10 Unique Ways Small Businesses Can Win at Link Earning (Part I of II) by @DholakiyaPratik

We’re seeing the industry shift now that massive corporations finally understand the value of online marketing. Enterprise level SEO is becoming more prominent. This is a great opportunity for SEOs who can appeal to clients with that stature, but it presents a problem to SEOs and small businesses who have limited resources.

In a world of massive promotions and big budgets, how can small businesses and local search optimizers set themselves apart? Here are first five strategies you can leverage to grab that much needed attention in the online sphere.

1. Host an Event
Events can be an incredibly powerful way to capture links that would otherwise be impossible. It’s so effective that any local event of sufficient size is bound to attract some links. That said, you can really up the ante and pull in a huge amount of SEO value if you optimize the event for online benefit.
First things first; you’ll need an event page on your site. Without a page, you’ll miss out on a tremendous amount of SEO value. This is the page you want to promote through all of your online and social media channels.

If you’re selling tickets, keep the ticket sales page separate. If you use Eventbrite to set up ticket sales, you can get a followed link out of it. Same goes for Brown Paper Tickets. Meanwhile, you should be able to get your event listed in tons of event listing directories and local newspapers. These are relevant directories that people actually use, so they make for perfect links. Yes, you should take advantage of listings even if they’re nofollow, assuming there’s any real traffic potential (and there always should be when you are manually building links).

In addition to local event sites, you should also take advantage of national ones like Meetup, Eventful, and Events.org.

Since odds are high you aren’t the first business to host an event in your area, there’s also nothing wrong with scoping some of the other local event pages with Open Site Explorer to see where they’re getting their links.

I hope it’s obvious that your event should be more than a tool to get links from event sites. You may need to hire a contractor to set up the event (preferably one who links to their clients), and you should certainly put a great deal of thought into how to monetize the event, or at least make it pay for itself.
Be sure to capitalize on the local features of Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Foursquare to reach as many people as possible. Your link building efforts shouldn’t stop there either. Do some outreach and, if possible, work with some local micro-celebrities to capture as much attention as possible.
Assuming you have a local location to promote, be sure to get your business address attached to as many of your links as possible. Those citations are solid gold. Even if the event is hosted somewhere else, there’s no reason you can’t say something along the lines of: “For more information, get in touch at…”
Also be sure to cash in on Schema.org markup to get rich snippets in the search results.

2. Sponsor a Charity
Have a cause you care about? There’s no shame in getting some SEO value out of it while also using it to help improve your reputation. It would be beyond cynical, and unlikely to pay off, if you tried to use charities for SEO alone, but there’s no reason not to make the most of it when you do. Local businesses are the biggest contributors to charities, and they can be a great opportunity.

The most obvious bit of SEO value is a link to your site from the charity as one of their sponsors. Many charities do this simply by default, and many that don’t will still be happy to send a link to return the favor.
Causes and charities also tend to spread through social networks more readily than just about any business message. If you embrace a cause and promote it on social networks, this can be a great way to expand your reach.

Be careful when mixing promotion and charity work, however. Business involvement in social causes is often viewed with skepticism, and if you blatantly capitalize you may end up getting shunned. Only embrace those causes that you sincerely believe in. SEO and other marketing efforts should always come second.

3. Build a Tool
We’ve been mentioning tools frequently as of late, and with good reason. The most popular sites on the web are all tools, not what would traditionally be called content sites. Tools naturally attract links because they are inherently more engaging than passive content.

While a content-driven strategy certainly does require a great deal of creativity and skill, tools arguably require even more creativity. Content at least obeys a preset format: blog post, video, infographic, white paper. It may take creativity, research, and ingenuity to figure out what the content should be about and the best way to put it together, but at least you have some idea of what the end product is going to look like.
Tools are very different. Google, Facebook, and Twitter were like nothing that had come before them. Tools are designed entirely around the problem they are meant to solve, and take on completely novel forms every time they are created.

For this reason, it’s difficult to give advice on how to create a tool for SEO value. You’ll need coders, graphic designers, and a spark of ingenuity. Beyond that, the sky’s the limit. The most linked to sites on the web don’t lie. Tools that people find useful or entertaining grab more links than anything else on the web.

4. Get in Your Local Newspaper
Why go for small time blogs when you can get listed in the most reputable publication in your area? Local newspapers are hungry for content just like bloggers, and there’s nothing stopping you from getting an entry in your local paper if you put your mind to it.

Making the paper is all about one thing: being newsworthy. The rest is window dressing. If you can bring something to the table that they haven’t reported on before, that will interest their readers, then you’re already halfway there. It’s all about the “inside scoop.” What can you reveal to the press that will intrigue them?

If you don’t think you have the writing skills to make the cut, there’s a fairly simple solution for that as well. Hire somebody who’s made it into the local paper before. Ask them for feedback on whether the idea is newsworthy, and let them take it from concept to published article. A one-off job is worth the money if it means a link from an established publisher.

A word of caution here, however. Make sure the content is actually going to make it to the web. Many local newspapers only published half of their content online, and many of them delete it as time goes by. Don’t bother working with a paper unless you know the content is going to make it online and stay there. Unless, of course, the paper would bring so much exposure that it would result in natural links from secondary sources.

5. Befriend the Mom Bloggers
I’m generalizing a bit when I say “mom” blogger. They don’t need to be moms, or even female. The point is, small blogs with tightly knit communities are some of the most powerful forces to be reckoned with on the web. These small communities have tremendous influence on social networks. The community members tend to know each other very well and have developed a great deal of trust.

There are undoubtedly “mom” bloggers in your area. They keep online food diaries, review products, share design inspiration, and dominate Pinterest. Get these people on your side and you won’t just see links with SEO value, you’ll see referral traffic that doesn’t quit.

Conclusion
Expanding your reach doesn’t have to involve making connections with widely popular influencers. Sometimes the smallest influencers are the most truly influential. Make friends with these people, maybe even hire them. The rewards are incredible.
(More 5 strategies to come in the 2nd part of this post)
What are your thoughts on these strategies? Got anything to add?

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PPC Tracking and Goals – You May Be Getting Them Wrong by @JCorriganSEO

What makes up a paid search account? Of course you have your website and your account manager platform(s), most likely AdWords and Bing Ads. You also have your campaigns, ad groups, keywords, & ads. But are you forgetting your tracking, and are you creating appropriate goals?One too many times I have had clients who have either missed the boat on tracking implementation or have designated goals that are not relevant to the reason why their site was created in the first place. It’s extremely important that you understand the possible fallacies of each particular paid search characteristic in order to ensure that you are running a successful paid search account.

In this post, we’ll explain why and how to use the Google Tag Manager to plug holes (and improve accuracy) in your tracking, and we’ll explain how to set up actionable goal reporting in AdWords and Google AnalyticsUse the Google Tag Manager for TrackingThis one seems simple: no tracking, no data. So get tracking and you will get data. Easy enough, right? Wrong. Before you go and drop pixels all over your website coding, be sure you are aware of all of your options.Because new pixels keep showing up from various sources, it would be best to implement or have your development team implement the Google Tag Manager. This will give you more control on all the pixels, also known as tags, within your site if you don’t deal with the coding. If you do deal with the coding, then this will make your job much easier and keep your pixels together.The Google Tag Manager just creates one pixel for you to add. Once the container tag is added, you can manage all other tags within the Tag Manager. The container tag can also speed up your loading time for your pages. This isn’t because fewer pixels are firing, because there shouldn’t be fewer pixels firing, but because the container snippet executes asynchronously.
The tag manager also has two features that I am a huge fan of. The first is the preview mode. This allows you to review how your tag will work to make sure it is firing correctly. The other is that it gives you the ability to create rules and macros to tell the tag when to fire. This option provides a lot of flexibility, as you can create rules/macros based on URLs, referrals, events, and other custom values such as how much a user spends.The advantages to implementing the Google Tag Manager snippet are endless. But just to review what we went over, here is a list of the benefits of using the Google Tag Manager:Don’t need to bug your development team to keep adding tagsOrganizes all of your tags in one location for easy managementCan speed up the loading time of your siteCan create rules and macros to tell the tag when to fireCan use the Tag Manager for Google & non-Google tagsPreview mode enables you to ensure tags are firing appropriatelyThe container tag snippet should be placed on every page within your site at the top of the opening body tag. The only exception is that if there are any variables that the container snippet should use that fire on the page load, the container snippet should be placed underneath those variables but still within the body tag. And while you implement the container snippet, be sure to remove those existing pixels that have been added to the tag manager. Otherwise you will be double-counting.If you are not using the Tag Manager because your site uses few pixels, be sure that you are recording the most accurate data. For example, if you are recording registrations, be sure that you have a page that only shows up when the user has registered, such as a thank-you or confirmation page. Here’s a scenario where loose recording can complicate things:There will be people who, by force of habit, click through a paid ad even though they have already been to your site and registered. When they do this, depending on where your pixel is placed, it will cause the pixel to fire again even though they have already registered. In this scenario, it is usually the branded keywords that are inflated.While you may have some third-party platform that accurately records conversions, the scenario still creates a few problems. The first is that it makes data-gathering more tedious and more time-consuming. The second is that because there are extra steps in gathering data, this increases the likelihood of errors. And the last problem is that not having accurate data in AdWords pretty much rules you out of using any neat features that Google comes up with, such as the conversion optimizer.Set Up Smarter Goal ReportingThere are many actions that can be tracked through Analytics. It is a great tool that should be used when evaluating data and patterns of your audience in order to optimize your site. And AdWords allows you to import your Analytics’ goals. (If you do this, be careful that you don’t double-count the data by assigning a goal in Analytics that resembles a conversion in AdWords. You can find more information on how to link Analytics & AdWords here.)GOAL FLOW IN GOOGLE ANALYTICSWhile all of this is helpful in developing strategies, it is easy to overlook the overall goal. Here’s a good way to break it down:The overall goal, such as registrations or sales, should be tracked in AdWords if you are buying into paid search.The steps before and after the overall goal should be tracked in Analytics.Let’s say you have a site that has four different ways a user can convert. One of those conversion types is getting a user to pay for a type of membership. The others are registrations, calls, & downloads. AdWords can track all of these but data behind their actions isn’t accurate because AdWords groups them all together. You can segment the conversion types, but then it gets complicated when dealing with the metrics.If you know which conversion is the most important, it would be best to just track that one conversion in AdWords and track the other actions in Analytics. This will make more sense when it comes to optimizing for a stronger CPA, ROAS, or any other metric. Plus, this will give you more options to use AdWords’ features like the Conversion Optimizer.After setting up your goals in Analytics and syncing with AdWords, you will be able to develop strategies on your landing pages. The strategies will be based on more information than just your conversion rate. You can see what is working and what isn’t within your pages. Leverage all of this data when coming up with new strategies, but make sure all of the data is being collected accurately and in a helpful and easy-to-read way.


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How Traditional Guest Blogging Practices Will Change After Next Major Penguin Update

The most popular way of building back links right now is guest blogging. Why is it so popular? Simple, it’s so effective at driving up keyword rankings – when it’s done consistently and when those guest posts are published on authoritative domains that are relevant.

It’s been in the back of my mind for some time now, actually since the first iteration of the Google Penguin update, that guest blogging may become a target of Google. I believe that guest blogging will still continue to be effective after the next major Penguin update, however the way in which you build links through guest blogging will change.

This is how I think guest bloggers will be impacted:

Devaluation of Websites
Sites that have the majority of their outbound links pointing at a single website will eventually be tagged with a penalty. Google likes it best when you link to lots of different websites that are authoritative. When you write, find ways to naturally work those types of links into your content.
Websites that do not create pages that have substantial content or that create non-relevant content are going to be tagged with a penalty. If they aren’t tagged with a penalty then at the very least the links within their content won’t pass much authority or weight.

Bloggers who make a habit of regularly publishing non-relevant links and content together will have their blogs significantly devalued.

When you research your list of potential candidate websites to guest blog for, you want to short list those that do not link to low quality websites and that are very relevant to the site you intend to have linked to within the post you will write for them. Don’t be afraid to link out within your guest blog post to other sites which you have no vested interest in but that offer value to the reader or contribute significantly to the content of your post.

Devaluation of Back Links
Using a keyword rich text link in the first paragraph of your guest blog post? Those links will likely carry less weight soon.

Rehashing older previously published content and re-publishing it with embedded links? Those types of links will also not carry as much weight in future. They’ve already lost some value over the past year. This trend will continue.

The links that you acquire within the author bio section of your guest blog posts no longer carry the same weight as they did previously. In future it is possible and likely that those links will offer even less weight and value than they currently do. Google will be a lot more selective about whose links receive more or less weight.

Don’t waste your time with techniques that allow you to easily and quickly acquire links in bunches. Put more emphasis on building value into the content you create. Creating fantastic content will garner links from people that naturally want to link to your content. If that sounds like deja vu to you, that’s because you’ve probably been told this numerous times before.

The Rise of Co-occurrence As a Ranking Factor
Traditional signals that influence rankings: keyword placement, anchor text, links and authority – have long been a staple practice when trying to get a website to rank high. Over the past several years there’s been a trend of citations emerging to improve local rankings and to date I think that we’re witnessing more co-occurrence of words, phrases and links within search queries and textual content having more of an influence in rankings. Anchor text will likely still play an important role and provide signals but soon Google will be looking at links and anchor text in a totally different way.

You can see examples of co-occurrence in play anytime you look through a Google results page for a query and find sites ranking high without the presence of authoritative links, relevant anchor text back links, the search query in the HTML title and a sprinkling of query occurrences in the document body.

In a very brief way it can be explained that co-occurrence is about the presence and frequency of terms that tend to co-occur on the same pages without being hyperlinked. The concept of co-occurrence and the theory behind how it works and how Google may be using it is extensive. More extensive than what we are covering here in this post. Here’s a better and more in-depth explanation of what co-occurrence is.
Your take away from this: Don’t think it always necessary to link back to your website from inside of your guest blog post. Create useful and engaging content that educates readers. You can make a mention of your company without hyperlinking to your company, if it’s appropriate to do so. Rarely is it appropriate to mention your company in a guest blog post outside of the author bio section, unless you’re linking to content that substantially adds knowledge and support to your guest post.

Author Rank
Author rank is Google’s way of seeing where on the web you publish your content. If you stick to a regular schedule of publishing fantastic content then Google will soon begin placing more authority and weight on your content.

Conversely, if you continuously publish low quality fluff and filler content Google will be tracking that too and you’ll find many of the links in those types of content devalued in time, regardless if your content is published on a high authority domain or not. In short, Google won’t just be devaluing websites and links, but also devaluing authors too.

Going forward you need to be very choosy with the content that you publish. If you want to learn how to write good quality content read this post. Personally, when I write a piece of content I’ll often hammer out my thoughts into a document, save it and then come back to it in 24 hours and refine my message. I edit with two criteria in mind:
Does this content make sense from start to finish or does it sound confusing?Am I providing significant value to the reader or am I about to publish a piece of rubbish?Social Media Signals

Most of you will know that the more often your content is shared, voted on and liked socially the better that content may perform in Google. While this has been the case for some time now, some content creators, publishers and website owners have been gaming the system by paying people and organizations to create social shares, votes and likes in mass quantities for their content.

What’s likely to happen after the next major Penguin update rolls out is that Google will probably pay less attention to the volume of social shares and pay more attention to who is sharing that content. If your content is shared socially by a person with a network of 300 or 400 influencers following their social media accounts, that will likely have more weight in Google than if your content were shared by a person with 50,000 to 100,000 bot created social media accounts. If this isn’t the case presently you can bet it will be soon.
It’s also probable that Google will look at your own social media accounts to determine if you are sharing your own guest posts on your own social accounts.

Write content that you wouldn’t mind having your name associated with, content that you’d have no problem sharing on your own social profiles.
Start building relationships with influencers who have a large following on their social profiles. If your content is worth sharing then those relationships you’ve built will come in handy and they may decide to share your content with their followers when you write a great post and ask them to share it.

In Summary
Some of the things that I predicted above may not in fact take place when the next major Penguin update rolls out, however they will likely be a part of Google’s algorithm in the near future.
How many other ways do you think traditional guest blogging practices will need to change after the next major Penguin update rolls out?

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Is Tumblr Worth as Much as Overture to Yahoo? by @lorenbaker

The Tumblr acquisition by Yahoo is smart in so many ways, from an advertising perspective to a “let’s be relevant again” perspective. And pair the Tumblr news with a relaunch of Flickr, and we’re looking at an end result of Marissa Mayer dominating a market where Google has a major weakness — photos.
(Anyone use Picasa lately?)

So as I was digging through the news around the acquisition announcement over the weekend and this morning, I wanted to look deeper into Yahoo’s other social media acquisitions, and the value / life expectancy of each.

Here’s a short list :
Flickr : $35,000,000 : Alive & well.Del.icio.us : $20,000,000 : It’s kind of become a Pinterest copy.MyBlogLog : A precursor to Google+, dead.Blo.gs : Integrated into Yahoo 360, which died.Upcoming.org : Part of Yahoo Local

While reviewing the list of Yahoo acquisitions, one really caught my eye. Back in 2003, Yahoo bought Overture .. the mack daddy of paid search, which powered Yahoo and MSN Search paid results at the time (along with a lot of other search engines, toolbars and parked domains).
Overture was also Goto.com; the FIRST paid search engine, and held the patent rights to paid search (which a court of law decided Google must pay Yahoo/Overture in order to keep AdWords running). At the time, Overture also owned Altavista.com and AlltheWeb search engines.
[Here's a great write up by Danny Sullivan back when he used to run Search Engine Watch ... note to Incisive, might want to update Danny's avatar].

In 2003, Yahoo purchased the juggernaut of Overture for $1.6 Billion.In 2013, Yahoo purchased Tumblr for $1.1 Billion.

Is one undervalued while one is overvalued, or did Yahoo get an absolute steal back in 2003 after the bubble burst?



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Pinterest Gets New ‘Rich’ Pins by @smorgs13

 Social media sites have to evolve, otherwise they decline in popularity like MySpace. Pinterest has not only climbed the ranks to the top 3 social media sites on the internet, but they have also evolved with the market and remained popular. Today, Pinterest made a new update that significantly improves the usability of the platform. Those in the movie and e-commerce industries will be very glad to hear about the new ‘rich’ pins.

There are currently 3 types of rich pins: movie, recipe, and product. I’m sure they’ll come out with more in the coming weeks and year. How do you set up these pins? It’s real simple, but you’ll need to fill out your meta tags, You’ll need to test the pins and then apply them to Pinterest. It should be pretty easy to set up. I personally believe e-commerce business owners will see an improvement in their sales. People will see the availability of a product and see the prices right away and be ready to buy. All of that would take place before they even get to your website. What are your thoughts on these new ‘rich’ pins?

Keep It All Straight and Get Started with the Locals: Yahoo Local, Yelp, Google+ Local by @highervis

It’s incredibly important to get your business involved in local SEO, but businesses should not stop at just one search engine or one local listing service. If you’re a business owner, creating a presence on all of the different local outlets including Yahoo Local, Bing Local Listings, Yelp, and Google+ Local will only help you gain visibility. However, you have to make sure that you stay organized and are able to manage all of your different accounts. It can be tough to make this happen and understand the differences between the different local options (not to mention how to get started), but once you get the hang of all the differences you will find it easy to differentiate and make the most of your local online authority.

3 Different Online Local Outlets and How They Each Work
Being able to keep track of all the different local SEO options not only helps you stay organized, but it can help some businesses determine where they should put their primary focus.
Below outlines how to get started, the different options you have, optimization tricks, and a few of the benefits for each of the local SEO options small businesses have online today:
Yelp

How to Get Started. You can get started by visiting this link and either unlocking your business or adding a new business. You will then be taken to different screens that ask you to fill in basic information about your business (hours of operation, address, contact information, etc.) and then wait for authorization by the site. Benefits. Yelp is the most beneficial when it comes to the restaurant industry, but other companies are also benefiting from its popularity. Yelp actually serves as its own social network and works well when it comes to making connections and finding businesses through those connections, so the benefits here are endless.Optimization. Every local listing is about reviews, but Yelp is really about reviews. The best way to optimize your listing is to respond to reviews and try and encourage reviews by pushing for check-ins, including the link on your website, etc. You can also offer special deals on your Yelp listing to help foster reviews and visits. You can learn more in detail here. Google+ Local

How to Get Started. You can visit this link and then choose from one of the following categories: local business or place; product or brand; company, institution, or organization; arts, entertainment, or sports; or other. Each will have it’s own specific questions to create you the best listing possible. Claim your listing if it already exists or create something new with your basic information. Benefits. Some Google+ local information such as a ZAGAT score will actually appear in search results on a SERP. The reviews here are more than just 5 stars and comments. While you can still comment, Google+ gives you the option of rating certain aspects of a business (usually restaurants) such as appeal, facilities, and service. Optimization. Become an active member on Google+ in general and start putting customers or those in your audience in your Google+ circles to help build visibility. This will not only help your local listing, but your overall Google+ brand. I also recommend checking out their “Getting Started Guide” to help you get into more advanced optimization.Yahoo Local

Options. You have the choice of a basic listing which includes your basic contact information, one photo, and descriptions of your products/services or an enhanced listing with will give you a tagline, up to 10 photos, and a detailed business description. Enhanced listings are $9.95 per month.How to Get Started. Visit this link and click “sign up.” Once you click this big yellow button, you will need to sign in with either your Yahoo ID, Facebook account, or Google account. Answer the basic information for the account (your name and information bout your company such as address and content information) and then answer more specific information such as your hours of operation. Hit “Verify” and wait for your page to be verified by officials in a few days, and you’re set to go! It’s as easy as that.
Extra Tip: The new Facebook Graph Search is putting a focus on searching for local businesses in relation to friend preferences, location, etc., so it’s important to begin gaining a presence on Facebook as a part of your new local strategy.
Which local services do you like best? Have you found that being active and optimizing your presence on all of these sites has helped improve your overall local strategy? Let us know your story and tell us your thoughts in the comments below.
Photo Credit: images.businessweek.com

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7 Ways to Find What Your Target Audience Wants and Create Epic Content by @jaysondemers

Great content sells. It converts. It helps with SEO. And sometimes, it works like magic: it goes viral, creates traffic inflow, and helps you achieve your goals. But what exactly is great content? How do you produce something so great it’ll go viral and help you achieve your goals?

The Internet is inundated with a lot of similar-looking content. This very article might sound similar to something you’ve seen before. Unique content is hard to produce, and it’s getting harder by the day as more websites grasp the importance of content marketing. In view of all this, how do you produce great content that stands apart from the rest?

Answer people’s needs.
As plain as it sounds, this is one of the toughest things to do in marketing. What’s tougher is getting your ‘solution’-like content to the people who’re looking for it; but in this post, I’ll be tackling the ways in which you can figure out exactly what your target audience needs so you can give it to them.
If you think about it, that’s what enables websites to survive. If your content answers, solves, and helps, you are going to earn trust and your brand will become an authority. The trick is to discover what your target audience wants. Here are seven resources that can help you figure that out.

#1: Competitors’ forums
One of the most ridiculously simple methods, though it’s a little controversial, is to stalk your competitors’ web presence. Some regard this as unethical, but I think it’s in the best interest of both the customer and your business for you to figure out what your competitors are doing (and do it better).
If you are an SEO professional working with a client and trying to leverage content for SEO purposes, this tactic offers one of the best opportunities to position the client’s business in an entirely profitable light. When done correctly, this can also be one of the best ways to tap into your competitors’ deficiencies, and leverage that to create a win-win situation for yourself and your target audience.
For those who think this approach is unethical, there’s nothing like a little opinionated, passionate content to drive click-throughs, traffic, and conversions. Your clients will love it.

#2: Comments
Comments are a great way to engage your target audience. But beyond that, if you’re dealing with B2C businesses, comments shed light on the needs of your target audience.
When we speak of comments, I’m not just talking about comments on your website alone. Comments are made on many websites and forums. Comment threads run into the hundreds on websites like Reddit. Discussion boards are flooded with people talking about something — expressing their need for some particular solution.

These are areas from which you can mine excellent content ideas. You have to exercise your creative neurons to find out what themes keep repeating and are hence more likely to gain traction when published. But don’t let go of an opportunity to create something epic just because only a handful of the users are talking about it. You might find yourself on the leading edge.

#3: Surveys (online and offline)
Surveys are boring; many people swiftly click past polls without even looking at them. But you can get some specifically targeted tipping points from surveys. So should you conduct a survey? If you have the resources and the user-base to get a lot of valuable input, go for it.
But you don’t have to rely only on your survey to figure out what your target audience needs. You can search for surveys conducted by others, both on the Internet and in magazines, newspapers, and elsewhere in the offline world.

Surveys are good because out of thousands polled, typically a few hundred will respond. And most of the people who respond are particularly interested in something (which is why they took the extra time and effort to answer boring questions). The results provide a funnel through which a targeted group is giving you ideas about what your content should include or cover.

#4: Keyword research – Trends, Related & AdWords tools
This is an old, but trustworthy method that’s still not often used enough.
Google’s own Trends can inform you about the interest level people have shown toward a particular item. You can pick generic keywords in your niche and look up trends. This may not give you content ideas directly, but it helps you understand what’s “trending.” With this data in hand, you can go further to identify specific keywords and then topic ideas.

If you’re hard pressed for time, Google’s Related Keywords is a great tool to start your content research and production. Related keywords are mentioned at the end of each search page. When you see a long-tail keyword, you should pick it up, do some preliminary research on it, and if indications are promising enough (search volume, competition, ROI of a particular theme/topic), you can produce content around that.
Speaking of long-tail keywords, Google’s Adwords tool has helped me figure out what people are looking for. The short keyword phrases are generic and can’t lead directly to topic ideas, but the long ones are clear indications of what people want. Chances are high that you might stumble upon a bunch of related keywords around which an entire content strategy can be designed.

#5: The social networks
Nothing beats social networks when it comes to personal expression. Although heavily diluted if you’re not looking at the right places, social networks can be a direct indication of user interest and content ideas. The key is figuring out where to look.
Twitter: #hashtags are a good place to start. Experts in your niche are bound to have conversations on Twitter that can lead to some really specific, targeted topic ideas that will solve a pressing need being discussed in the Twitterverse.
Facebook & Google+ pages: Brand pages try to engage with their audiences at an intense level. That can spark comments in which people explicitly demand something. Capitalize on this and you might really be at the forefront of creating really useful content that targets your audience perfectly.

#6. Product forums, a.k.a. support
If your niche has a product and people are looking for support, in all probability there’s going to be a forum somewhere. If your client is producing a product, find out if there are forums and support pages that relate to it. Such forums are gold mines that can be mined to learn exactly what the target audience needs.
But if there’s a support page already, isn’t it going to cover the same ground? Why produce content around the same thing again? Because support pages aren’t exhaustive, they aren’t intensive, and they’re often not terribly friendly.

Also, if your work as an SEO professional centers around a website that deals with a particular market (and not a product), you can still figure out what the end-user needs by identifying associated products or end-points where the user gets something. Then you can tailor your content accordingly to leverage this.

#7: eCommerce
This applies largely to product-focused markets. Suppose you or your client run a website for top-notch information on headphones. How do you generate content that’s not just unique but also interesting enough to attract visitors and solve problems, so you can build trust, authority, and a fan following?
Head over to places where an associated product is being sold. This might be a JBL headphones listing on Amazon or a Sennheiser headphone set on eBay. Check out customer reviews, comments, and the general chatter around the product. You can find a lot of this specifically on Amazon and Amazon-like websites.
When you go through these reviews, you can find some interesting suggestions, a few tips, and potential insights about the product. This is highly specific information that you can hardly get from anywhere else. And it’s real.
How about sorting this information and packaging it into a great article that helps your users make well-informed decisions? Bingo! You scored a point there.

Conclusion
Conclusively, the bottom line is simple: if you’re in the shoes of a customer, you know precisely where people talk about what they require. And when you answer this, your content — no matter how boring or short — will serve a defined purpose, making it much more valuable.
Ultimately, it’s the users who matter… for everything from your brand to your return on investment.



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