Hello, fellow content gems!

Welcome to a new month here! It’s officially Groundhog Day, which got me thinking about the classic movie and how it can relate to us in the content industry.

If you haven’t watched it yet, today might be the day. The premise is that this selfish, nonchalant character gets ‘stuck’ reliving the same day over and over again, no matter what he tries.

And he learns some lessons along the way, of course.

For us in content and SEO, it can sometimes ‘feel’ that we’re reliving the same day over and over again.

In the realm of content, it's easy to fall into a repetitive cycle, much like our Groundhog Day curmudgeon protagonist. Yet, every day presents an opportunity to break free and redefine our approach.

If this salty character can have a perspective shift, so can we.

What if we focused our content goals on something other than SEO traffic?

What if we didn’t dwell on building large audiences on every social media platform out there?

What could we do better to really help someone?

Or create real dialogues with our audiences?

Or build publications that really matter to someone.

When you’re in the digital content marketing space, SEO, traffic, and audience size can all get overblown as North stars, but there’s so much more to content marketing than this.

Our goal in content marketing should be to provide actual, real, life-changing value for people.

If we can master this, the audience will be there.

This brings us to what I want to discuss today — content optimizations.

It's not just about tweaking for rankings; it's about meaningfully enhancing our content's value and relevance.

Content Optimizations 101

I have been thinking a lot about content optimizations lately. I still believe this is one of the best ROIs for most publications and companies. While producing fresh new content is fun, we can often see a greater initial lift in improving our existing content.

Content optimizations have always been a big part of what we do at Venture 4th Media, and we’ve worked with other publishers and brands to help them improve their content.

I like to think of content as a living, breathing thing that needs continual love, care, and nurturing.

But the easy-win things we used to do don’t work anymore.

Brandon from Retro Dodo took the hot seat with Google this week, and while some of Google's responses may help improve the article he asked about, I think Google missed the boat and really, really didn’t ‘read the room.’

But the discussion got me thinking.

I know that Google can be a great source of traffic. I mean, we’ve grown our businesses on Google and rode the rollercoaster for over a decade.

But, when it comes to our overall content marketing strategy, shouldn’t we do more than cater to Google’s whims?

Brandon and the team at Retro Dodo have done a lot of things right:

• They have an authentic brand and identity.

• They have real, dedicated fans and readers who love what they do.

• And they actually do the things they say they do and share a ton of videos to prove it.

Reflecting on Brandon's experience and Retro Dodo's success (despite these recent downturns), it's clear that authenticity, engagement, and brand identity far outweigh the fleeting gains from just SEO-centric adjustments. I am sure the tides will shift for them in Google as well, but we’ll have to see.

So, it’s time we stayed the course and thought outside the SEO box for now.

We cannot wait for Google to be better to make our content better.

This means we need to consider how, why, and what we optimize, but I’m here for all of that!

Typical SEO Content Optimization of Days Past

When people talk about content optimizations, this is what I usually see:

• We’re ranking in 7th position; let’s make some tweaks and get pushed up the rankings.

• Let’s use ___ (SEO optimization tool) to tell us what keywords we’re missing.

• Let’s add more content to this post to make it ‘better.’

There are many content optimization tools out there that can help us with this as well. While there are some good ones, most of us have used these tools to ‘keyword stuff’ or update headings to be what we have considered more SEO-friendly.

While many of these tools and optimization methods ‘worked’ in the past, I don’t think we can get quick wins with them like we used to.

But this is a good thing.

If we only optimize for SEO, we’ve missed the big picture (providing real value for our audiences).

While our past efforts in SEO content optimization focused on climbing the SERPs through tactical tweaks, the evolving digital landscape invites us to broaden our horizons.

This shift isn't just necessary; it's an opportunity to deepen our impact and enrich the value of our content.

There are Many Types of Content Optimizations You Should Do Today in Content

Over the next few weeks, we’ll dive deeper into some of these, but I thought I’d start this week with an overview to broaden our thinking about improving our content.

Here are just a few ways we can make content better:

1. The un-optimization optimization (De-SEO-ing and brightening up our content)

2. The EEAT or content quality optimization - Article Level

   1. Find better sources to quote

   2. Update stats, information

   3. Update and check external sources

   4. Optimizing with point of view in mind

   5. Creativity and readability

   6. Internal linking to help readers dive in more

   7. Fact-checking (builds trust)

3. The EEAT or brand building optimization - Site Level

4. The user intent optimization

5. The monetization optimization

6. Content cluster optimizations

7. Pillar post optimizations

8. Semantic richness optimizations (Much different than keyword stuffing of olden times)

9. User experience and content design optimizations

10. Accessibility optimizations

These are just a few of the optimization layers we can do to improve our content that goes way beyond tweaking to get higher in the SERPs.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll delve into some of these a bit more.

For now, let’s remember that we’re here for our people, not for the algorithms.

Here's to content that sparks joy, not just traffic!

🤔 Content Musings of the Week

📈 Growth is never as linear as we think it should be.

🔑 Success hinges not on audience size but on engagement. A smaller, connected community trumps a large, disengaged crowd every time.

💰 Feeling like we're in a gold rush of spam right now? It won't last. Great content will.

🌟 Google needs original content. AI needs original content. These ecosystems cannot survive without creatives.

Things to Read, Watch, and Ponder

▶️ Writing is hard. Building an audience is hard, but does it have to be? This insightful piece from Howard Gray got me thinking about what we really need to do in content (your audience doesn’t need to be as big as you think!). Read it here!

▶️ If you want to learn the basics of SEO, this course from Eli Schwartz covers all the basics and is only 6.99 right now! (This is an unsponsored plug). Check it out here!

▶️ What’s it like working for a huge, failing publisher? This firsthand account from Jordan Hoffman, from his final days at The Messenger gives an insight we often don’t see. Read to get the full story here.

▶️ Ahrefs just documented 67 types of SEO. Get the full list here. 

▶️ If brands want to build authentic relationships with their audiences, should they embrace their flaws? Robert Rose seems to think so. I do, too. Get some tips on what this looks like here!

▶️ Semrush just released their 2024 AI in Content Marketing Report. Learn from 2600+ businesses and 8 industry experts. Get the report here. 

▶️ If you want to go down the rabbit hole of entities for SEO, I cannot recommend this guide more! Check it out!

Thanks for joining me on this journey every week.

Like our friend in Groundhog Day, we might feel stuck in an endless loop of content creation.

So, here’s to breaking that loop with fresh perspectives and transformative content strategies this week.

Cheers! Amy

P.S.) We have room for a few select partners ready to supercharge their content marketing.

Starting with a detailed site and content assessment, we'll lay out clear costs and growth opportunities—ensuring you see the ROI before diving in. Ready for an expert perspective on elevating your content?

Schedule a free chat with me here. 

Some Bonus Newsletters You’ll Love

If you want to get into the weeds on these topics, here are some newsletters that I read regularly that I think you’ll enjoy: