Read this before you write your next blog post or newsletter!

Blogging and relevant content

Content marketing works best, when your content is targeted toward the needs, wants and interests of your prospective clients or customers.  The value you then deliver in those highly relevant posts (or newsletter articles etc), is what encourages people to link to and share your work; helping you grow a targeted and valuable readership.

Often, in an attempt to get as many readers as possible, bloggers write about a wider and wider range of subjects, until they end up with a blog that is no longer directly relevant to their prospective clients.  By focusing on reader numbers (traffic) rather than the quality of that traffic, it’s all too easy to find yourself building numbers, without building value into those numbers.  The end result can be a site or newsletter, with no real direction and little power to convert.

The numbers that matter

For your content to attract and convert prospective clients, it must be highly relevant to them and their needs.  If it isn’t, you can end up with a site that gets hundreds or maybe thousands of visitors a day, few of whom ever become clients or customers.  I have seen bloggers with a few hundred visitors a day generate more inquiries and sales, than sites with several thousand, poorly targeted visitors.  Content always king, but only if it is relevant!

In addition, by keeping your content focused, you will also make it a LOT easier for search engines to get a handle on the kind of traffic to send to you.

The bottom line:

Keep your content tightly linked to the needs and interests of your prospective clients.  Grow a targeted community of great people around your blog, rather than just building traffic.