Everyone says “content is king,” but what if your king is silently sabotaging your SEO? For plumbers, HVAC companies and home service contractors, content can be your best salesperson—or a silent SEO killer.
Bill Gates was one of the first to make this proclamation way back in 1996, explaining that he believed content would be the key to online profits.
Many years later, the saying has held true. It’s been especially popular in the world of search engine optimization (SEO), where practitioners will be quick to tell you that “content is king” if you want results.
They’re not wrong. It’s just that sometimes, even though content is vital for SEO, the wrong type of content can actually have a negative impact on your search engine presence.
Let’s take a look at three ways good content can boost your SEO, and three ways harmful content can hurt it.
Before we jump into the many benefits of content for SEO, let’s quickly define what good content actually means. According to Google, good content isn’t just about the text on your pages. It also encompasses images, page speed, site layout and other factors that impact the way people engage with your site’s content.
Quality content that’s optimized for the right keywords should result in search engine users feeling like the page they found was designed just for them. This is especially true when it comes to SEO for plumbers and HVAC contractors. With all the fluff and poor-quality content out there, simply answering a visitor’s question can provide that “match made in heaven” feeling. And when search users find your page content relevant and valuable, you’ll start to climb the ranks for a given search term, giving you more exposure to the specific people who need a relevant service.
When content is useful, people tend to engage with it longer. Even in the era of scannable content and bite-sized media snippets, a visitor will spend more time on a page they find more valuable. This metric is officially known as “dwell time,” and it’s an important ranking factor that has an impact on your SEO.
If you’ve studied SEO even briefly, you probably understand the importance of backlinks – when an external site links to yours. Generally speaking, the more backlinks you have, the better your SEO. But there’s a caveat – you need quality backlinks.
For many years, SEO practitioners created shoddy directories and blog sites designed for the sole purpose of getting backlinks. Google eventually caught on, and while this practice still happens today, low quality backlinks now reflect poorly on your site and its search ranking. On the other hand, relevant content that solves a real problem will generate links from better-quality websites, improving your SEO and moving you up the search engine results pages (SERPs).
According to Google, low-quality content is any type that doesn’t do a good job of meeting its main purpose. This could be for a number of reasons:
From a technical perspective, poor content can also be the kind that doesn’t load properly or isn’t easily accessible on one or more types of devices.
Responsive design refers to a site that loads on all kinds of devices, from a desktop to a smartphone. This kind of site design is critical for good SEO. If your page text is too big to scroll through on a small screen, or certain images or buttons aren’t sized properly for touchscreen browsing, people will quickly leave the page. The good news? Most modern website templates and platforms make it easy to design a mobile-friendly page.
Like milk or a prime cut of steak, age can turn what was once a high-quality piece of content into something you’d rather stay away from. Even if the information was helpful and valuable when originally published, if page content isn’t updated as trends develop and change in an industry, the site will eventually lose its value. Fresh, up-to-date content is another important part of SEO success.
In its most recent updates, Google has focused more and more on making sure website content meets a certain standard of quality. If it seems like your site’s content was created just to rank higher on search engines, or there isn’t enough content to provide any actionable advice to visitors, you can get flagged for what Google calls “thin content.” This indicates to the search engine that your site doesn’t have helpful content, and will be a huge obstacle to any SEO efforts.
Remember, these are just a few of the factors related to successful content, and content is in turn just one element of your SEO. But if you talk to any search engine specialist who knows what they’re doing, they’ll agree that content is the most critical yet most difficult element of SEO to get right.
Don’t have the bandwidth to devote hours and hours to developing a content strategy, staying up to date on keyword research, and ensuring your content production stays on schedule? Let’s face it: most contractors don’t have time to research keywords, create weekly content, or stay updated on SEO rules. But your content could be doing the heavy lifting to bring in traffic and leads. At KickCharge, we make content that ranks—and sells.
Our team has many years of experience helping all kinds of plumbers, HVAC companies and home service contractors take the mystery out of complex digital marketing topics like SEO, to achieve tangible results on the bottom line.
Let’s make content your secret SEO weapon. Schedule your consultation today
Ryan Redding