For some reason there seems to be a misconception out there that content is cheap and that it’s OK to pay $10 for an article to be published online. Are you kidding? Content is the foundation of everything that you do online, particularly of an online marketing strategy. If you think that it’s OK to be a cheapskate when it comes to content, you are very wrong.
Think about it. You don’t need to be a genius to know that the content that you are reading online was thrown together in ten minutes, written by someone that doesn’t speak the language as their first language, or doesn’t have much knowledge of the topic being discussed. Would you take an individual or a business that published this kind of content seriously? Probably not.
Online content should be handled with the same care that offline content is handled. If you were buying a $1000 print ad, would you allow it to be haphazardly thrown together by someone that was paid a minimum rate? Or even worse, by a non-paid intern? Doubt it. So why do businesses think it’s OK when it comes to web content?
Perhaps one explanation is that they simply don’t “get” the medium. They were told once upon a time that in order to build up their search engine visibility they needed to build up their links so they became so focused on quantity over quality and forgot about what truly mattered. They worried so much about keyword density to attract the search engines that they were churning out poor content that didn’t resonate with their target audience.
Another possible explanation is that they got too caught up with the “free” nature of the Internet. It’s “free” to publish a blog post, submit an article, sign up for social media accounts, and upload videos online. So the content should be free (or cheap) too, right? Wrong. While it may be “free” to participate in all of those online branding and link building tactics, it takes time and effort, which usually translates into money.
The bottom line is that online content is an important representation of your brand. Your work should be of good quality at all of your touchpoints. If you want it done right, you need to accept that it costs money. For a good piece of content, you need to be willing to pay $50-$200, and possibly more depending on the nature of the content. It’s worth spending money on a writer that has knowledge or even paying someone to get the knowledge. An in house content writer or contract writer that knows the ins and outs of your business and industry is invaluable.
About the Author:
Brick Marketing is a Boston, MA based SEO services company. For more information please call 781-999-1222 or visit http://www.brickmarketing.com.
The best of contents is available online for free. I wish you had also revealed the ways to monetize it.
The best of contents is available online for free. I wish you had also revealed the ways to monetize it. How do you ensure it? Do let us know.
There we have it, the only two comments to your exceptionally good article is that “The best of contents is available online for free”.
It will be some time until people realize that writing is a skilled job, as is translating which I also do as a remote writer, yet, how do companies assume that I can pay my bills if I work for free?
You haven’t mentioned the “article spinning” community that sell such bad articles, spun up to 1200 times (the mind boggles) and think nobody notices it. A good writer can see a spun article at a glance since words are often used in an “unusual” way, i.e. Thesaurus suggestions.
Apart from the fact that we don’t need the same information written badly 1200 times, Google also has a way of determining “spun” articles, it seems to me.
Well, anybody want a really good article or translation and pay for it, simply contact me!
An excellent starting point… the reference to “free” and “written by someone that doesn’t speak the language” leads me to think of blog owners which write in order to gain SEO rank and sell ads and affiliate space. It would be nice to read about the other side of the coin, the professionally written, serious blogs. A small fact: did you know that the Google blog, on Blogger is the main outlet of Google information? Google actually does not have a site the way other companies do. Take a look at Google product pages and compare them to the Google blog: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/
I absolutely agree with you Brick. The web is just another medium.
The principles of excellence, professionalism, brand, credibility, and resonance apply in every medium. As you say, companies wouldn’t dream of throwing cheap, slap-up, content into other mediums like brochures or magazine ads.
The technology ‘framework’ may be free, but content is still person-to-person, regardless of the medium. At the end of the day, people do business with people.
Bottomline is people are attracted to well-written contents. What most marketers think is how to spend less and earn more. If you want to generate quality backlinks or have a good stream of traffic to your site then invest to meticulously written contents. Yes, they may cost most but at the end, it’s all worth it.
Content may be King, but royalties is expensive to maintain, particularly for the Internet. “It was one of the early epiphanies of the Web: imagine how much cheaper it would be to produce an online magazine,” Jennifer Greenstein wrote recently in The Standard. “Printing of most burdensome cost that would go: the paper, printing, mailing it to readers … But if one after the other site, content that epiphany has hit financial sled turned out to be an illusion. “
I can immediately tell if an article has been written by a non native or spun a million times. It just means I don’t bother to finish reading it. But some people don’t care – it’s there purely for SEO purposes usually
Could not agree more, the best content is free, we can also call it guess blogging, I do feel it is also important to note that getting free content is a whole lot easier when your site has good rankings as it will be beneficial for both parties, the guest & website owner.
It’s definately quality over quantity to get your website ranked well in google, quality everything is the way forward.
very excellent content this blog…..thanks