By Alli Summerford
August 1, 2013
I wrote, Content Keeps Them Coming Back: Content is King, in 2001. I recently re-read the article and was struck by how little has changed in the 12 years since I published it. Aside from some dated phrases like “stickiest site in cyber-town,” the basic idea that content is the heart of your website remains true today. Content is the reason that visitors will come to your site and share it with others. Content is also the reason, at least in part, that your site will rank well (or not). The search engines love good content and engage in an ever-evolving effort to provide search results that reward the best content producers.
So, given its timeless value, I want to re-emphasize the importance of writing good content for your site and doing it regularly. Here are just a few benefits to creating great content for your website:
- Establish yourself as an expert
- Help others by sharing that expertise
- Give others something to link to and share
- Provide a steady stream of content for your social media profiles
- Increase the size of your site
- Penguin-proof your site
- Gain more exposure in the SERPs
- Increase traffic to your site
- Expand your contacts to the ever-widening audience finding your work
- Remains an essential piece of any SEO effort
The upsides are many; the downsides are few. Well, really, I can only think of one: the cost of time to create good content (whether it is your time or someone you hire for the task). There is no short cut; it takes time to create good content. And any method that you would employ to reduce that time will undermine the point (see our article on Can’t I Just SEO). So, start writing! Now.
