Your web site content helps you get in search engines, speak to
visitors, and ultimately get visitors to buy, contact you, or
follow a link. Meanwhile, your content has to be updated at
least once a month if you want to get return visitors and
search engine traffic. To be successful, you need to have a web
content strategy.

Web Content Strategy: Sources of Content

There are four basic ways you can get content for your site:

1. Licensed content that you can publish on your site for a
one-time or recurring subscription fee, or in exchange for
putting a link to the author's site under the article. The main
benefit of this kind of content is that you can build up your
site quickly. The drawback is that hundreds if not thousands of
other sites will be publishing the same content, which means you
will get little search engine traffic from it. Also, within a
few years, the subscription fees or the value of visitors who
leave via the required link to the author's site will amount to
more than you would have paid to have original content
professionally written.

2. Original content contributed freely by your visitors, such
as message boards and guestbook-style comments. The main
advantage of this content is that it costs nothing and gives
you insight into your visitors. The disadvantages are (usually)
low quality and the constant vigilance needed to police it for
misbehavior.

3. Original written content that you allow other sites to
republish in exchange for a link to your site. This content is
usually informational articles, whitepapers, and sometimes,
press releases. Distributing content is an essential component
of getting links to your site.

4. Original, well-written content that's exclusive to your
site. You should have some content that you hold back from
republication, to avoid giving visitors or search engines the
idea all your content can be had somewhere else. This can
include FAQs, "about us" pages, case studies, testimonials, and
other content that other sites would not want to reprint anyway.


What Kind of Content to Use

So, which of the four kinds of content should you use on your
site? Ideally, all four. That way you'll maximize the amount of
quality content your site can have.

But, the precise ratio of the four kinds of content you end up
using will depend on the goals of your site. Some examples:

* Licensed content: If you have a content-based website that
draws revenue from advertising, a large amount of licensed
content can be useful. However, if your site's primary goal is
to collect leads, too much licensed content might risk
distracting visitors from contacting you, without the benefit
of bringing in significant search engine traffic.

* User-contributed content: A website that handles support
issues may have a lot of use for a user forum. A professional
services firm would probably be better off without a forum,
with all the user-contributed content in the form of
testimonials.

* Original written content, exclusive and for distribution: Any
website can benefit from original content since it draws search
engine traffic and puts your best foot forward with visitors.
The broader your potential audience and the greater the
competition from other sites, the more content you need.

Scheduling Content Updates

Search engines, especially Google, seem to give pride of place
to sites that regularly update their content. Regular content
updates also give visitors a reason to return.

In short, if you have thirty web pages worth of content this
month, it's better to post one page each day rather than put
them up all at once. To make sure you do this, schedule an hour
each day for updating your site's content.

One way to get regular content updates for your site is to
start a blog, a "web log" in which you write your thoughts and
post news. The one disadvantage is that many web users are
getting tired of blogs, which are often not well written and
contain more opinion than information. Search engines, too,
seem to be featuring blogs in their results less often.

Identifying a Content Provider

Ever wonder how Bill Gates keeps the MSN and Microsoft sites so
content-rich? Doesn't he get RSI from writing a thousand or more
pages a day?

You guessed it: Bill Gates does not write the content for any
of the Microsoft websites. Nor should you write all your own
content. All successful website owners have someone else write
a large part of their content. This person or company is often
called a "web content provider" or "website copywriter."

You need to select a web content provider with proven
experience writing content for the web, rather than just
writing for print. Ask to see writing samples. You might even
ask if you can commission just a single page to start with, for
evaluation purposes. Also make sure that you are buying all
rights to the content.

After all, the most important part of your website content
strategy should be quality.


About The Author:

Joel Walsh, a professional content writer and
founder of UpMarket Content, recommends you check out their site
to learn more about what you can get from a web site content
provider: http://upmarketcontent.com/website-content [When
posting on the web, please hyperlink this text as the anchor
text: "web site content provider"]