I think I figured out why nearly every social media blogger sounds exactly the same — commonly referred to as the “echo chamber.” I’m learning that copying and pasting can be profitable.
To unpack my point, allow me a brief explanation of content marketing.** One hot concept is using statistical methods to determine optimal “keywords” that, when used strategically in your content, result in “inbound leads.” In plain English this means embedding words about hot social media topics in your blog to snare sales prospects. People are charging for webinars on this topic so I’ll save you a few dollars/euros/dinero by providing the theory in a nutshell:
- Conduct research into the “keywords” that are leading people to your, or your competitor’s, website.
- Seed these keywords liberally and systematically into strategic places like blog headlines to fool the search engines into thinking you are the premier destination for those search terms.
- Employ “outposts” like Twitter and other social platforms to become vessels for your keywords and links.
- Attract backlinks from places also laden with keywords.
- Focus your content plan, headlines, tweetstream, etc., precisely on these key words.
- Rinse. Repeat as needed.
So within this theory, original content is secondary and it’s not really about marketing either. You identify hot topics and then engineer your content to perform a precise and technical function. The ultimate goal in this new age of content engineering is not necessarily to engage, inform or entertain. It’s to pump up your search engine results.
Let’s get back to the echo chamber. One of the master purveyors of content engineering (my term, not his) is a guy named Lee Odden. He’s pretty much the Elvis of SEO and has done some outstanding work in this field. I don’t know Lee but I read most of his posts because I think it’s important to keep on top of the latest tactics in this arena. Here is his advice from last week:
Social conversations influence search behaviors and if you can identify relevant concepts that are emerging in popularity on the social web, why not create and optimize content around those topics so you’re easily found via search engines?
So the big idea here is to simply copy what everyone else is doing and ride the wave of sameness to SEO glory. This may explain why my blog reader sounds like there’s a scratch in the record.
I have mixed feelings about this. I can’t deny there is a certain ruthless beauty about using statistical analysis to turn your content into those tentacled robots that tunneled through the rock and chased everybody on the Matrix movies. I’m a capitalist pig-dog and the idea of using data to annihilate your competition appeals to me.
But I also have a soul and I’m in love with the idea of building an audience through content that is profound, beautiful and entertaining. I think it’s possible to fight through the clutter, engage a meaningful audience and realize business benefits without pre-determining my subject matter through a statistical analysis.
On the other hand, the whole keyword thing seems a lot easier! : )
I’m really interested in your ideas on this important and fascinating trend. Will content engineering kill the soul of blogging or finally drive the measurable results effective business people demand?
** It was correctly pointed out by community member Jeremy Victor that this sentence reads as if I am fully describing the discipline of content marketing. I was not attempting to do that, I was only exploring this one “keyword engineering” aspect. Jeremy provides a more thorough explanation of content marketing in his comment on this post. Rather than re-write the original article I decided to address my insufficient description with this annotation. Thanks for keeping me honest, Jeremy.