Building a Content Rich Website - Part 2

Beyond the benefit of keeping your content dynamic, it is useless to create content for the sake of having it. If you want to be successful online, you need to determine what you are trying to say or sell and who you are trying to say and sell it to. Make sure your target audience is highly qualified. You don't want your audience to be, for example, women because your message would have to be too broad and diluted to reach this entire demographic. Having a generic message will do little to make you stand out from the crowd. Once you have identified your target audience, determine what they are likely to want from you - as a provider - and then develop quality content that meets these needs or subtly points to your products as solutions.

by: Byron Stuart

Lots of quality content is the key to lots of traffic. What does this mean and why is it so?

Derek Gehl (from http://www.marketingtips.com/) says that the vast majority of people surfing the net are are looking for information. This also means that they are not looking to buy. It then follows in most cases that if they click through to a site that is obviously trying to make a sale they are unlikely to stay on that site.

So how do you provide visitors to your site with the sort of content they're looking for? Firstly you need to find out the sort of questions that your target market is asking. Once you know those sort of questions you can set about finding the answers either yourself or paying someone to do it for you.

It is worthwhile at this point to check that you actually know your target market well because if you don't know what you're aiming at then how are you going to hit the target? You should also be careful not to target too broad a market because then you will have a lot of competition, potentially limiting your ability to make money. Do some keyword research (a good place to start is http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/) to help you find out if you should narrow your target market.

This keyword tool is no more, but there are plenty more you can try. http://tools.seobook.com is a great resource, and you can find some of our favorite toys on our tools page. Keyword research is a great way to get you into the mind of your audience. What are they searching for and what methods are they using to look for what I am offering? Remember - the best websites, blogs, products and content are the ones that are created with the
searcher in mind. Always.

How can you find out the sort of questions your target market is looking to find answers for? There are several ways you can do this. One of the easiest ways is to spend time in user forums specific to your target market. In those forums you can easily read the sort of questions people are asking.

If the answers are readily available (web, library etc) then you can simply reproduce those answers (being careful not to infringe copywrite) on your site. If the answers are hard to find then this signals a great opportunity for you to get the answers, possibly even a potential product you could create!

Another way to research your target market is to set up a survey on your site and do some targeted advertising requesting people to help you with some market research. You'll be pleasantly surprised at how many people who are struggling to find answers will be willing to do this. It is best to be upfront about your intentions for collecting the market research. Why not just tell them that you are going to answer their questions once you've determined the issues that are of the most importantance to the target audience. The reward for those who are generous enough to fill out your survey is they will be glad for the new content you provide and you could even give them a free copy of your new product if you create one. If you do have a product this also gives you a potential source for obtaining the all important testimonials you need for your sales copy when you officially launch it.

An alternative way to research your target market is to try and do a joint venture with someone who already has an established audience in a similar niche/topic. Of course if you do it this way you need to be very careful that you frame it such a way that it is a win-win for you both. Also you need to ensure that you don't give them the opportunity to steal your product idea before you have formally made any binding arrangements. If you are able to negotiate through these initial hurdles then you will have the captive audience that you can ask questions of.

So once you have clearly identified the target market and established through careful research (not by guesswork) what sort of content they would appreciate you are then ready to go ahead and create that content! This is easy to do even if you're not a writer and will be the subject of my next article.

Forums and online communities are a great way to get real, honest feedback and input from your target audience. Adding to these discussions and establishing yourself in these arenas can help you to develop interest for your site. Just be careful not to look like a spammer by blatantly and shamelessly selling yourself. Today's users are eager to find trusted providers, but they are more likely to trust providers who can establish their value and credibility through information and solutions, not ad content and hook lines.

About The Author
Byron Stuart is an internet marketer, author and software developer. To find out how to build content rich profitable websites quicky and easily see http://www.ultimatecontentcreator.com.

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