by Gordon Hamilton

Created on: May 24, 2010

It is frequently and widely touted that, “Content is King,” on the Internet. This is not simply an accolade employed as a quirky catchphrase but is rather a wholly accurate reflection of that which serves more than anything else to determine the intrinsic value provided by any website, blog or Internet article. It is the content to be found and the quality of same at any Web address which will above all contribute to the usefulness which the page or site holds for its visitors and the overall success it is likely to know on the Internet.

The content which is included on any business website must be viewed in general terms as an advert for the business. Just as with a TV commercial, the concept of business websites is enticing customers to buy in to the products or services which the business offers. Although customers will often be interested in quality photographs and attractive layouts to a certain extent, they are many times more interested in determining full details of what the business can do for them and how the products or services can either make their life easier or more fulfilling, or simply save them money. Customers buy benefits, not features of a product or service; securing a sale is about succinctly and accurately informing the customer what benefits a product or service can introduce to their lives. It is the inclusion of quality content which will serve this purpose.

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is in simple terms the process of making a website attractive to the search engine spiders which will crawl it, rate it and accordingly rank it in the search engine results provided for any given criteria submitted by Web browsers. When a website is ranked favourably by these indexers, it will appear higher on the search engine rankings and is accordingly more likely to be found and clicked upon by search engine subscribers, thus boosting significantly the traffic levels generated for the site. This form of traffic is known as, “Organic,” traffic and further enhances the standing of the site.

SEO is an inexact science and although there are many principles employed in SEO, none of them absolutely guarantee success. Otherwise, everyone would practise the prescribed techniques and the entire concept would become worthless. Although Google and the other search engines for this reason make the ranking criteria a closely guarded secret, it is no secret that quality, original content, extremely specific to the subject of the site, is one of the most important factors they consider. This is simply because the search engines are looking to rank pages in exactly the same way that an Internet user would rank them, in terms of the quality of information and usefulness they provide to visitors.

It can be concluded therefore that the inclusion of quality, original content which will be of interest to site visitors serves a treble purpose. Content of this type will please visitors to the site in that it will give them the information they require, it will serve the desired purpose for business owners in that it is likely to increase sales leads and conversions and it will serve very much to cater to the requirements of the search engines, ensuring that quality traffic in the form of potential customers is driven to the website on an ongoing basis.

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