Content marketing is more than just writing a great blog post. We are going to assume you have a good team writing interesting and grammatically correct blog posts. But you need to do more if you want your content to fuel your rise in search rankings.

Here are just a few simple steps you can take to supercharge your blog posts to support your search engine optimization plan. The nice thing is these same strategies will actually improve your written content so real people will appreciate it as well.

SEO Basics

Keyword research – While you think you know the words and phrases people use to find you, it helps to check from time to time. I also like to use the keyword tool to suggest alternative phrases to give some variety to my copy.

For example we often use terms like marketing tools, marketing resources, and marketing tips. A few years ago, I checked Google KeyWord planning tool and discovered that the phrase marketing ideas was searched more often. With just a few edits to existing blog posts, we started seeing an improvement in our resource posts.

Write the best content – If you are trying to rank for an especially competitive keyword, be ruthless when you look at your content. If it isn’t the best available information on the topic, why should Google put your post on page one?

This is not a case where sheer quantity wins. Quality counts when it comes to earning positions in search.

Go for the niche – Everyone wants to write the general blog post “5 ways to improve …” If you really want some SEO benefit from your post, go deep, writing one blog post on each point. Do your homework, and give real, actionable ideas, not just the same recycled five suggestions I can find on a number of your competitors’ blogs.

Another approach is to focus on a specific customer. Everyone wants to know if your approach will work for companies or people like them. Instead of the general post, find a few industry specific suggestions and write: “5 Ways Plumbers Can Improve….”

Pay attention to structure – Make sure page titles and permalinks are unique for each blog post and relevant to the key word. Your meta description should also contain your primary key word. This sounds a bit technical but if you are using WordPress the Yoast plugin will do most of the heavy lifting for you.

Don’t forget the pictures – There should be an interesting header image, which is also featured in your social media shares. Make sure the image is also titled correctly with a description that also includes the key words you want to rank for. Image search is a powerful source of traffic to your website.

Strong Call to Action

Ok, so this is not an SEO tool, but if you are going to the trouble of bringing people to your site, make sure they know what they are supposed to do when they arrive.