There are 3 reasons that content is so important for SEO
- To engage the reader
- Drive traffic and search engine rankings
- Getting links from other “quality” sites is only an option with great content
Google is looking for the content subject matter to provide a rank position #1. It is not just a single glowing page however, the more quality pages on the site about a topic will identify your website as resource-rich, and make YOU appear as a subject matter expert. Someone for people to listen to, learn, and take advice from.
Google, Yahoo and other serch engines traverse the web, page to page, site to site, navigating through links analyzing text, graphics and then comparing it to the other pages to determine relevance between them. They identify and attempt to eliminate from high rankings content from two or more identical pages. The reason; it defeats the overall purpose of why a person was searching online in the first place. Few if any people see the need for identical pages showing identical content for the same search criteria. Most find it aggravating, a waste of time and it’s not helpful in the least to satisfy their quest for information and answers.
Put yourself in the shoes of your potential searchers, do you think it would be helpful to have 5 results out of 10 identical? Will you not want the best website to be on the top? That’s very obvious! The search engines make sure that you don’t face such a problem, which is why they have such strict rules when it comes to the content.
Depending on the type of your topic/website/business you might consider various self-updating data but not screenscraping but something more akin to lists with the hottest or featured products, or items on discount. This may not bring you a huge number of new online visitors in an of itself but it is still something of value and is “fresh”. Providing value is the key.
SEO should be specifically designed to increase traffic to your website and marketing techniques is what keeps them on your website. Well done it encourages visitors to make a purchase. The challenge is to find the balance between the two. I can’t stress enough how crucial it is to have a unique content for SEO if you desire high rankings in Google.
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