Every website, no matter what industry it is in, needs to have more than product listings and a checkout screen. If you want your site to continually bring in new traffic, you’ll need to make sure that your site ranks well in the major search engines. In order to rank better in search engine results, you need to build out your website to attract additional traffic, which will make you appear authoritative to the search engines and show that you maintain your site. A quick and easy way to do this is to add meaningful content to your site.
It’s Easy to Build Content… If You Have Ideas
Adding content may be the simplest initial solution, but it gets increasingly difficult as time goes by and your initial writing ideas are exhausted. You may be willing to write additional blog posts or informative articles, but you just can’t find anything else to write about. To prevent running out of things to write about, let me suggest two easy ways you can generate sure-fire content ideas for any industry.
Sign Up For A Feed Aggregator – It’s Like a Personal Newspaper
First, sign up for a feed aggregator. If you have a Google account, you already have access to Google Reader, an excellent beginner’s online feed aggregator. (I’ve listed a few more options below that you can use as alternatives, including some dedicated applications.) This simple site will allow you to track additions to your favorite websites without having to visit them individually. Imagine that this feed aggregator is like a personal newspaper, where you decide what sort of stories should be covered and what sources you like best. Nothing will appear on your feed aggregator without you selecting it, but this process is pretty simple. Just visit your favorite websites and look for the RSS Feed logo. Once you click on it, you’ll either be given a number of buttons you can click on (if you’re using Google Reader, click on the “Add to Google” button) or you’ll see a lot of HTML code pop up on your screen. Click on the appropriate button for your aggregator if you can, otherwise, press the back button, right click on the RSS Feed logo, select “copy link address,” then paste the address into the add a subscription button on the aggregator’s page. To make things even easier, some aggregators offer buttons that you can add to your bookmarks bar that allow you to add a feed by clicking that button. Check out the settings page for further instructions, and always take time to read the FAQs.
Most online aggregators will more than get the job done, but some include more advanced functions that may be worth investigating as you become more familiar with feeds. Take a few weeks to play around with the aggregator you chose, make sure that you add your favorite websites or other sites you come across, then marvel at your ability to scan thousands of articles each day. As your list of feeds grows, organization will be key, so start using folders to keep groups of similar websites together.
Here’s a list of some of the available online aggregators and aggregator programs:
Online:
Applications:
- Newsgator (OSX & Windows)
Browser Applications:
Google Alerts Keep You in the Know Instantly!
Second, if you also have the time to scan tons of emails every day, you can sign up for Google alerts for news, blogs or mentions of any topic, keyword or term. Google alerts follow the same framework as Google searches, so you’ll want to try to narrow your terms down as much as possible. Think of specific phrases that interest you or represent significant portions of the industry, or use some of the keywords that are driving traffic to your site. One thing to definitely do is to set up a Google Alert for your company’s name – it’ll let you know whenever someone is talking about you by name online, positively or negatively. You may want to set up a separate email account for this purpose if you find Google alerts begin to overwhelm your mailbox.
Use Instapaper Instead of Bookmarks & Reduce Clutter
One final minor tip: If you are the sort of person that constantly comes across interesting information that you would like to use to create content for your site, consider signing up for an account at Instapaper. The website allows you to save a link to a website or a copy of the text of that website with the single click of a button. You can then organize the sites and information you save into folders that can be accessed at anytime. This is a great way to save ideas for a rainy day or to build up a collection of sites that mention you or your product. Even better, the link is removed once you read it. Unlike bookmarks that have to be manually deleted, Instapaper saved pages automatically move to the archive once you click on them, so you don’t have to worry if you’ll waste time reading something you’ve read before.
Summary
Using these methods to generate content ideas will help you keep your site fresh and current. You’ll find new ways to draw traffic and improve your search engine rankings. Creating content takes a lot of time, which few people have these days. With these tips, you can cut your pre-writing time down significantly by reducing the time you spend deciding what to write about, leaving you with more time to build out your site.
By RocketClicks Staff
Source for Aggregator Links:
