Have you ever wondered why there is so much fuss about content? The answer seems obvious – because information is the main thing web surfers are looking for. They aren't looking for you specifically, unless you're well-known. If they don't find specifically what they're looking for on your site, they will leave quickly. And will probably never return to your site rather than stumbling by pure chance.
Quality sites provide quality content. And it is quality content that helps you retain visitors. Visitors may spread the word about your site and thus attract new visitors.
Adding new high quality content to your site regularly is also beneficial. With more content, you will have more pages indexed by the search engines. That in turn means you will have more opportunities for people to find you via search engines.
Some websites may sink into oblivion because they either don't have quality content or merely duplicate content from other sites and provide nothing else of value.
I hope you are convinced that content is critical. But how do you go about getting content for your site? The sources include:
1. Your unique knowledge
Everybody knows something others don't. Use your own unique insight and knowledge to provide content. Think of what activities you've participated in the past and about things you’ve learned through past experiences. Depending on your site, any experiences can be counted, whether at home, school, work, or anywhere else. Of course, providing your own content regularly can be very difficult.
2. Personal stories
Personal stories provide the basis for some sites and blogs. Want to connect with your audience and let them know more about you? Go on and use personal stories. However, if you don't want to be too personal, just make sure you inject your personality into your writing. Personality differentiates you from the rest and can keep visitors coming back.
3. How-to guides
People have problems and want to figure out how to solve them. I’m sure you’ve had some problem you struggled with for a while. Did you eventually solve it? The way you solved it could be written into a how-to guide. Or write a how-to guide about your expert area. For example, if you're a technical computer whiz, you could write a how-to guide for fixing computers.
4. Research
Do some research on the web. Follow links from search engines and search directories to find relevant sites. Or, in an exotic fashion, you may do some research at your local library. Grab some books about your site's topic and start digging through them. Find local experts, teachers, and professors and ask them questions about your site's topic. When you research, note down interesting ideas and you'll undoubtedly learn more. You'll have more unique knowledge that you can turn into content. You might even discover something ground-breaking!
5. Newsletters
Good newsletters are a great way to keep informed about a particular topic. They can keep you informed of offers that you may be able to provide on your own site. Also, they can keep you on top of what's happening in your area by providing time-sensitive content.
6. Provide news
News can keep you informed of what's happening in your chosen area. Go to a news site and search for information about your site's topic. Think of your visitors and what would benefit them the most. Think of what they would want to read about. Provide your own comments on the news stories you feature. If there's a lot of news out there, weed out the duplicate ones.
7. Use RSS
Websites use RSS to share their content easily. With RSS you can receive headlines from news sites and other types of sites like blogs. If you have a favorite news service or a blog that is pertinent to your site’s theme, consider displaying its RSS feed. Some people use RSS aggregators to combine various RSS feeds.
8. Hire writers
Everything doesn't have to done yourself, unless you really want it this way. Go to a service like elance.com or rentacoder.com and have others write articles for you. The quality of the articles can vary a bit, so try to make sure you get a good writer. Hiring writers can save you time and cover areas in which you are lacking.
9. Rewrite content with your own spin
Take a piece of content from anywhere, like a book, a newspaper article, a magazine, or a website and use it as a base article. Read it over and analyze it. Looking at other sources of content on the same topic helps as well. After you've digested everything, write content that combines what you've just learned. Add in your own spin and your own unique knowledge.
10. Article directories
Article directories are great since they're free content. But they're not absolutely free as you usually have to leave the resource box intact. It's a win-win situation, though. The article writer builds up his or her reputation and gains inbound links. On the other side, you can gain content and though it more search engine traffic.
Some people worry about a duplicate content penalty, which means they risk getting a lower search engine ranking for using content that is available elsewhere. However, it's utterly impossible for every good page to be unique. For example, if a news story breaks out, there are many sources that report it. But these sources may add their own slant to the story.
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