A few rules to improve the quality of your content

The web is filled with articles about how your marketing strategy should be essentially based in having quality content. That will get you visits, links, and boost your SEO. But the recommendations stop there; most discussions don’t dig in the concept. What is good content? Or more specifically, what makes your content shareable so you are able to attract the most links to your page? The description about valued content is usually vague and seems to evolve with time.

A few articles, like this one http://www.searchenginejournal.com/20-ways-make-content-shareable/114975/, approach the topic and provide useful tips to improve the appeal of your page. After some research in best practices, the recipe can be boiled down to five simple rules to follow.

1. Think about the things you’d share, and use them. This is a basic but powerful rule; often visitors to your page will have similar motivations to you. If you think a piece of content is not worth it or relevant, don’t publish it.
2. What does your network want? Use analytic tools to find out about the characteristics of your audience, often it will surprise you. Analyze them, follow the trends and try to lock them in with targeted content.
3. Make it simple, attractive and structured. People feel more comfortable recommending content that is easy to understand and looks good. Also, Google gives a great value to well-structured content and rewards it with a better visibility that will increase your traffic.
4. Use CTAs (Call To Action) as much as you can. If you want people to respond to your content and recommend it, ask for it! Include “like” buttons, ask for comments, have an accessible share button, etc.
5. Update, update, update! SEO is a long-run race in which time is also a factor. If the content is not refreshed periodically the interest in your page will drop. On the other hand, updates will provide you with new links form diverse sources to the new content that will strengthen your position in search engines.