To not state the apparent, however as entrepreneurs, a part of our job is to create content material. Whether or not it’s within the type of weblog posts, touchdown pages, social media posts, emails, newsletters, and so forth – there’s no method to get round it. It’s a important part of our job. And generally, it may be difficult to give you new concepts or methods to iterate on previous ones. With the world consuming content material at lightning velocity, it’s changing into much more troublesome to maintain up with the expectation of turning out contemporary content material.
We’ve not too long ago printed some glorious items on the Moz Weblog all about content material distribution and technique, together with the Whiteboard Fridays “The right way to Maximize Content material” and “A Content material Engine that Drives Income” (each from Ross Simmonds). And, as I’m certain I don’t should let you know, content material ideation and inspiration can come from anyplace. However what if I advised you which you could additionally use the Moz instruments to mine for content material concepts? Let’s dig into other ways to make use of the Moz instruments to complement our content material methods.
Discover gaps in your present content material
When supplementing or modifying your content material technique, a superb place to start out is by inspecting your present content material and discovering the gaps. This may also help determine new content material concepts and areas the place your content material technique could also be lacking key alternatives to thrive.
The Key phrase Hole software in Moz Professional means that you can enter your web site and as much as 3 opponents to determine Key phrases to Enhance and Prime Competing Content material.
Professional tip: Unsure who your on-line opponents are? Or simply need to affirm and scope out who they might be? Try the True Competitor software to search out out.
The Key phrases to Enhance part is instrumental when figuring out gaps in your present content material technique. After coming into the websites you’d like to match, the software will record key phrases for which you and your opponents rank. You may then use the filter choice to see solely particular segments of key phrases. For instance, we might need to see solely key phrases the place we’re rating on the second web page to determine alternatives for content material enhancements. We are going to even present you the Site visitors Elevate for these key phrases, which is the quantity of visitors we estimate you’ll be able to acquire by overtaking your competitor within the SERP.
One other nice use case for this software is to determine new content material concepts. Let’s say we’re engaged on constructing out the “better of” part of our foodie weblog; we are able to filter to see key phrases that embrace “Greatest,” as seen within the screenshot under. We will then determine key phrases for which we’re not rating, however our opponents are and work to construct content material round them. On this case, we’re not rating for “Greatest Pizza in Los Angeles,” so we might need to see about making a weblog submit about this matter.
Recognizing these content material gaps can strengthen your content material technique. It can’t solely assist spark concepts for brand spanking new content material but additionally assist determine locations the place your content material may be improved or refreshed for higher efficiency.
Determine what kind of content material is performing
Among the best locations to get concepts for content material is to see what sort of content material is already on the market and performing. Prime Competing Content material in Key phrase Hole can present perception into what’s performing nicely by itemizing content material your opponents rank for with the Content material URL and Prime Rating Key phrases.
On this instance, we are able to see that one of many opponents I’ve entered ranks nicely for key phrases associated to selecting a mattress measurement and, maybe extra importantly, that the content material rating is from their weblog. We will now have a look at the weblog posts themselves to get an thought of what format has been profitable for them and what info they’re together with. We will ask ourselves:
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Is that this a subject we are able to cowl on our web site?
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Will we already cowl this, nevertheless it’s not rating as nicely?
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Is there a method we are able to enhance the content material or add a unique perspective, format, or content material kind to the house?
The chances are infinite!
Spot tangential content material concepts
Sticking with Prime Competing Content material in Key phrase Hole, let’s examine if we are able to spot some concepts for tangential content material. As Amanda Milligan discusses in her Whiteboard Friday episode, content material concepts which aren’t straight associated to your product can typically result in optimistic outcomes like hyperlinks, social shares, and model consciousness. These peripherally associated subjects can complement your content material technique and assist create a well-rounded library of property.
Sticking with our mattress firm instance, let’s say we’re in search of content material concepts to assist construct out our newly launched weblog. We might know that there’s worth in creating items round mattress-related subjects like deciding on a mattress measurement or figuring out what firmness could be greatest, however what tangential content material concepts can we determine in our analysis? The instance above reveals that our opponents are rating for content material associated to subjects like weighted blankets and sleep hygiene. These could possibly be nice alternatives for me to create new content material circuitously associated to mattresses however nonetheless associated to the sleep business.
Uncover hidden gems
Similar to content material creation, key phrase analysis is a elementary a part of search engine optimisation and advertising and marketing methods. And as you’re on the market digging into issues like search quantity, issue, and SERP evaluation, you might be able to uncover some hidden gems to tell your content material technique as nicely.
Hopping over to Key phrase Explorer, we are able to mine for content material concepts within the Key phrase Recommendations part of the software. Key phrase Recommendations will present a listing of key phrases associated to the seed key phrase entered, sorted by Relevancy to the unique time period. You can even apply filters for the supply kind, grouping preferences, and quantity to additional outline your outcomes.
Let’s begin by trying on the choice to filter titled Show key phrase recommendations that. This filter defaults to Embrace a mixture of sources, however an possibility within the drop-down could possibly be the ace up your sleeve in the case of content material ideation – the filter possibility known as are questions. By deciding on are questions, we are able to see a listing of the kinds of questions searchers ask in relation to our preliminary key phrase.
On this instance, contemplate that we work for an actual property company and are researching content material associated to purchasing a home. Filtering our key phrase recommendations by are questions will present us with particular content material concepts associated to what folks ask when shopping for a house. This may supply a gold mine of content material concepts to flesh out an actual property weblog or web site to assist purchasers discover the data they search.
We will even take this analysis one step additional by grouping our key phrase recommendations by lexical similarity. Only a reminder right here that lexical similarity refers to how carefully associated or comparable the key phrases within the group are. Low lexical similarity will end in fewer teams with extra key phrases because the software will group key phrases which can be much less comparable.
Grouping key phrases may also help us determine extra key phrases we might need to goal and broad-match key phrases that could be value together with in our content material. Be aware of over-optimizing, although! We need to keep away from key phrase stuffing and cannibalization since they might negatively affect rankings. That being mentioned, contemplate the under instance of how grouping key phrases has helped to determine a couple of content material gems.
Utilizing our earlier instance of “shopping for a home” because the seed key phrase, we’ve grouped our key phrases by low lexical similarity. Throughout the “What to contemplate when shopping for a home” group, there are two long-tail key phrases which can be nice inspiration for a brand new piece of content material for our actual property company – “what to search for when shopping for a home guidelines” and “what to know when shopping for a home for the primary time.” We will now take that info and create a devoted useful resource or a weblog submit that features a guidelines for what to contemplate when shopping for a house for the primary time and what the shopping for course of seems to be like. Think about the inspiration you will get from digging into these recommendations even additional!
Scope out the competitors
Thus far, we’ve recognized content material alternatives, uncovered new concepts, and located gaps in our present technique. However what about our competitors? What are they doing? We touched on this a bit utilizing the Key phrase Hole software however let’s dig in additional. When modifying your content material technique, it’s vital to know what your opponents are doing and what their viewers is participating with. Though you received’t have entry to their visitors knowledge (except they provide you entry to it, which is extremely unlikely), there’s a method you will get an thought of what content material could also be driving visitors to their web site. Or, on the very least, what content material is of excessive worth. That is by means of hyperlink evaluation. Moz presents fairly a couple of methods to do that, however I’m going to spotlight a function which may also help get us began with this analysis.
Prime Pages in Hyperlink Explorer will return a listing of the pages on a web site with essentially the most backlinks. This may present perception into the kinds of content material folks discover beneficial on a web site – pages with extra hyperlinks are extra beneficial. That is partly as a result of backlinks are a rating issue. Moreover, all these hyperlinks present advantages like visitors, model publicity, and extra.
After inputting a competitor into Prime Pages, we are able to get an thought of which pages on their web site present essentially the most worth. Within the screenshot above, we are able to see that this specific competitor has numerous “better of” articles which acquire numerous hyperlinks. We will now discover these pages and see if there is a chance to create or modify content material on our personal web site to satisfy comparable calls for.
Professional tip: When you’ve created your content material, you need to use Hyperlink Intersect to search out domains and pages linking to your opponents and to not you. This may supply an effective way to complement a hyperlink constructing technique!
Uncover alternatives for elevation
Similar to creating new content material, refreshing your present URLs is crucial to any content material technique. Elevating your present content material is like sharpening your jewellery – it helps maintain it in tip-top form, extends the piece’s life, and retains it related to your “assortment.” There are lots of methods to determine and replace content material in your present library, however listed here are two methods to get began (and discover new content material alternatives within the course of).
First, let’s examine featured snippet alternatives. As soon as we’ve created a Marketing campaign in Moz Professional and are monitoring key phrases over time, we can have entry to the SERP Options part. This a part of the software tracks SERP options included within the search outcomes in your tracked key phrases, together with featured snippets.
Exploring which of our tracked key phrases have featured snippets within the SERP may also help us determine alternatives for content material refresh and new items of content material. When in search of alternatives for a content material refresh, we are able to search out key phrases the place we’re rating on the primary web page of the SERP however usually are not included within the featured snippet. On this case, the software will present perception into what web page is included within the featured snippet and our present rank. This may make it simpler to identify high-value pages with an opportunity of transferring into that coveted prime spot of the SERP.
Alternatively, taking a look at which of our tracked key phrases embrace a featured snippet however the place we’re not rating on the primary web page (or in any respect) may also help to determine doable alternatives for creating new, high-value content material. We’ll simply need to you’ll want to optimize for the featured snippet proper from the beginning.
Professional tip: Export a CSV of the SERP Options knowledge in your Marketing campaign to type and filter exterior the app. If a SERP function is marked Included within the CSV, it means your web site is included in that exact function. If it’s marked true it means the SERP function is current for that key phrase, however your tracked web site isn’t included.
Subsequent, we’ll pop over to the Web page Optimization part of our Marketing campaign. Though the first goal of this function is for instance how well-optimized a web page is for a specific key phrase, there’s a hidden gem that may assist determine refresh alternatives, new content material concepts, and tangential subjects. The Content material Recommendations tab will record key phrases and subjects typically used on the top-ranking pages for the key phrase we’re optimizing for.
Within the above instance, we’re optimizing for the key phrase “greatest pillow.” Trying on the content material recommendations, it might be a good suggestion to format this content material as a listing (like “11 greatest pillows”) or to incorporate details about what kinds of sleepers would profit from every pillow listed (like “aspect sleepers”). These content material recommendations can even assist us to search out concepts for different items of content material, tangentially associated.
Discover the candy spot of innovation
If there’s one factor we are able to take away from this exploration of content material ideation with Moz Professional, it’s that there are infinite methods to do it. This submit solely covers a handful of them; the fact is that the world (of content material creation) is your oyster! The secret’s to search out which options, instruments, and processes match greatest along with your technique and make them be just right for you. How do you utilize the instruments to analyze new concepts? I’d love to listen to about it!