Lesson 3: Provide Unique, Valuable Content

We have all landed on web pages that we had researched using related keywords, and found that they were nothing more than ugly clones of other worthless sites we’d found earlier. What a major disappointment...

Obviously, these sites were set up only to get clicks on their advertisements or sign-ups to a list they would soon use to bombard their subscribers with repeated offers – and sadly, never giving you what you really wanted in the first place - high quality information about the subject you had been researching!

This is definitely NOT the scenario you want for your own websites, and that’s why unique, valuable content is vital for your ongoing success and building your online reputation as a valued resource.

We’ve covered choosing your niche and good design, so now – how and where do you find top-quality content for your website?

• Finding Or Creating Unique Content: You have chosen your niche, so now you need to gather some top quality content for your site. You don’t want to ever just copy and paste, you could be violating a copyright – so read each resource carefully, to make sure you can legally use that particular information.

  The other reason for not just copying and pasting is the ‘duplicate content penalty’ that is imposed by some search engines (primarily Google). You want to come off as an expert in your field, not a copycat – so that’s another reason not to use other people’s content verbatim.

  I’ve found that using PLR articles and PLR ebooks (Private Label Rights) as the basis for creating content to be the easiest and most affordable solution. Many places online provide you with free and low-cost PLR products. Grab a few in your chosen niche and get busy!

  You can open up a PLR article in any text editor and start editing them. Add your own unique experiences, stories, anecdotes and information you have gleaned from other resources such as books, encyclopedias, life, etc.

  You can also add graphics if they are related to the subject matter – don’t just add them to make it ‘cute’ because your reader is after information, not pretty pictures. For example, if you were writing a content page on a craft site about basket weaving – you could include some helpful illustrations showing the exact ‘how-to’ of each step in the process. That would definitely add value for your reader.

• Solve A Problem: The craft site example is a good one for solving a problem. You can also choose to solve any other types of problems, relationships, household tips, gardening tips, marketing tips and so forth. People search online every single day to solve problems of one kind of another. Your site could be the one they land on first – and if you have done your homework and set it up right, you have the potential for even more referrals from your visitors and more future traffic to your product or service in the end.
• Write Your Own Content: It’s always the best option – and very likely you already know a LOT about the niche you’ve chosen, anyway. This way, your content is original, unique to you, and you can add your own personal touches to it.

  If you absolutely don’t feel like you can write at all... you can consider hiring a ghostwriter to do the writing for you. Just be sure you choose someone who is very proficient in the use of the English language or you’ll be disappointed. Ask for samples of the author’s writing before ever committing to hiring him or her!

  Most people do have some innate writing talent, whether or not they think so. After all, good writing is much like writing a letter to a dear friend, telling them all about a subject you are passionate about. Write in a natural, easy style – don’t use a bunch of big words – most people tend to prefer conversational English over formal English when reading a website, anyway.

  Give it a try, it can’t hurt, and you may be pleasantly surprised when you awaken the author within you that you really didn’t know existed before. Or, to make it a little easier that first time, use some niche related PLR articles as the base to start from, and then change it by adding some additional facts and your own personality to it, so in the end it will look and feel more like you had written it from scratch.

In the next segment we will cover that vital-to-success subject: web traffic – for without visitors, your website will just drown in a sea of billions of others – and you definitely don’t want that to happen!