So if you’ve been keeping up with my blog, you’ll already know that content isn’t king – that is, having “high-quality content” or SEO-optimised blog posts does not improve your chances of ranking for your search term. Sorry to break it to you, but I’ve explained why that is the case from several angles in the first few posts.
But that doesn’t mean SEO-optimised blog posts are irrelevant. In fact, it’s very important for several reasons, only one of which directly relates to SEO.
The reason that content is directly important for SEO is because it’s a very easy way to create relevancy for a search term.
What does relevancy mean?
A page is relevant for a search phrase if it’s a candidate to appear in the search results when somebody types that search phrase into a search engine. And relevancy is very easy to build yourself when you know how.
For example, if you want a page on your site to appear for the search term “blue widgets”, an easy way is to have a page with “blue widgets” in the URL, H1, some H2s and H3s, the first line of the text, and a few times in the body of text.
This way, when the search bots churn through your SEO-optimised blog post, they’ll know it’s about blue widgets.
Do this, and you have made a claim to rank for blue widgets, along with the dozens, hundreds, thousands or even millions of other pages that are also relevant for blue widgets. (You can do this for several keywords at once, but this is disadvantageous, unless you have tonnes of authority.)
One thing – don’t stuff your page with the keyword. That is penalisable. The algos will look at your page, see that your keyword dominates the text, and omit you from the SERPs for that keyword.
Notice I didn’t say that relevancy guarantees high ranking. It just guarantees that you’ll appear in the rank somewhere, even if it’s on page 100.
Once you’re relevant for a search term, your position is determined by the authority of the relevant page.
Nor did I say that perfectly optimising (if such a thing exists) a page for a certain keyword boosts your chances of being ranked. Stop worrying about getting an exact percentage of keyword density, for example. It will not help you rank.
You can spend all day, all week and all month getting perfect scores on Yoast, AIOSEO or any other common plugin, and it will not help you.
Just make sure the page is relevant. If you’re not sure, look at a search engine results tracker (AKA SERP tracker). If your page is getting impressions for your desired search term within a week or two, you can be sure it’s relevant.
If it’s ranking high (i.e. in top 5 positions), stop. If it’s ranking low (i.e. not on the first page), you need more authority.
There are other ways to create relevancy for a search term other than creating an SEO-optimised blog post, but for now I just want you to remember that a relevant page is your claim to rank for a search term. Nothing more, nothing less.
It’s true that content is indirectly important for SEO because it can attract backlinks, which directly contributes to your SEO rank, especially if you get top-quality links and redistribute the authority around your site.
I’ve had some incredible links over the years from university sites, university press sites, academic publications and reputable blogs, who clearly thought my articles were useful for their readers.
But as far as SEO goes, all your SEO-optimised blog post does is create relevancy for one or more search terms. It sends a signal to the search engines that you should be considered. No more, no less.