When it comes to SEO and content creation, people often focus on creating high-quality content and optimizing their articles for search engines. While these are both extremely important, sometimes it can take time to find the right balance between traditional SEO and content marketing. That’s where content velocity comes in.
What is content velocity?
Content velocity is the rate at which content is published that impacts SEO.
This differs from the traditional focus on pageviews per piece or the number of articles published per month. Instead, it focuses on the change occurring within a set period. Because of this, content velocity provides a clearer indicator of how much progress you are making as an organization regarding your SEO effort. When looking at content velocity, we’re not just comparing the present to the past – we’re also considering what’s happening right now.
Why Should You Track Content Velocity?
Tracking content velocity provides a clear indicator of your progress as an organization regarding your SEO effort. Considering that we are in the middle of a content explosion, it’s easy to see how this could be extremely valuable. Analyzing content published over a period of time allows you to observe change over time. This, in turn, provides you with the ability to identify improvements that can be made and the resources to make these changes.
How Does Content Velocity Impact SEO?
So how does content velocity impact SEO?
Traditionally, gaining traffic from search engines has mostly focused on optimizing older content for search engines. Creating high-quality content and regularly updating your publications with fresh material is one of the core components of a traditional SEO strategy.
In line with this, content that is updated frequently and has additional content published alongside it increases the chances of the content being picked up by relevant audiences. Naturally, this, in turn, leads to higher visibility and increased traffic to your website.
However, as we’ve moved into the future of content and SEO, this focus on older content has begun to shift. Attracting relevant audiences and gaining traffic from search engines has become more difficult.
The problem is that search engines have evolved and begun to prioritize frequently updated content that keeps the user engaged. In other words, content that keeps users coming back for more.
Tracking content velocity allows you to consider how frequently potential audiences access and engage your content. Naturally, this impacts your SEO strategy and the search engine ranking of your content. It also allows you to set measurable goals and track your progress.
How Is Content Velocity Calculated?
Content velocity is the rate at which content is published on your website. The concept is simple: the more content you publish, the faster you move forward as a website.
When people think about creating content for their websites, the first thing that often comes to mind is, ‘hay, I’ve got some great ideas for blog posts!’ In theory, this is great! Having content is important, but ensuring that this content is being distributed and read by the right audience is even more important.
Creating content is only the first step, however. While you’re busy brainstorming blog post ideas, it’s vital that you also consider the other steps that need to be taken to ensure that this content is going to reach your target audience.
Step 1: Create content that will interest your ideal buyer
This is an obvious one. If you want your content to be read and acted upon, you must ensure that it is relevant and meaningful to your target audience. You must research your buyer’s interests and habits to determine what kind of content you create.
Since your buyer is at the center of everything you do, start by considering their interests; what are they reading, listening to, and looking at on social media? Take some time to dive deep and unearth all the information you can about your ideal buyer.
Don’t be afraid to go beyond what you know or what you think you know about them. Remember: the more you know about your target audience, the better you can serve them.
Step 2: Create shareable content
In the same way, you would think about the quality of the content you create, you need to consider the quality of the content you are curating or distributing. When someone shares a blog post that is well-written, useful, and interesting, this is highly likely to result in the blogger being praised, liked, and possibly even considered a professional acquaintance.
You can also consider the sharing options available on your blog. Do you have a button that enables readers to subscribe or follow you on social media? If you do, ensure you are active on social media and distribute interesting and engaging content.
Step 3: Measure the results of your planning and execution
Now that you’ve got a clear idea of everything you’re going to create and how you’re going to create it, you need to measure the results of your planning and execution. First, you need to consider the type of content you create, whether you’re writing a blog post or creating a YouTube video.
Do you think your articles are getting read and engaging with your target audience? Are people sharing them on social media? Consider the various metrics and data that you can measure to get an idea of the success of your content strategy.
To keep things simple, YouTube Analytics is a free and easy-to-use tool that can help you measure the results of your videos. If someone has engaged with your content by liking or commenting on a video, you can measure the results of your work by visiting the YouTube analytics dashboard. You can see all the metrics you need to know about their engagement with your content.
For instance, you can see how many people have watched your video, whether or not they have liked or commented on it, and much more.
Step 4: Create content to engage with your audience
The idea here is to create content that keeps people coming back for more. Considering the three steps outlined above, you can easily see how creating interesting and useful content benefits your target audience and results in happy customers and referrals.
If you want to engage with your audience, ensure that you are responding to what they’re reading, seeing, and listening to. If you’ve got a blog, consider writing posts that directly respond to topics that interest your target audience. For example, suppose your target audience is business owners, and you’re a marketing manager. In that case, you could write a post about how to market to millennials using business-owner-y words and phrases effectively.
Responding to what your audience is interested in is a great way to gain credibility with them. When someone sees that you’re responding to their interests, they will believe that you’re either: a) an expert in that area or b) you’re trying to be an expert in that area. Either way, they’ll value your opinion or recommendation. Most importantly, they’ll remember your interactions with them.
If you want to engage with your audience, ensure you distribute content worth sharing. If you’ve got a blog, consider writing informative and interesting posts. If you have a YouTube channel, ensure your content is interesting and useful. Designing a simple poll to see what your audience thinks about a particular topic is a great way to engage with them. For example, if you’ve got a YouTube channel about fashion and you’ve got a poll where people can choose between a long skirt and a short skirt, you can engage with your audience by discussing which one they prefer – a long or a short skirt.
The point here is to create content people want to share and discuss. If your content strategy leads you to create engaging content worth sharing, you’ll see a rise in your website’s content velocity.
