Your blog is in constant need of more fresh content.
That is a given.
The search engines tend to reward websites that update often, and have large numbers of web pages. Adding fresh content to your site can also help develop your blog into the much sought after "authority site" status.
A major problem faced by many bloggers, as they search for ways to add that new content to their sites, is where to find it. While most bloggers are aware of the need to upload additional web pages to their blogs, writing that content is often a difficult task.
To become an authority site requires strong content in your blog’s area of expertise. Gaining that cherished authority site status also requires many additional theme related incoming links.
Usually, natural links and strong content go hand in hand. The dilemma is creating that content in the first place.
Here’s some help for those seeking authority site status, but are at a loss for words.
What is an authority site?
An authority site is a large site that is recognized by the search engines as being the most important for its keywords.
Authority sites are built on large numbers of content pages and large numbers of incoming links. While that would appear to be obvious, there are several steps that are required to achieve authority site status.
All authority sites, which can almost always be found in the top ten search results for their most important keywords, contain large numbers of pages of content. With the larger sites, like amazon.com, for example, the total of indexed pages may run into the thousands.
For highly competitive keywords, your site will need to add literally hundreds of new content pages, to gain that coveted authority site status. For less competitive keyword searches, obviously not as many pages will be required.
Authority sites are built on content and links.
These two features are equally important and are closely entwined with one another. To get those important incoming links, to as many internal pages as possible, there needs to be powerful content to attract them. By adding content, you will draw links like a magnet.
Authority sites are not afraid to link exchange with others. The search engines will recognize the importance of your blog, if it has incoming links from other top ten search result websites and blogs. Those linking sites may indeed even be your business competitors.
While you might not want to advertise your competition’s business on your home page, a good resources or directory (avoid labelling any pages as links.xxx) page will suffice for the exchange.
Authority site linking procedures are beyond the scope of this article, however. What is of concern here is the addition of those all important extra content pages. Links will be turned naturally toward your blog, if you have strong content. Both links and content are needed to build an authority site.
Your blog needs freshly updated content to provide food for the hungry internet search engine spiders. As these constantly travelling computer robots find your site, they are hunting for new material to chew upon. That means new content.
The question then arises for the blogger, about where to find ideas for additional content pages, to feed those ravenous search engine spiders.
If you are having problems finding suitable ideas, to add fresh content to your site, you are certainly not alone. The problem of content creation has baffled many a blogger, and traditional website owner too.
A good way to start searching for fresh content ideas is to examine your own blog very carefully.
Look over every page and its most important keyword subject matter. You may see where some posts can be created by expanding upon some of the posts you already have printed.
For example, if you have a travel blog, you can provide articles on individual destination cities and countries. Each of those topics can be further subdivided into more posts of tourist attractions and accommodation in each location.
As your pages of informational posts multiply, so do your number of important keyword phrases. There are simply more ways that searchers can find and enter your specific blog.
Your competitors’ websites are also bountiful sources of additional content ideas. They may have entire sections of their websites devoted to topics, in your area of business, that you have not even considered. Because of that oversight, your competitors are gaining valuable new search engine traffic, in keywords that your blog does not include.
As you add new pages of content from expanding upon subject matter from your own blog, and from competitors’ sites, your number of archived post pages will increase. It is generally thought, by many search engine optimization professionals, that sites with a larger number of pages will generally rank higher in the search engine results.
While that is not a hard and fast rule, and many exceptions may be found, it is still a good idea to have more pages on your blog. If nothing else, each new page provides additional new keyword phrase entry points. That means more visitor traffic for you and your business.
If you have written any articles, for other publications or website where you have maintained the reprint rights and received permission, be certain to archive them as additional content. Post them to your blog, and provide credit to the previous hosting site or blog.
Make certain that the archived pages are properly title tagged and have good anchor text links from your site map and back to the home page. This may not be possible with some blogging systems, like Blogger, that do not allow for categories. Since the articles are already written, they can provide extra search engine content, at no extra work and no charge to you.
If you add photographs to your blog, they provide strong visitor oriented content. People like to look at pictures. Photos can often be enough to tip the balance, toward having a link pointed toward your site, especially if you are in a visually important industry like travel, clothing, or automobiles.
As always, be sure to mark all of photos with good search engine readable alt tags, to ensure their indexing. The search engines also include special photo indexes. You want to be included in them, as they will definitely help your blog status.
To create the important status of authority site for your most important keywords, you will need to increase both the size of your site, and the number of incoming links. The two are closely related, as one enhances the other.
To add fresh content pages to your blog, you will need to use every possible avenue available to you. Content can be self written, by you or your staff. It can also be provided by offering your blog to a guest blogger.
Grow your content to create an authority site from your blog.
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