As the Internet gets saturated with surface-level content, the Google EEAT guidelines set out to change the way many marketers approach content creation. Search engines like Google are cracking down on keyword stuffing, AI-generated fluff, and everything that doesn’t provide substantial value to actual online users.
As digital marketers ourselves, we know how discerning both search engines and online users are in the quality of content they rank and consume. So, if you’re a brand that wants to enjoy a good ROI on your local SEO campaigns, it’s high time you focus on ‘people-first’ content.
In this post, we’ll discuss the Google EEAT guidelines, what they mean for your marketing efforts, and how they can set you apart from the competition. Read on and see why people-first content is the name of the SEO game.
What is the Google EEAT?
The Google E-E-A-T update was rolled out in December 2022, a follow-up to the 2014 E-A-T guidelines. Basically, E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness:
E is for Experience. The extra ‘E’, which stands for ‘Experience’, was added to the EEAT principles to ensure that high-ranking content is produced by someone who has actual experience and on the topic. For example, Google wants to ensure that a tax guide is actually written by an accountant or a tax lawyer.
E is for Expertise. This establishes your knowledge and expertise on the subject matter. It can be in the form of author bios, certifications, credentials, and more.
A is for Authoritativeness. This is on a more technical aspect as Google checks how credible your website is in terms of hosting, backlink quality, and more.
T is for Trustworthiness. This checks the accuracy of your EEAT content to avoid misleading readers with incorrect information.
In short, the E-E-A-T concept wants to guarantee that marketers are writing for people first, as opposed to simply writing to rank.
This means the EEAT signals reward “original content created to be original and helpful for people” instead of simply feeding the belly of your generic blog page. Google will evaluate your website content based on its accuracy and reliability, in addition to the traditional ranking factors.
By writing for people first and showing your expertise on the topic, you can display competency in your brand. This will boost your SEO efforts as search quality evaluators start to comb your new content.
In the end, it’s important to remember that your target readers are living and breathing humans. Making the top priority when writing content will ensure that your marketing strategy will reap good rankings, engagement, and, eventually, conversions.
Why is people-first content important for digital marketing?
A good digital marketing campaign relies heavily on good messaging. While writing to rank is may seem like a quick fix for your dwindling rankings, the Google E-E-A-T update may want to differ.
Here’s why people-first content is the foundation of our SEO services, and so should your campaigns:
1. Building your brand authority
Publishing people-first content will position your brand as the authority in your industry. This helps build trust not only with your target audience, but with Google as well.
To be specific, online users gravitate toward brands that provide them with useful, practical, and authentic content. This is an excellent strategy for content marketing where online users slowly build trust and interest on your brand until they eventually become paying customers.
In terms of search rankings, Google loves authoritative websites. Consistently publishing quality content will soon bring you to the coveted top position on search results.
2. Providing the best value
People-first content addresses the audience’s problems, pain points, and interests. By creating content that targets these areas, you can easily attract more readers and potential leads to your brand.
As for Google, user-centric topics signal that your website has the expertise and experience in the subject matter. While there’s no definite EEAT checklist, high-value content will surely tick the boxes when ranking your pages on search results.
3. Attracting quality leads
Take note that a high traffic volume isn’t the true measure of your SEO campaigns – it’s how well they bring in quality leads.
With that said, people-first content is arguably the most effective way to attractive potential customers. When you focus on your customers’ needs, they are more likely to end up in your landing page or checkout page.
4. Outperforming your competition
Right now, most of your competitors are stuck with mass-generated AI content that doesn’t give any value to their readers. That means now is the perfect time for you to leverage people-first content to outrank them on search engines and get a bigger market share for your brand.
By investing in content that speaks to your customers’ wants, needs, and fears, you’re allowing them to relate to your brand more easily. This creates an image of trust, expertise, and authority, which is a win-win situation in getting more leads and ranking higher on Google search results.
5. Improving your conversions
Conversion is the be-all and end-all of every marketing campaign. If you’re not seeing good results from your old content strategy, it might be time to review it against the latest E-E-A-T principles.
This way, you can craft quality content that hones in on your target audience. This will help attract more leads and convert them in the process.
The secret: balancing people-first content and SEO strategies
Don’t forget that the main goal of SEO is to reach a wider audience so you can provide content that answers their search queries. With this, the right balance of SEO strategies and people-first content would be your powerful combination in ruling the top search results.
Here are some of the important things that an effective SEO plan should include:
Avoid keyword stuffing. Optimize your target keywords organically throughout the copy, including the first paragraph, headings, and titles. This will help both online users and search engine crawlers read your content more easily.
**Use keyword themes. **Instead of stuffing your content with the same keyword repeatedly, you can search for keyword themes that include synonyms and semantic phrases.
Write with personality. Good content that speaks – literally and metaphorically – to the readers ranks higher on search results. Instead of boring AI content, you can write your own copy that reflects the personality of your brand.
Best practices for Google EEAT in SEO content
To improve your EEAT implementation, you can start with the following points:
1. Focus on practical and helpful content
When creating content under the EEAT guidelines, you should focus on in-depth topics from first-hand experience.
For example, if you’re a notary public trying to reach more clients, you can write content about acceptable identification cards, types of documents that need notarization, notary mistakes, and so on.
Your target audience always seek these practical information. And by giving it to them firsthand, you position yourself as the leading choice for them.
Still, just because you’re writing about subject matter expertise (SME) doesn’t mean you’re going to inundate your readers with jargon. Always use a conversational tone and keep your writing simple for your target audience.
2. Add more info about the content creator
Next, you should add an author bio on your blog page to boost the trustworthiness and authoritativeness of your content.
For example, if you’re marketing a medical spa through content, it would be a good idea to add author profiles of their medical team. This can be a “Medically reviewed by” section to enhance the credibility of your copy to both the readers and the Google search engine.
Aside from that, you can create an “About Us” page to boost the overall reputation of your website.
3. Link to credible sources
Another way to establish the trustworthiness of your content is by linking to reputable websites. This includes relevant .gov, .edu, or .org pages that provide value and support to the topic you’re writing.
Aside from that, external linking to reputable sources will enhance your content’s depth. It will also signal search engines that your content is high-quality and should be ranked on SERPs.
4. Leverage your user-generated content (UGC)
Take note that you don’t necessarily have to produce all the content to meet the E-E-A-T guidelines. One way to create people-first content is by leveraging user-generated content or UGC.
User-generated content consists of testimonial videos, images, reviews, and any material that your product or service users produced. These are solid social proofs that will add instant Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness to your copy.
For example, you can use Google My Business reviews as part of your copy to establish your brand’s credibility. You can also feature unboxing videos, vlogs from customers, or product hauls that include your brand.
Aside from boosting the authenticity of your brand, it’s also a cost-efficient way to create quality content for online users.
5. Acquire backlinks from reputable sites
A healthy backlinking strategy is also crucial in building quality content that meets the EEAT guidelines. Take note that backlinks are like votes of confidence from other web pages – it’s important to have them both in good quantity and quality.
Overall, avoid spammy tactics that only drive low-quality links to your website. While this can boost your ranking in the short term, it won’t be cost-efficient in the long run.
Get help writing people-first content from Top Position
People-first content is indispensable if you want to boost your brand presence, reputation, and conversion. The best part is that you don’t have to deal with content creation on your own!
Here at Top Position, our team of specialists will craft personalized content that resonates with your target audience. We use a people-first approach for our search engine optimization to ensure authentic and quality engagement from online users.
The result? High-ranking content that drives traffic, quality leads, and revenue to our clients.
So, if you want to learn more about EEAT or need help crafting compelling content, all you have to do is reach out to our digital marketing agency in West Palm Beach. You can book a free consultation with us and let’s discuss how we can help your brand with compelling content!
Source link: https://topposition.com/blog/google-eeat-principles-guide-to-people-first-content/
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