Back in the day when everyone was keyword stuffing we talked about writing for Google, and how many people would opt to do that over writing for their actual traffic. Thanks to the big changes brought about by Google Panda and Penguin. However, this is something that rarely happens any more, the general consensus being that the best way to please Google is now ironically to actually write for the people.
In other words then not much has changed other than Google’s accuracy and sensitivity. That was always the plan over at Google HQ, but a predictable algorithm that relied on keywords meant that many people started abusing the system.
So sure writing for people is definitely the best way to please Google, the best business sense, and the best way to future proof your marketing. But at the same time it’s also worth noting that for the foreseeable future at least, Google is always going to have to use some kind of algorithm to identify the content of a site and to find new pages to crawl, which means it doesn’t hurt to think about the way Google will view your content.
So how can you write smart and help make your content Google-friendly and good value for your readers?
Synonyms
One thing to bear in mind is that precise keywords are pretty much useless these days. Partly this is to do with the simple fact that Google is coming down hard on sites that stuff keywords into their content (meaning you risk being penalised) but it’s also due to the new semantic search that means Google will second guess what users are looking for anyway. So if someone searches for ‘types of chair’ (I do not know why that was the example that came to mind…) then there’s a good chance that Google will bring up results for ‘kinds of furniture’ anyway.
So if you want to increase your chances of your search coming up, then you should attempt to include some synonyms and some slightly different versions of the same phrases in order to communicate to Google what your site is about with using the same exact line over and over. In this way, Google is almost celebrating a good vocabulary…
Length
The word on the street is that Google prefers longer articles, and reading around various SEO blogs research seems to support this. Partly this is because longer articles tend to mean greater depth/more research and of course more content for them to crawl. On the other hand though, most people find that if an article is too long then it can be a little daunting and off putting for readers. A good compromise then might be a long page, but with lots of headers and sections that readers can dip in and out of or skim over.
Style
While Google won’t be able to analyse style too much, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was biased against poor spelling and grammar so good writing should obviously be a priority. At the same time they also like opinion and reflection, which means a first person style (like this one) with lots of ‘Is’ and ‘we’s’ peppered in for good measure could be another way to get in their good books.
Attached Images:
- License Image #1: Creative Commons image source
- License Image #2: Creative Commons image source
Today’s guest post was submitted by Todd Ramos, Founder of PenTech Consulting. He is a part of one of the topmost SEO companies in CT. You can read more about PenTech Consulting and the work they do from their website or follow them on twitter @pentechconsult.
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