useful material

…not to mention we threw in a few “Easter eggs” throughout the post, such as those little lightning bolts, which indicate a post can be completed at lightning speed! Look through this post any time you need some creative inspiration for your own blog.

20. Facebook’s Targeting Expansion Box: Should You Check It? – 2,801 Pageviews

In 2016, Facebook threw us all curveball and rolled out the targeting expansion feature.

Fortunately, Molly Pittman was on top of things and quickly tested this brand-new optimization feature.

This post came after Molly gave her thoughts on one of our Perpetual Traffic Episodes, and we thought a blog would accompany the episode nicely (repurposing content, anyone)!

Apparently, our audience liked the idea too, since it remains one of our top trafficked posts to this day.

In this blog post, Molly proves once and for all if checking that tiny box is actually worth it and if you will actually see conversions.

21. Build a Steady Stream of Clients in 30 Minutes a Day Using This One Free Tool – 2,789 Pageviews

It’s no surprise that everyone loves the word “free.” So when Ted Prodromou, author of the Ultimate Guide to LinkedIn, wrote a post about how to grow your client base using a free tool, it naturally gained a lot of traffic.

The tool was LinkedIn, of course, and as LinkedIn continues to grow in value for businesses, this blog post only becomes more relevant.

Ted walks through his 8-step process to teach readers how to optimize their profiles and generate leads. It takes no more than 30 minutes and is well-worth the time (at least we think so)!

It’s so valuable, in fact, that Marcus Murphy, Director of Monetization at DM, started a whole series roasting LinkedIn profiles just to prove the point!

Well, that’s a wrap for our best content on the blog for 2018… here’s to an even better content-filled 2019!

The post DigitalMarketer’s 21 Best Articles for Organic Traffic in 2018 appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

I hope so.

After all, back in 2014, when DigitalMarketer was a young company that nobody had ever heard of, it was content that helped cement our authority and launch us into the international brand we are today.

And do you know how many pieces of content it took to begin that dramatic transformation?

10.

That’s what it took to launch the DM brand.

Just 10 amazing pieces of content.

And if you don’t believe me, check out this recent post from Ryan:

Now when we say all you need is 10 pieces of content, these aren’t just any old blog posts you can put together in 45 minutes. These are big, meaty, strategically positioned pieces of content that we call “pillar posts.”

And in this article, I’m going to show you how to create your own pillar content so you, too, can build your authority, your brand, and your business through better content marketing.

When you’re done reading this article, you’ll have a simple 3-step system you can follow to create a pillar blog post that continues to bring new website traffic and leads to your website—and pre-sells them on the value of your product or service—for years to come.

But before we get started, there’s one question you need to ask yourself.

Are You a Publisher?

Many people have the mistaken belief that in order to succeed with content marketing, they have to post a new piece of content every single day.

Luckily, that’s not true. At least… not for most of us.

Most companies out there do NOT need to create a ton of new content on a hyper-regular basis. The only exception is publishing companies.

Publishers are companies whose business model is “publishing.” These companies make their money by serving ads on their content. And in order to maximize their revenue, they also have to maximize the amount of content they produce each day.

Classic examples include The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

Now if you’re a publisher, volume is the name of the game… which means you DO need to publish a lot of content. Because that’s how you make your revenue.

Gizmodo, for instance, publishes 6-8 pieces of content per day. theCHIVE produces 40 a day!

That said, this post isn’t for publishers.

Because the strategy I’m about to teach you doesn’t really apply to companies like Gizmodo or The New York Times. If you are a publisher, you may find our “Ultimate List of Blog Post Ideas” helpful.

But if you’re a company that sells a product or service—whether it’s a physical product, a service, a SaaS product, whatever—then this process of creating pillar blog posts WILL work for you.

At this point, you might be wondering…

What the Heck is a Pillar Blog Post, Anyway?

Think of a pillar blog post like the columns in the ancient Greek temples. The pillar is what holds up the building. It supports the weight.

A pillar post does the same thing. It’s the foundation that supports the rest of your content marketing.

Pillar posts are big, meaty posts. They’re useful, actionable, well-written, and engaging. They’re filled with relevant images and audio/video files to support the points you’re making in the text.

As a result, pillar posts have something that 99% of other blog posts don’t have: longevity.

The average blog post gets a spike of traffic when it’s first posted… then it quickly dies down. After 48 hours, most blog posts are basically dead. They never again bring in more than a trickle of traffic.

Pillar posts, on the other hand, provide long-lasting ROI. They’ll continue generating new visitors to your website day after day, week after week, even year after year.

Some of our pillar posts at DigitalMarketer are still generating massive organic traffic, even 5 years after they were initially published, like our “101 Best Email Subject Lines.”

Finally, the last thing that separates a pillar post is that they pre-sell your product or service.

It’s not enough to simply publish a blog post that’s somewhat relevant to your product or service. Your content should actively pre-sell your audience on the value of whatever it is you offer by providing them with the education they need to fully understand why your product or service is so incredibly valuable.

It might sound complicated, but I promise it’s really not. In fact, the whole process can be boiled down into 3 simple steps…

Step 1: Choose Your Topic

The first and most important step is to simply decide what you’re going to talk about.

Don’t rush this step. In order for this process to work, you need to spend a little time here and really come up with a topic that is going to resonate with your audience.

Remember, I said that a pillar post is designed to help pre-sell your product or service to the reader. Well, in order for that to happen you need to really think about your audience, what their problem is, what they want, and what kind of content would be most helpful to them.

Here are the 3 questions you should ask yourself about your ideal customer to help come up with great topics for your content. Trust me—the topic for your pillar post is hiding in those answers.

1) What does your prospect need to believe in order to buy the product or service you’re selling?

For example, if you’re selling a marathon training course, maybe your prospect needs to believe that they can run a marathon—even if they work full-time and can only train on nights and weekends.

Or maybe they need to believe that they can run a marathon, even if they’re over 40 or 50 or even if they’re currently overweight.

Because if your prospect doesn’t believe they can run a marathon because of their job, weight, age, etc., then they aren’t going to buy your marathon training course.

So it’s your job to educate them and answer their most common objections with a post like:

“How to Run a Marathon, Even if You Work 40 Hours a Week”

Here’s another example of an article that does a good job of this. It’s called, “5 Reasons why Small Businesses Should use A CRM”:

Clearly, this company has identified some of the beliefs that their customers have (particularly the small business owners) need to be overcome. Then they turned that into a blog post that helps to overcome those common objections.

2) What do your prospects research before they buy your product or service?

So our marathon company that we mentioned earlier needs to figure out the kind of things that marathon runners research before they run a marathon, and thus, buy your product.

Are they searching for marathon training tips?

Best marathon shoes?

Marathon motivation?

Here’s another example from REI. They’ve put together a checklist of mountain biking equipment:

This is a great post for new mountain bikers who are researching what kind of gear they need to get started. And, of course, the list has plenty of hyperlinks to products you can buy right on the REI website.

3) What conversations are going on in the mind of your customer before they buy your product or service?

Now you have to really dig deep into the minds of your customers.

When people are thinking about running a marathon, what kinds of things are they thinking about?

Maybe they’re wondering if marathons are good for you or not.

Maybe they’re wondering if running long-distance will hurt their knees, or cause muscle wasting, or 100 other similar questions.

Here’s a great example from Glassdoor. Clearly, they’ve identified some of the doubts that tend to run through people’s minds right before an interview:

Here’s another from Charles Schwab. It’s a timely topic for parents (like myself) who are just starting to think about paying for their kid’s college and so on.

Become the Answer to These Questions

These questions are super important because they help you to identify all the hot-button topics that are on your customers’ minds during the buying process.

And once you know the questions your prospects are asking, you can start being the answer to those questions. This will be the foundation for your pillar blog post.

Are you having trouble figuring out what kinds of questions your prospects have? If so, here’s a little hint.

Get out there and ask them!

Check out forums dedicated to your niche. Attend a local meetup. Or just see if you can interview some of your company’s previous customers to find out what sort of things they researched and thought about before they purchased your product.

HINT: Think About the Way Your Audience Self-Identifies

People often go through a process where they suddenly decide to self-identify a certain way.

As a guitar player. A chef. A photographer. Someone who’s fit. Etc.

For instance, maybe you have been mountain biking off and on for a while. But one day, you find yourself biking more and more often, and you realize you really enjoy it. And then you stop thinking of yourself as a guy who goes mountain biking… and start thinking of yourself as an actual mountain biker.

And just like that, the way you identify yourself in your mind has changed.

People do this all the time, and when they do, it’s a great thing for savvy marketers who know how to take advantage of it.

Why?

Because anytime a person decides to self-identify as something, they have a tendency to buy a lot of stuff.

When you start to think of yourself as a mountain biker, you’re going to want to own all the things that mountain bikers generally have—like a hardcore mountain bike, protective gear, mountain biking shoes, and so on.

Those possessions are a way of reinforcing your new self-image.

And the trick, when you’re coming up with a topic for your pillar blog post, is to figure out what is going to speak to that person who has just now started to self-identify as a customer who uses the same type of product or service that you provide.

Now, this isn’t necessarily an exact science. There’s always a little guesswork involved. Which is why 1 blog topic idea isn’t enough. Instead, I recommend coming up with a list of at least 10.

Create a List of 10 Content Ideas

When you find the perfect topic for a blog post—I mean that 1 blog post topic that absolutely hits your target prospect right where they live and makes them hungry to read more—that 1 piece of content might be all you need to connect with your audience and launch your content marketing success.

That’s what you’re looking for: that 1 idea that will truly resonate with your audience.

And if you take a closer look at Ryan’s post, he says the same thing:

For DigitalMarketer, it was a post called “Customer Value Optimization: How to Build an Unstoppable Business.”

The bad news is that you probably won’t pick the perfect topic right off the bat (ask me how I know). It will probably take a few tries until you hit on a content topic that really works for you.

So, start with a list of at least 10 great content topic ideas.

Then follow the rest of this process for each of those 10 ideas, one at a time, until you hit that home-run.

Step 2: Pick a Type of Post

Now that you know what your content is going to be about, the next step is to choose how you’re going to present it.

And there are 2 post types that I recommend you start with here. These aren’t the only way to format a pillar blog post, certainly, but in most cases these are the 2 best formats to use if you’re writing a pillar post.

And the 2 perfect pillar post types are…

1) The “How To” Post: Describe how to execute a process, and use images, video, or audio to enrich the post

This type of article teaches the reader how to do something—whether it’s how to lose weight, how to change a flat tire, or even how to create a pillar blog post. (Woah, meta.)

If you choose to write a how-to post, make sure to go into detail on every step so that the process you’re explaining is super clear to the reader.

The awesome thing about how-to articles is that they have the natural side-effect of positioning you as an authority in your niche.

As a company that offers training programs, DigitalMarketer would want their prospects to view them as an authority in the digital marketing niche. So creating how-to posts is a natural fit for them, which is why DigitalMarketer writes a lot of them.

An example would be DM’s pillar post on customer value optimization:

This post goes into great detail in explaining how to nurture leads into customers and then how to maximize the value of those customers using a marketing funnel that runs largely on autopilot.

2) The Listicle: Create a list of books, tools, resources, or literally anything else your audience will find useful

The other type of post I recommend is a listicle. This is a big old honkin’ list of things that will be useful for your reader. It’s a good choice when there are many different ways to accomplish whatever it is your reader is trying to do.

It’s also a great choice for a lot of B2C companies who want to give their customers new ideas about different ways to use their product. For example, here’s a listicle post from an essential oil company showing people all the different ways they can use essential oils:

If Those 2 Post Types Don’t Fit…

Chances are pretty good that your pillar post idea will work best as a how-to article or a listicle. So try those 2 post types first.

But if those don’t seem to fit, then check out our blog post called The Ultimate List of Blog Post Ideas. And appropriately enough, this is actually a listicle that contains over 50 (and counting) types of blog posts you can use to deliver your content online.

Then, the last thing you’ll need to do is…

Step 3: Find Your Angle

At this point, you have your topic, and you know what format you’re going to present it in. So now you just need to start writing… right?

Wrong.

I can almost guarantee that your post is going to need some kind of angle. Some way of presenting your topic that grabs your reader’s attention and makes them want to click and read that post.

Because here’s the thing. Just about every topic under the sun has been covered before. So it’s not enough to simply write about your topic in a straightforward way.

Instead, you first have to find a way to differentiate your post by adding an angle to it. Something that makes it more interesting, more attention-grabbing. Something that makes it stand out from the pack.

Don’t Skip This Step!

Choosing an angle for your post is the step that most people skip.

And that’s a shame because there are a lot of really great posts out there—super helpful posts written about topics people are interested in—that never got the traction they deserved…

All because the creator didn’t write the post in a way that made it stand out from the competition and grab people’s attention.

Here are the 5 main post angles that I recommend for your pillar post:

1) Benefit: A direct angle that speaks to the reader’s self-interest

In this angle, you present your topic as something that will benefit the reader. And everything about that post—from the title to the way you lay out and write the text itself—needs to focus on that benefit.

Because this angle is pretty straightforward, it needs to make a big, bold promise. It needs to tell the reader what they’ll gain or learn.

Here’s an example of a “benefit” angle…

…which promises to show the reader how to be a good leader.

2) New: Use this angle when you are revealing something novel or previously unknown to the reader

People love things that are new and exciting.

New developments, new technology, new announcements—if there’s anything about your topic that you can portray as being new and exciting… something people haven’t seen before… then this is probably the angle you’ll want to use.

The great thing about this angle is that it will appeal to people who are already well-read in your niche.

Take this example from our friends at Social Media Examiner:

If someone has already read 100 articles on how to monetize blogs, they probably won’t want to read a blog that looks like it covers the same thing they’ve already read 100 times.

But you just might grab their attention when you mention “New Research” in your headline, promising them something NEW that they’ve never read before.

3) Threat: A form of the “benefit” angle, this post speaks to the avoidance of pain

This is basically the inverse of Angle #1. Only this time, instead of focusing on how taking action can benefit the reader… you’re focusing on the ways in which NOT taking action could harm them.

Here’s an example of a post with a “threat” angle:

4) Piggyback: Leverages the authority or popularity of someone or something outside of your company

A piggyback is when you leverage something else that’s well-known to lend extra interest and credibility to your topic.

Here’s an example from Inc.com that piggybacks off of the authority, credibility, and success of Richard Branson:

Richard Branson didn’t write this article. But the author can take advantage of his popularity by writing a post that talks about some of the principles that Richard Branson has talked about or written about in some of his books.

5) Curiosity: Piques interest without providing direct information

The last angle, curiosity, is when you write a post that makes people curious to read more.

You’re not necessarily promising a benefit, or something new, or piggybacking on something else… you’re just piquing the reader’s interest as a way to draw as many people into your content as possible.

Here’s a great example of a “curiosity” post:

This was a super shocking headline, but it made perfect sense for this post because most people (including myself) didn’t know that James Chartrand is actually a woman.

Note: You have to be a little careful with curiosity angles. Don’t try to get too cute or too clever with your angles until you know what you’re doing. Otherwise, you’ll end up writing a post headline that doesn’t really speak to anyone.

You Can Combine These Angles Together

Now that you know the 5 most common angles for pillar posts, keep in mind you can also Frankenstein these things together to create an even more enticing post angle.

For example, you might combine a benefit angle with a new angle to create a post like:

“Research Shows This New Face Cream Reduces Wrinkles by 90%…”

Or you could combine a threat angle with a piggyback angle to make this post:

“Warren Buffet Warns Investors: Do NOT Invest in the Stock Market Unless You Do This First!”

3 Tips to Help Extend the Lifespan of Your Post

Remember, the goal of this process is to create a post that will live for a long time, bringing you more and more organic traffic even months or years after you publish it.

If you follow the 3-step process I outlined above, you’ll be well on your way to achieving that goal.

But just to make sure you’re armed with all the content firepower available, I’m also sharing these 3 tips to help make sure your posts live a long and healthy life.

1) Update Them Regularly

If you want your posts to continue bringing in traffic year after year, you need to update them and add to them on a regular basis. (Once a year is a good goal.)

This does a couple things.

First, it lets Google know that your post is still up-to-date, still relevant. Google rewards pages that are updated more often with better organic rankings, so this is a way to let them know your post hasn’t fallen behind the times.

It also makes the post itself more relevant, interesting, and useful for the end reader. Because no matter what topic you’re writing about, there’s bound to be some new information on that topic every year.

And by keeping your post up-to-date, you’re making sure that it continues to be the go-to resource for people who are researching that topic.

2) Create Something 10x Better Than Anything Else Out There

Before you write your post, it’s a good idea to find some of the other pieces of content out there on the topic. Read through that content and see what your competitors have already done.

Then do 10x better than that.

If you aren’t willing to go way above and beyond what’s already out there, then this process isn’t worth your time.

If you want people to choose your blog post over someone else’s (especially a blog post that’s already out there and getting organic traffic), then you have to give them a good reason to do so—and you have to make sure that your content is the best, most helpful resource out there on your topic.

3) Buy Some Website Traffic

Once you publish your blog post, don’t be afraid to pay to send some web traffic to it.

There’s a lot of competition out there for people’s attention, and you can’t always just publish content and hope that people will notice it.

“Hoping” isn’t a strategy.

Instead, it’s your job to make sure that people notice you. And one way you can do that is by spending some money to get your content in front of the right kind of people.

How Many Pillar Posts Do You Need?

The last thing I’m going to talk about in this post is: how many times should you go through this process?

In step #1, I recommended coming up with 10 pillar post topics.

And that’s a good number to start with. When I first started at DM, that’s what I did: I started by creating 10 awesome pieces of content.

And that was enough.

Those 10 blog posts were enough to grab the attention of our market and really launch us into the brand we are today.

So come up with 10 post topic ideas. Then complete the rest of this process for each of those ideas, 1 at a time, until you have 10 amazing pieces of content.

But don’t stop there!

Once you’re finished with your first 10 pieces of content, do it again. And again.

And again.

And watch your audience, your brand, and your business grow to new heights.

The post 3 Simple Steps to Creating A “Pillar Blog Post” That Generates Organic Traffic for Years to Come appeared first on DigitalMarketer.