The Case For Content, Part 3

How to Build Great Content on a Shoestring

In Part 1 and 2 of this series, I made the business case for using content to radically expand a brand's opportunities using content. I also compared neilpatel.com, danhenry.org and ladyboss.com to show the difference, while also pointing out that all are successful in their own right, but very different in how they do or don't use content.

In this post, I want to drill into how to build solid content. I'm focusing on doing this with little or no budget, but the rules apply to any brand regardless of size.

I'm going to show the "no budget" way, but with the disclaimer that when I work on content with clients, I and other content managers use advanced tools that give us an edge at a faster pace, but at a cost.

I'm going to focus on building a 2000 word article in about 90 minutes, which is doable in almost any niche.

As an example, let's build an article for ladyboss.com that we're comfortable will rank high in the SERPs, while also engaging readers. In the next post, I'll show you simple strategies for extending the reach of this article, but let's first build one that matters.

I'm also going to show you 1 thing that any content strategy MUST include to help overall rankings.

My general rule is that content needs to be entertaining, compelling, controversial or teach the reader something. In the best of cases, more than one of these will be in play.

I'm going to build an article on the keto diet for women. It's a hot topic and I'm betting that the search volumes will be pretty high, but I haven't yet taken a position as a writer.

I divide my time for building an article into segments. Only in the final segment or two do I really formulate how I want to approach a subject, because I want to let my research guide me.

The research phase takes about 45-60 minutes and I divide it into 2 parts. First, I want to educate myself on the subject matter. Second, I want to know what the competition has done.

For this low cost example, I'm going to use Ubersuggest.com, Neil Patel's latest acquisition. Once there, I'm going to plug in "keto diet for women." In a few seconds, I have a lot of phrases coming back. I click the arrows next to volume so the results are sorted from highest volume down.

When you're building an article, you have to consider who the audience is and where they are in their journey. At the widest point in a women's journey to understand and implement the keto diet, she might search with, "keto diet for beginners (27100 monthly searches)" or "is the keto diet safe? (9900 monthly searches)" Once she starts to feel more confident in her understanding of all things keto, she might search with, "how to start keto diet (14,800 monthly searches). When she is ready to try the diet, her searches will likely move to phrases such as, "ketogenic diet recipes (6600 searches) or "keto cycling (1900 searches). In almost any niche, the search volumes drop as the searcher becomes more advanced in their knowledge.

Since I'm showing you search volumes, I should mention how I feel about them. There are lots of ways to generate eyeballs. But, trying to rank for a highly searched term is more difficult that for a lower search volume. Duh! What's cool is that if you build your content correctly, you can rank for multiple lower volume search phrases PLUS build content that is more focused on the searcher's journey PLUS serve them the correct call-to-action (CTA) inside that content. There's zero reason, if your ladyboss.com to serve up an "Advanced Keto Guidebook" within content that's built to resonate with women who are just discovering keto.

Also, in this case, a large percentage of the search volume may be men, who are not the target. This is another reason, at least early in a content strategy, that search volume should be the only focus.

So, as I enter my research phrase, I've decided that I want to do a content piece for beginners. So, I open up a Google tab and search for, "keto diet for women," first. I just want to see what's going on in the space and 1900 searches that I know are likely to be close to 100% female is a good starting point. This is where my research will slow down a bit, because I need to do 3 things.

First, I need to review the page 1 and maybe page 2 results so that I am comfortable with the subject. Second (and I'm doing this on a shoestring), I need to copy and paste each article into a new Word document so that I can see the word counts. There are stats that show that articles that are over 2000 words tend to rank better, but I want to see if my competition is doing more than that, in which case I either have to build a bigger article or find another search topic to work with.

Finally, I need to scroll to the bottom of the page 1 results and look at those "Searches related to keto diet for women." There is gold in those phrases for 2 reasons. One, it can add inspiration for the article I'm working on or redirect me in a new direction. But, it can also inform me of phrases that I want to add into my article, perhaps even whole sections.

In my search, "keto diet plan pdf" is one of those suggested, so I might want to include a section in my article about that phrase (with or without the pdf).

The other good news in my search is that the majority of the results are coming from blogs. It's almost impossible to organically outrank institutions such as Wikipedia or The New York Times. If I see a lot of them in the page one organic results, I'm off to hunt another phrase.

Once I've quickly read/reviewed the 10-20 articles and done a word count, I know roughly what my article needs to contain and it's time to build a working title and outline. I want to make sure that the search phrase is in my title, but also make it entertaining, compelling controversial, etc.

So, maybe my working title will be, "I thought the keto diet for women was BS, I was wrong," or "10 considerations before you jump on the keto diet for women train." If I choose to work with the 10 considerations, my outline is pretty straight forward- Introduction, 10 Sections, Conclusion and I can probably build those 10 considerations with a bit more research with phrases such as, "why doctors hate the keto diet." and "keto diet side effects."

If I choose the alternative, I would likely spend 1/3 of my article speaking to what I thought and 2/3 about why I was wrong.

In either case, I just want to build a simple outline. Then, as I am researching, I'm going to add things I find that fit into my outline. I'm just adding snippets, facts, etc. If I come across a noted brand, such as the American Medical Association doing an article, I'm going to grab citations from that article and copy/paste the link.

This is because I generally want to add at least 3 external links for each 1000 words that I write. At this stage, I'm not worrying about internal linking or backlinks. I'm only worrying about supporting my article with sources that the reader is likely to trust.

I'm also making a running list of the search phrases that I'm using to dig into my research. I do this because I want to include these phrases when I actually write the article. This increases the net effect of my article, as it will rank for more than one phrase.

If I want to get a bit advanced, I'll plug these phrases into the "search" feature for those 10 or 20 articles that I copied into Word for word counts and I'll note how often they use (or don't use" a particular phrase. I do this because my article needs to be better, both in quality and in use of key phrases.

Backlinko's Brian Dean calls this the "skyscraper technique," where you see what's ranking and make your content better. And, it works like a charm. This doesn't mean you should create a trash article with more words and expect great things.

So, including my research and outlines, I've probably eaten 45 minutes to an hour. Now, it's time to write. I just take the phrases in each section of my outline and expand them into sentences.

Then, I add examples or analogies to help the reader grasp topics. I also reference the notable external sources within each section.

And, before I know it, my article's word count has jumped. By spending more time researching, the writing gets MUCH easier.

By the way, this is EXACTLY the same way you would research and create an outline for a infographic or video, which should be part of your content mix.

My only real choice, if I am on a shoestring, is how many articles I want to create each day versus how often I want to publish. Here again, my competition can help me, because I can look at their blogging schedule and know how often they are publishing as a guide.

So, this is a simple example of how to build an article from scratch. As I mentioned, I use advanced (and often expensive) tools to speed up this process and increase my odds of success, but the principle is exactly the same.

But, even as I'm showing you the mechanics of building content, I don't want the use case to be lost. This content will settle into a SERP rank for multiple search phrases and likely stay in place for a long time. This means that lots of people who have never heard of me or my brand will be introduced to me. If it's their first time seeing my brand and content, they'll likely surf around and read more content, giving me the ability to demonstrate that I know what I'm talking about.

I'll probably add an opt-in popup, giving them the option to see more great content, special offers, etc. as I publish, which is only going to add to my list.

Tomorrow, I'll share simple ways to have that list help you rank content even higher and also take about the content cocktail, including friends helping friends and more.

If you have a question about building content, ask it here!