Content marketing: the new wave of SEO and internet marketing

Everyone knows that SEO has always taken a beating over the years. SEO has been viewed as a necessary evil to grow one’s business in the age of internet marketing.

For most small businesses, SEO has been a nightmare experience with an industry full of nothing but money hungry crooks holding a website and search rankings hostage in lieu of thousands of dollars and empty promises.

The SEO industry, as is any other industry, has its share of good, bad and ugly players that market themselves as SEO ninjas, specialists, professionals, internet marketers, inbound marketers, and whatever other phrase of the month comes to mind to make a dollar.

As of late, the top buzzword or phrase of SEO has been content marketing, and how it’s becoming the new SEO and future of internet marketing.

So, just what is content marketing and why has it been coined the new SEO? I’m so glad you asked.

In short, sound content marketing is writing engaging content that solves customer problems and challenges is the future of internet marketing, also known as search engine optimization (SEO).

Content marketing is separating the men from the boys in the SEO industry

Content marketing is definitely here to stay and not just some fly by night fad that will soon fad with the next search engine update.

Unlike previous deceptive SEO tactics and practices, content marketing will weed out the bad and ugly of SEO that focus on short-term gains at long-term expense of the customer’s business and website investment.

But amongst all the bad and ugly players and their deceptive SEO practices, there are those SEO professionals who truly understand SEO.

More importantly, these rare SEO professionals understand how to plan, implement, execute and sustain search-safe practices in adherence to SEO policies and guidelines.

These are the SEO professionals you want on your team.

They are willing to help you for the long-term benefit of truly being a partner to your business.

They are not in it for the quick win or dollar, and onto the next customer after sub-par SEO tips and tricks don’t work.

Unlike the bad and ugly, these SEO professionals are truly showing great interest in not only your business, but your industry and how it operates.

True SEO professionals are much like having a business coach as a part of your business.

And those traits are the ones you should expect when it comes to partnering with anyone or agency looking to SEO your website, nothing less.

These are the traits of a trustworthy internet marketing professional that can generate and sustain highly converting website traffic with sound content marketing.

Why is content marketing so valuable?

Content marketing is a form of internet marketing in which potential customers are engaged through useful, unique, and valuable content.

Simply put, it is the wooing of potential customers to become lifetime customers with no gimmicks or over promising and under delivering.

Matter of fact, in most cases potential customers are not sold too directly, nor should they be, in content.

If they are sold to directly, then this is nothing more than cold advertising of useless incentives and benefits.

Content marketing, as opposed to direct selling, is the presentation of informative and real content that solves a customer’s problem or challenge in a very direct and engaging manner.

Most potential customers will become customers because someone they know will share your business’ website or content with.

Talking about the power of word of mouth or, in this case, the value and power of click marketing to share value-add content with the masses on the internet.

One click is all it takes from sound content marketing to change traffic, conversions, and both the top and, more importantly, the bottom line revenue.

Content marketing is definitely more art than science when engaging potential customers to read and act upon your content.

Avoid gimmicky content marketing promising search-safe SEO success in a short time

Let’s start with one of the most abused methods that is passed off as content marketing: article spinning.

Many deceptive SEOs will confuse small business owners trying to educate and inform them that content marketing is article spinning.

Both concepts are quite different, and are as far from one another as east is west.

While content marketing is considered one of the best search-safe SEO strategies, article spinning is the opposite of it.

Article spinning is nothing more than unreadable, keyword-laden content filled with grammatical and syntax errors.

Moreover, article spinning has also tried to pass itself under the alias of guest blogging.

If you are using spun articles to publish on other relevant blogs as guest posts or even on your own website, then expect a severely penalizing visit from the panda and penguin ninjas and soon.

In addition, those websites that are you trying to guest blog will reject your posts due to their low quality.

In short, it’s best to invest in the time and effort to plan, implement, execute, and manage a sound content marketing strategy.

Trying to deploy gimmicks or take SEO shortcuts such as article spinning and keyword stuffing will only end with a great mountain of negative penalties.

How effective content marketing is achieved and sustained

There are many ways businesses can focus their SEO efforts on content marketing that drives lasting, profitable results.

Building an audience that helps to grow your business needs a thorough understanding of the latest internet trends.

Understanding how potential customers communicate, seek advice and share ideas must be at the core of any sound content marketing strategy.

More often than not, the regular or daily use of social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, and so on will help you craft your content marketing strategy.

In addition, small businesses can also focus on other marketing strategies to implement content marketing like the following:

• blogging
• case studies
• articles
• lists
• podcasts
• white papers
• microblogging
• videos
• e-books
• webinars

Are SEO and content marketing two sides of the same coin?

Well, content creation and marketing are two very important aspects of a business but definitely they have not replaced the traditional search engine optimization techniques as of yet.

SEO, if performed in accordance to SEO guidelines and policies, increases your website traffic and hence helps to grow your business.

Content marketing, on the other hand, is what makes your visitors your future customers. It needs a plan for regular content creation and then sharing it or distributing it to your target audience.

You need to remember that consistently posting fresh content is important for your business but posting to only post fresh content is necessarily not going to improve your search engine rankings.

I definitely suggest you read Content marketing that increases search ranking and website traffic to learn what search engines are looking for when it comes to sound, optimized content marketing.

Standout with content marketing that uses Google Authorship

In addition, to lessen the value of traditional SEO gimmicks of the past and to make people understand the importance of real content marketing, Google also introduced Google Authorship.

Google Authorship allows writers to claim their content and publish it with their real name and photo attached to their Google+ profile.

And why does this matter to your business and its search rankings?

Here’s why: not only does Google Authorship put a damper on pirating content for the bad and ugly of SEO, it highlights those of us who are writing value-add content to help people, and not sell people.

So, don’t take content marketing light at all as Google is making every effort weed out the good, bad, and ugly of SEO using Google Authorship as a quality content marketing indicator.

If you don’t have your Google+ profile setup or Google Authorship implemented, the read and learn more about Google Authorship and what it means for your content marketing future.

In closing, know that content marketing is the wave of the future for SEO and internet marketing in general.

Plan, implement, execute, manage, and measure your content marketing strategy accordingly and see how your business grows in both short and long term.