Editorial Articles

Online, content is everything. Yes, your website needs to work well. But without fresh content, visitors and search engines have no reason to return to you.

OK this isn’t breaking news, but what has changed this year is the attention search engines are giving quality content.

The search marketing industry is watching avidly as innovations in web design and interactivity make way for content. Content that is of premium quality. Content that establishes the website as an expert in its industry. And most importantly, content that keeps the search engines and site visitors coming back time and time again.

From this year onwards we will begin to see businesses that produce engaging, audience appropriate content rewarded by the search engines with top rankings, proving that Content Marketing is a major influencing factor in ethical Search Engine Marketing.

So what is fresh content?

In recent years fresh content has simply meant staying up to date; a few press releases in the ‘news’ section or a bi-monthly contribution to your blog. Now, it is the prolific generation and publication of quality industry commentary or, news content.

News Content Marketing isn’t solely about populating your website with customised industry news. It concentrates on the creation of new opportunities for customer engagement through the application of content across websites to connect on and offline marketing channels.

News Content Marketing means the delivery of fresh, industry relevant news to a website with the purpose of enriching the user experience. In doing so, news helps to generate trust as an invaluable source of reliable information, building the authority of the website with all audiences.

So how does Search Marketing strengthen your News Content Marketing? Through the inclusion of key phrases, on and off page SEO techniques, what could have been simply news becomes a part of your online strategy in a way that will pull in search engines and consumers through content syndication and backlinks.

For search rankings news can pay dividends. By increasing the reach of quality news content, marketers can create even greater levels of visibility online. Publication of news in more places can elevate the smallest website, making it more significant in the mind of the search engine than its greatest competitor.

Aside from search engine rankings, News Content Marketing has a significant role to play in branding and social media.

As a valued resource of reliable information, News Content Marketing builds brand visibility that engenders loyalty within the key influencers. Thinking beyond this, PR has a role to play. Suddenly the proposition changes from being a passive participant in your industry publishing quality industry news on its website, into the role of publisher and unofficial spokesperson for your industry.

And it is once you start thinking outside of its role as fresh web content that other advantages become apparent.

Savvy marketers will cross pollinate news; to enrich newsletters, blogs, social media, email marketing, intranet, extranets and more. They will see an application for social media marketing too. For as the industry matures, News Content Marketing will be used to create greater opportunities for customer insight through integration with Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc for fresh postings but also to instigate dialogues between influencer groups and to gain publicity through earned media. For those with even greater vision, news can stimulate dialogues between consumers to identify even greater levels of marketing insight into consumer behaviours.

Without exception, the potential opportunities for content are boundless. It simply depends on a relentless commitment to quality and the determination to become an authority in your industry.

Kerry Marriott
Marketing Manager, Vertical Leap
Twitter: VerticalLeap