How to Manage your Website Content
Any business owner can tell you just how consuming managing their business is. Add managing a website to your to-do list and you will soon find what little free time you once had all but evaporated.
In this digital age, having a website for your company is all but mandatory. You want to attract as many customers as possible, and if your website isn’t top-of-the-line, those would-be customers will fall into the clutches of your competitors.
One of the best ways to attract customers is through the regular output of content to your site. Fresh content tells Google and other search engines that your site is active and can offer searchers up-to-date information. If you are producing content, you will soon find that it is a full-time job. Without proper management, you will find other duties will go neglected which can be disastrous for your business.
This post will outline some tips to effectively manage content creation on your website, so you can make the most of your time and draw in the widest audience.
Your Resources
First and foremost, you need to determine what resources are available to you. If you already have a site up and running, but plan to produce content as well, you have a leg up on companies with no site. But if you tell your web developer to start writing blogs, you will soon have to find a new developer.
If you have employees with strong writing skills, they may be interested in taking on extra responsibilities, but if not, you will either have to write the blogs yourself, outsource your work to a company like Legend Web Works, or hire a new employee.
However, if you are interested in making other forms of media, you have to find individuals with skill sets that match your desired form of media. If you are putting out anything less than high-quality, professional work not only are you wasting your time, you may be hurting the reputation of your business.
Before you even get started making content, you need to have a realistic understanding of what you can do and, more importantly, what you cannot.
Determine the Type of Content you want to Make
For some companies a simple information blog post once, a month is enough content, for others, you may need to make videos or even put out webinars or infographics.
The type of content you make depends on your business. Does your business make products and perform services? Then you probably want to write blogs and produce videos. Does your business produce products for other businesses? Then webinars may be the way to go.
There are myriad options for each business but determining what is right for you will determine the effectiveness of your content.
Figure out What is Working and what is not
Once you start producing content, the hard work truly begins. It’s not enough to just put out content and assume it is working. No, you might as well be screaming into the void.
For each piece of content, you put out you must study analytics to determine its success level. The metrics aren’t as simplistic as views and clicks either. You need to look into bounce rate, backlinks, page loading time, and many other things. These gauge the success of your content.
There is no upper limit for how successful your content can be either, so there is always room for improvement no matter how well you are doing. If you can get your metrics trending in the right direction, then you will be on the road to success.
However, if your metrics are not improving despite your best attempts there could be several reasons why. Your content might have no hook, causing people to flee your page, or the page may simply take too long to load. Perhaps there is better content out there that covers the same topic.
You must do your research to figure out what the source of the issue is. It is always wise to reach out to professionals who are familiar with such issues as cutting to the root of the problem quickly will save you time and money.
Finally, put a heavy focus on search engine optimization (SEO) and keywords. If you are not familiar with these terms, you will not go far. Essentially SEO is the practice of making it as easy as possible for search engines to identify the quality of your content. Keywords are terms that people search for to find your content.
It’s always a good idea to keep up with the best SEO practices. There are dozens of sites that produce free information on SEO. If you have the time, it is of great benefit to read up on these terms as they will pay dividends in the long run.
Make Constant Adjustments
In the world of digital media, change is the only constant. Best practices change often and what worked one year will not always work the next.
It is a good idea to have a team strategy meeting every quarter to get a better understanding of what is working and what is not. Never be afraid to alter your strategy or try something new. Your site’s traffic patterns will tell you everything you need to know.
Also, don’t be afraid of producing new forms of media so long as you don’t make any jarring transitions in terms of consistency. You don’t want to write blog posts that have steadily gained in popularity then suddenly switch to producing videos only. This will cause you to lose much of the base you have built up without any certain benefit.
Stay Organized and Optimized
When it comes to ideation and production organization is your best friend. You will want to create a content schedule and strictly stick to it. One of the number one ways to lose your audience is through inconsistent content. If you post three posts on the first of the month, you will be much worse off than if you put out a post every ten days.
Planning will allow you to produce your content well before your publish date and ensure that any issues can be ironed out with plenty of time to spare. The last thing you want is to be scrambling to produce content hours before your deadline. Last-minute work will leave you with sloppy content, no matter how great an idea you have.
Also, make sure your site is completely optimized. This means completing all database options that your site builder prompts of you. This will allow your site to load faster and will give the reader a more complete experience.
A good Site makes good Business
Any business owner or manager who wants to improve their business should have a well-functioning website. The best way to get eyes on your page is to produce helpful and eye-catching content. But you can’t just put anything out. Your content needs to be the best it can be or else anyone who comes across will quickly regret that they have.
Managing your content is no small or simple task. Many have failed despite their best intentions. If you can’t seem to get your content working for you, reach out to Legend Web Works. Our digital marketing team is adept at turning a bum site into a prosperous source of engagement. Not only do we manage and build websites, but we also produce the highest quality social media content. Don’t waste any more hours trying to improve your site, let us do the work for you.
