That doesn’t help either. The only way to NOT get into this mess is to –pull up your socks, do your research and start writing genuine, original material.
How would you react when the second you land on a website - find it riddled with grammatical errors? Or find spaces glorified with their ‘out of this world’ products and services? Or find chunks of duplicated and regurgitated content? But not what you’re looking for?
Well, I would, without second thoughts, jump to the next site… or hit the back button to type another URL. And I’m sure you’d do the same.
The reason being, there’s more where it came from – and we would like to settle for the best; that’s the human nature. And we wouldn’t want to return to that site… ever.
Because it has left a bad taste in our mouth… and if opportunity strikes, we will jump right in to warn our colleagues and peers - About how the content ‘did not feel good’; was utterly ‘inauthentic’. Instead we may happily direct the seekers to a better site – a worthy competitor.
That is but one out of many ways, in which website with poor content gets shunned and is compelled to take the bullet train to its imminent destination - The grave.
How Crummy Content Kills Your Site
1. Crummy content doesn’t get linked.
Speaking of ‘Getting linked’, you must have figured that I am referring to the ‘Inbound Links’. Simply put – it is a link from one website to another website. Inbound links from Authority sources to your site can reel in a huge number of referral traffic; improve your SEO and help you rank better in the search engines.
But frankly, these ‘Big Name’ Authority websites aren’t even going to notice you if you splutter your website with sloppy content – let alone putting up inbound links to your site with the URL or the Anchor text (For example: www.contentmarketinginstitute.com orCMI).
Oh, and speaking of links, it doesn’t translate that you go right ahead and ask your sister to flood her blog post on ‘my dog pics’, with links to yourself.
2. Panda penalises sites with crummy content.
Google’s algorithm ‘Panda’, launched in 2011 is a ‘nightmare’ to sites with spammy, irrelevant-ads-laden, keyword-stuffed, poor-quality content. If you own such a site where the content is found to be shallow, duplicated and overlapping; or you use content farms to spin your articles, then Panda is sure to raise a flag and penalize your site.
In other words, your site rank will take a ‘nose-dive’ – rendering you to a state from where the climb can be very steep and arduous. No wonder Google came up with a cute name ‘Panda’ to soften the blow!
If you feel your content is tilting more into the Panda ‘radar’, take a look at this official guidance rolled by Google on what Panda counts as high quality sites.
3. Crummy content is not ‘Share-Worthy’.
This goes without saying that if a site is not ‘Link-Worthy’ (as in point No.1), it sure enough is not ‘Share-Worthy’.
Would you risk your name or taint your social media presence by sharing links of shabby websites or blog post to your friends? Absolutely not!
We’re always on the lookout to add more value to our image – our website, blog post, twitter handle, FB page etc. And in the inbound marketing game, the ‘value’ is pronounced with the volume of traffic that swarms to consume our content – either in the name of Facebooklikes, comments; blog post comments; Instagram shares; LinkedIn Shares or the tweets and retweets.
It is but natural that we hoard as much traffic by sharing genuine, trustworthy and engaging content. Google algorithms are also designed to give ‘thumbs up’ to content that is shared, bookmarked and recommended more often.
A content that is poor and not ‘share-worthy’ misses out on this marketing opportunities and risks losing its presence in the web.
4. With crummy content, your reputation is at stake.
When users visit your site, they like to get assured that they’re in good hands; the content they’re poring over is well worth their time and money; and they like to trust that you have the right information or answers to their queries. And don’t be fooled, the users can figure this out within 5-10 seconds of visiting your site.
You could have a dynamic responsive site with great images; but what if your content is not ‘user-centric’? What if the content brags more about your brand and products rather than providing clear, concise info and easy-to-digest answers to the visitors? What if your content is spammy and has not been updated since last two years?
If any one of these attributes is found in your site - mind you, it’s this one ‘weak link’ in the chain, which can confuse your users and send them storming off your site and they may never return.
The visitors also take this unfulfilled feeling and a deceiving, shoddy image of the site/brand along with them - A heavy blow to the site’s reputation; as this first impression will get reestablished time and again in the Facebook conversations, blog posts & comments, tweets and forums run by those unsatisfied users.
Finally…
It has been proven time and again that ‘poor’ content – in whichever form- can backfire severely and hold your brand or site’s reputation at stake.
In the race to rank higher and bring in more traffic , many a brand/site have chosen ‘keyword stuffing’ ‘content duplication’ and other ‘black hat SEO’ practices to alter their website content – only to fall flat on their faces with penalties sanctioned by Google’s algorithms.
Before, shady practices in the online marketing arena did find their ways to the top; but as of now and for the future, the world of Content Marketing screams in favour of ‘Quality Content Creation.’
If you would like to know more or would like to contribute to this article I want to hear from you.
Call Andy Fox (me) on (03) 5249-5570 or email andy@element7digital.com.au
Website is element7digital.com.au
