Guide to Content CreatioN

Helping more than 400 marketers nationwide.

Table of Contents

What Should I Write About? 1

What is a Good Title? 1

How Long Should a Post Be, On Average? 2

How and Where Should I Use Links? 2

How Many Keywords Should Be in a Post? 3

How Can I Use Images? 4

How Do I Insert a YouTube Video into My Post? 5–8

Guide to Content Creation Review 9

Appendix: An Exemplary Post 10

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what SHOULD I write about?
Writer’s block, at one time or another, finds us all. To stave off these unproductive times,
Compendium created the Content Suggestion Tool. The Content Suggestion Tool scours
current news stories and blog posts using your target keywords in order to find relevant, up-
to-date content that you can read for inspiration. With the Content Suggestion Tool, we hope
you’ll never stare at a blinking cursor again.

Still not inspired? Here are nine more things to consider writing about:

1. Products or services you sell

2. Phone conversations you’ve had
3. Interesting emails you’ve received
4. Marketing collateral you can repurpose
5. New features or upgrades you’ve introduced
6. Experiences partners and customers have shared with you
7. Industry-related news you consider important
8. Best practices you can teach your readers
9. Recent press, awards, and honors you’ve received

What is a good title?

Any title is a good title so long as it is relevant to the keywords you’re targeting. That is, if
you’re writing content that discusses the historic relationship between love, music, and revo-
lution, you should probably title your post “Love, Music, and Revolution.” If you’re expounding
your theories about Beethoven’s fascination with major seventh chords, you would be smart
to consider “Beethoven and the Major Seventh Chord” as your post title. It’s really that simple:
narrowly focus your content around the specific keywords that you would like to target, and
then, title your post based on those keywords.

For best SEO results, use keywords at the beginning of your title rather than at the end. That
is, searchers prefer the post title “SEO: A How-To Guide” over “A How-To Guide to SEO” simply
because the keyword, SEO, is used earlier in the title.

Note: Always repress the urge to be whimsical. Inside jokes, metaphors, and wordplay might
seem like great ideas for titles, but they won’t help with SEO.

keyword (noun) any word or phrase a searcher might search engine optimization (SEO) (noun) the process
use to describe or identify a desired resource on the of creating and adjusting website content with the goal
Internet of improving search engine rankings

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How long should a post be, on average?
If you keep your posts between 250 and 350 words—which we recommend—the average
reader will be able to consume and process them in one or two minutes. Miscellaneous meet-
ings and engagements plague us all. Your audience, like everyone else’s, is probably busy.
Keep this is mind when you’re creating new posts. Write enough to convey your idea clearly
and accurately, while making sure that it can be read or skimmed in the in-between times of
the day. Also, always remember that content is more important than length. If you have good
information, don’t let a word count restrict you from sharing it.

How and where should I use links?

You can use links for numerous reasons. For in-
stance, if your current post is revisiting an idea Weak Linking:
I wrote about this in an earlier post about search
you’ve discussed before, link to it. If your current engine optimization.
post mentions a product you sell, link to it. If your
Strong Linking:
current post was inspired by someone else’s con-
I wrote about this in an earlier post about search
tent, link to it. If your current post mentions a web- engine optimization.
site, link to it. Not only will this allow your readers
to absorb your content in a more integrated way, but it will also help search engines do two
things: relate your content with other, relevant content, and allow you to create targeted
anchor text.

Links are also a great way to get readers to take that

next step. That is, we write blogs so that people can
read them, but our end goal is to convert readers into
customers. So, be sure to use links as calls-to-action.

Linking can have positive and negative impacts. Don’t

give your reader so much external content that they are
taken away from your page and your offerings.

anchor text (noun) visible, clickable text that links call-to-action (noun) an image, form, or link used to
one webpage to another; a significant variable in SEO; convert the readers of your blog into leads and/or
should contain keywords for best SEO results clients

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How many keywords Should be in a post?
When using keywords, you want to make sure that you strike a balance. Too many, and you’ll
jeopardize the integrity of your content. Too few, and you’ll set yourself up for obscurity. We
developed the Keyword Strength meter (pictured below) to address this issue head on. Think
of it like a consultant that analyzes your keyword usage against the length of your post and
responds with color-coded feedback. Green means the ratio of your content and keywords is
good. Red means it’s lackluster.

Remember that the Keyword Strength meter only verifies an appropriate ratio of keywords—it
does not evaluate the quality of the content. Your job is to create relevant content that justifies
and enhances your keywords. The Compendium platform offers things like the Content
Suggestion Tool to help with this.

Note: The keywords within this post have been artificially highlighted to show their correlation with the Keyword Strength meter.

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How Can i use images?
Maybe you want people to know what you look like. Maybe you want to brag about your
newest design. Whatever the case, images can be a great way to expand and support your
post’s written content. Use them, and while you’re at it, be sure to supplement them with
keyword-rich descriptions.

To get started, click this icon in the Compendium dash-

board: You will be prompted with an Image Prop-
erties dialog box (shown right). If your image is currently
saved to your computer, you can retrieve it by clicking
the browse button. If you are using an image from the
Internet, you can paste your image’s URL into the “Paste
the URL” section. (Make sure you don’t use images you
do not own.) Once you’ve chosen your uploading meth-
od, click the “Insert this image” button.

Once Compendium processes your image, you’ll see an

updated Image Properties box (right). It will display your
newly uploaded image next to some dummy copy. You’ll
notice that this dialog box gives you many options to
manipulate your image to your liking. For instance, you
can adjust your image’s height and width (unlock the
padlock to adjust these values independently); you can
add white space around your image by increasing the
value of the horizontal and/or vertical margins; you can
add a black border to your image; and you can decide how you want your image to be aligned.
Play around with these customization tools, and you’ll find a perfect fit in no time.

Again, be sure not to ignore the “Image Description” box. This box does not add captions, but
it does embed metadata within your image that enhances your SEO, so use keywords if they
are relevant.

metadata (noun) information embedded within a

document that helps search engines define, structure,
and understand its characteristics

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How do I insert A YOUTUBE video inTo my post?
So, you want to embed a video into your post? No problem. Write your post as your normally
would and, once you’re ready to add your video, just click the Source button in Compendium’s
platform. I’ve highlighted it below in red.

The Source button allows you to see the markup language that gives your content its charac-
ter. Here’s how the post above looks once I’ve hit the Source button:

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Now that you can see the source code, locate your YouTube video and click on its <Embed> but-
ton. If you are accessing your video directly from YouTube.com, the <Embed> button’s location
will be similar to the one highlighted in red below.

When you click the <Embed> button, a dropdown box will reveal itself. This box will provide you
with the embed code that you need to copy. I’ve highlighted it above in blue.

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With your copied <Embed> code, navigate back to the Compendium platform and scroll down
to the last line of your post. After the final <br/>, press the return key twice, leaving two lines
blank like I’ve done below.

Paste your <Embed> code.

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Click the Source button again to switch back to Compendium’s default text editor. If your
video has been embedded correctly, you’ll see a green puzzle piece.

If you followed these directions and your video didn’t embed correctly, try the process again,
or email our help desk at help@compendium.com. If you would like to upload a video that
you have created internally, either contact your IT department for assistance or simply upload
your video to YouTube, and follow these steps from there. To upload a video to YouTube, go to
www.YouTube.com.

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GUIDE TO CONTENT CREATION REVIEW & CHECKLIST

Read the Guide to Content Creation

Your audience is busy. Keep your posts between 250 and 350 words so they can read them
during their limited free time.

Write about your business, your industry, and your customers­. If you’re having trouble coming
up with writing ideas, consult the Content Suggestion Tool for more inspiration.

Title your posts with keywords. The earlier the keywords are used—in both your title and your
post—the better.

The Keyword Strength meter verifies an appropriate ratio of keywords and content—it does not
evaluate the quality of the content. Write relevant content, mix it with appropriate keywords, and
you will be well on your way to a good post.

Use links to help readers engage with your information­. Also use them to call your reader to take
action (e.g., purchase a product, sign up for a webinar, download a whitepaper)

When applicable, use videos and images to enhance your post’s written content.

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APPENDIX: AN EXEMPLARY POST

Title: Conversion Rates & SEO

Author: Chris Baggott

I wanted to share something that was shared with me the other

day. Rand Fishkin did a talk at Web 2.0 last week where he dis-
cussed keyword length as it relates to conversion. As you can see
in this image, research shows that 4-word query phrases have
the highest conversion rates. Seeing this, I wanted to compare it
to data that we are seeing with our social marketing clients here
at Compendium. Check out the below graph. This is showing the
weekly progress of one of our larger retail clients. They are lever-
aging a long tail social media marketing strategy based on targeted corporate blogging.

The next chart below shows their weekly conversion. Keep in mind, this traffic is coming almost 100% from
first time visitors. Compare this data with research that shows the average site converts 2% - 4% and that
number is usually lower for first time visitors. In the most recent week, this retailer had moved up to an
11% conversion. They have been averaging around 6%, which is significantly above average.

Digging in using Rand’s findings, I looked at the

specific keyword phrases that drove this conver-
sion. Looking at 100% of their traffic we found
that they had an average of 4.2 words per query
and a median of exactly 4. I love it when things
work out this way :-)

There has been a lot of discussion lately about

the role of content in search engine optimiza-
tion I’ll argue all day long that the further out the tail (by definition, the lower the competition) the more im-
portant content is to driving qualified search traffic. Companies that expand their categories, leverage user
generated content and widespread employee blogging are having outstanding success using content as a
high ROI inbound marketing strategy through both search engines and social networks.

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