I’ve talked before about Google’s best-kept secret for their search rankings: the Content Quality Score. Every managed service provider dreams of seeing their site perched at the top of the rankings for their most relevant search terms, but simply cobbling a site together out of generic content and throwing it online will leave you doing only that: dreaming.
You’ve got to produce content that actually matters to your target audience, and here’s the thing: Google will have an opinion on how good that quality is. No one knows the exact way that Google decides what’s good and what isn’t, and there’s no magic trick to just convert all your content into something that will rank well, but you can take steps to improving your content and watching your ranking improve alongside.
Here’s how: give a damn about what’s on your site
Ulistic clients who engage with our team and take advantage of our writers for unique content each day see higher than average content scores. But enough of the shameless self-promotion! Seriously, start writing high-quality and engaging content on a daily basis. Don’t just shove a bunch of SEO terms together and call it a day. You want content that speaks to your audience that actually sounds good (and sounds like someone who’s a native English speaker wrote it), not some regurgitated filler content from some content provider.
Primary factors for great quality content
Clients of Ulistic know that I drill them on the importance of:
- Case Studies
- News and other interesting stories
- Testimonials
- Project and Technology spotlights
- Current Events
Don’t just write about your main services and call it a day. Keep updating your site and talk about everything that can connect to your business! When you regularly publish unique content that has a purpose, you are showing Google (and hopefully, your clients and prospective clients), that you’re engaged with the changing world around you. You show that you’re paying attention and keeping up with the times.
We all know that technology isn’t static
So if you don’t seem like you’re changing as the world around you does, you look like you’re falling behind. That’s a good enough reason to keep updating your site, let alone that it’s one of the things Google seems to look for in a Quality Content Score.
Watch out for red flags
There are common mistakes that managed services provider (MSP) sites make that lead to poor quality scores, and the number one red flag for most sites is duplicate content. Yup, that includes those who only subscribe to a content delivery service. You’re doing harm to your search rankings, and you’re probably wondering why you’re not getting any leads from your MSP Web site.
Here are some other red flags to watch out for:
- Inaccurate content (research is your friend)
- Spelling and grammar errors (another reason to make sure you’ve got content written by a native English speaker)
- Images that do not add value to the content (yet another picture of a smiling guy wearing a suit? Not helpful)
- Rewording from other sites (Google knows how to use a thesaurus too)
- Using commonly known facts (pretty soon, no one will need to ask “What is the cloud?” because every site has a page about that question)
- Overuse of keywords (seriously, don’t just kept repeating “New York IT services” over and over again, that’s not helping)
At the end of the day, your Web site ranking and scores are directly tied to the quality of content you are producing and sharing on your MSP Web site.
Expertise, authority, and trust are the major factors on your MSP Web site ranking. Show that you know what you’re talking about, give your readers something to actually respond to, and produce your content because it’s good and worthwhile, not just because you want a better ranking. One will come with the other.