Will Content Marketing Replace SEO?

To add to the confusion that can surrounding the term "content marketing," some are wondering what the difference is between that and SEO, and if content marketing will soon take over SEO as what is arguably the most important tool in every Internet marketer's toolkit.

First, it's important to note that content marketing will never replace SEO in full. The reason for this is that content marketing includes SEO - you can't call it content marketing unless it uses the elements of search engine optimization for making it effective.

You see, for every piece of content that you place on the web - an article in an article directory, a post to your blog or even a small blurb placed on your website's home page, if it's not search engine optimized, it's not as likely to find its way to higher search rankings where people will see it.

On the other hand, when all of your content is properly search engine optimized, each piece of that will contribute to your overall visibility by showing up higher in search rankings and getting more views and traffic to your landing page or website.

That's what content marketing is all about - getting more targeted traffic by using the fundamentals of SEO.

So the difference is that good content is what drives traffic to you, but SEO is a vital part of what makes the content good!

Since effective content marketing can't exist without SEO, and SEO is basically meaningless unless it's used correctly, you need to focus on both SEO and content marketing together if you want to really make a splash in Internet marketing.

First, let's look at what makes content good. Good content is made up of these basics: it's well written, or in the case of a video or pod cast, well delivered; it is interesting; it is unique; it offers helpful information or a solution to a problem; and it is entertaining.

In the case of being well written or delivered, the content needs to make sense, be correct as far as spelling and grammar go, and be delivered in an appealing manner. This is the foundation of good content and will set the tone for everything else.

Next, content needs to be interesting, unique and entertaining. Why? Because people have short attention spans and they don't want to be bored or to hear the same thing from you that they've already heard from ten other people.

Finally, your content should solve a problem or offer some helpful information - otherwise, why would the person be searching for this topic?

Now, as far as your focus on SEO goes, this is simple - each piece of content you deliver should be search engine optimized. That means that you must focus on using effective keywords and placing them correctly in your content. Keyword stuffing is no longer effective for getting favorable rankings with search engines - but skillful use of keywords is.

It used to be that you could stuff a web page or article full of keywords, even if they seemed to be just stuck in randomly and get good rankings on search engines. That was then - this is now. SEO has become more sophisticated out of necessity - search engines are more sophisticated.

Keywords are still the backbone of SEO and using keywords skillfully in your content is probably about the smartest thing an Internet marketer can do to get traffic and targeted attention, so we'll start there.

The basics of keywords are this: you need to thoroughly research your keywords for your chosen niche before you just randomly pick a bunch of them. While using broad keywords like "diet" for example is fine, you'll get better and more targeted rankings if you use keywords that are more pinpointed, such as "high fiber chia seed diet." When you're choosing keywords, just be sure that you take time for research and then keep track of what's working and what isn't.

Currently, search engine optimization means more than keywords. The URL of your website is important, too. It's good if your URL contains an important keyword, such as chiaseeddiet.com. Titles of blog posts and articles can also be search engine optimized with keywords. See? You're still using keywords, but not directly in your content.

Another SEO basic is links, links and links! Search engines love to see links back to your web content from other sites and this will help your content rise in the rankings. These are the basics of SEO - a great place to start and a wonderful way to work with content marketing.