In this fast-paced world, people have little patience for options that don’t generate results. Yet too often, publishers of affiliate sites mistakenly assume that if they flood their domain with the right keywords, but pay lip service to content quality, site visitors and, by extension, their advertisers, will be happy nonetheless. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Online advertisers, more than anything else, seek quality referrals. Think about it: do merchants want “window shoppers”, or people who are serious about buying? It only makes sense that to attract serious prospects, you need to provide serious information.
Hence your need for serious, high-quality content. Not only will higher search rankings result, but you’ll also attract visitors who are closely targeted to your advertiser’s key audience—and primed to purchase.
So what defines serious content, and how do you generate it? First let’s look at the traits all strong publishing content has in common:
• It satisfies a niche. Web sites don’t have to satisfy all aspects of a subject to be useful. In fact, the more completely you cover a subset of a topic, the more value you’re likely to be to those interested in your subject area.
• It’s original. This is the golden rule. Nothing draws and holds site visitors like fresh, useful material. Newsfeeds and syndicated copy are valuable content sources, but they won’t score traffic.
• It’s to the point. Obviously your content must contain critical keywords, but just as importantly it needs to focus on the subject matter. It’s remarkable how many publishers fail this test with long home page introductions or bait and switch text.
• It contains no flowery language. To hold your visitor’s attention, avoid needless adjectives, polysyllabic mumbo-jumbo and self-important technical jargon (unless, of course, keywords are in play). And if you can say something in five words instead of ten, do it.
• It’s updated regularly. Active Web sites score higher in searches. You don’t have to rework your entire site every week, but make sure you’re adding content regularly.
While there’s no shortcut to creating a high quality, content driven site, the payoff more than offsets the investment required.
If funds are tight, you can save by writing the content yourself, as long as you have expertise in the subject matter or can research it adequately. But don’t be afraid to hire a professional writer; freelancers are affordable.
Don’t forget that original videos, site-specific applets, graphics and animation all count as fresh content. What’s more, free online services such as DM-2.com enable you to easily organize your content using attractive page templates, and even host your site at no cost.
Strong, unique content is your key to success as an affiliate site. Chances are your core audience will return frequently, bookmark you, even refer you to others.
Sites with serious content are also naturals for community pages and forums that count as original material. Pay close attention to the content you furnish, and you’ll create a destination that benefits—and profits—both you and your advertisers.
Dylan McDanniel is COO and Co-Founder of Epicenter Network (www.epicenternetwork.com) , an integrated affiliate marketing network and provider of affiliate publishing software.
Download the entire FeedFront issue 8 here – http://www.scribd.com/doc/20220412/FeedFront-Magazine-Issue-8
FeedFront issue 8 articles can be found here as well: http://feedfront.com/archives/article00date/2009/10
