Mummy Bloggers: How to generate blog ideas that are great for SEO?
Calling all Mummy bloggers! Maybe you want to get more traffic to your blog, or you’ve just started out. Your blog can seem like a teeny tiny fish amongst all the other content on the web. You need your content to get found. Other websites will pass you traffic by linking to your blog. This is great for your search engine ranking (Google loves those inbound links), but if you aren’t ranking yet, you won’t be found by other websites. It all sounds like one big Catch 22 situation. Blogging as a mum is great fun and helps you to vent some of your frustrations and connect with other parents. However, there are times when you need to tailor your content to the needs of your audience, rather than just speaking your mind. You need to know what your readers are interested in and what they are searching for on the internet. What if you had a crystal ball and were able to see the sort of content that people wanted? Well there are ways that you can pick out the topics and keywords that your target audience is searching for so that you can provide the articles that they want to read about.
- Google Analytics
Your Google Analytics data shows you the sorts of keywords that people are using to find your website. This can help you to assess your current audience, see which articles have attracted the most hits, which pages people were most engaged in and which pages made them want to leave the site as quickly as possible Which content sent people packing You can find out which blogs people didn’t seem to like by looking at the following factors: Bounce rate: this is the number of people who came to the website, looked at one page, and then left straight away. Exit rate: this is the number of people who left the website from a particular page. It could be a sign of people not enjoying your website. Or it could be people following a link in your text. Don’t get too focused on this metric as you never really know why people would leave a website (maybe it was just dinner time?), but it is worth considering the possibilities. Average time on page: if people read your article right the way till the end, hanging off your every word, then this could be a sign that they enjoyed it, or found it useful. NB. Bounce rate for blog articles: Blog articles that solve a particular problem can have quite a high bounce rate as people come to them, find the solution to their problem and leave straight away. Don’t be offended, it is not a reflection of your writing, it’s just human nature. Discover the keywords that people are using to find your content Traffic Sources > Search Engine Optimisation > Queries This can give you an idea of the phrases that people have put into Google to find your blog articles. Did people find what they were looking for? Can you provide more of the same? Find out which content is the most popular Content > Site Content > All Pages This tells you which pages on your blog are looked at most often. You could make assumptions here about the topics which interest your readership by analysing the number of page views, the average time on page (how engaged were they with the content), the bounce rate and percentage of people who left your website at that page (exits).
- Google Adwords Keyword Tool
Looking at Google Analytics is all very well, I hear you cry, but this doesn’t tell you about the high percentage of people who haven’t yet discovered your beautifully-crafted mummy blog. The Google Analytics Keyword Tool https://adwords.google.com/o/KeywordTool can show you what terms people are searching for. You might write a wonderful article on chocolate cookies, but what if the majority of people were searching for chocolate biscuits? You could miss out on a big chunk of the traffic. It is also a great way to spot what interests people and what they are searching for. This can help you to tailor your content to the masses, meeting the needs of your target audience by providing the content they are seeking.
- Ubersuggest
We have discovered a great free tool that allows you to find long-tail phrases based around Google Suggest – the autocomplete tool in Google which tries to guess what you want to write and finishes the phrase for you. Long-tail keyword phrases are longer, more specific search terms that people are using. So a long-tail phrase could be “Top ten UK mummy bloggers”. Long-tail searches are searched for less often, but actually represent 70% of all searches on the internet. So it is definitely worth writing some content with these sorts of phrases in mind. Some long-tail phrases that are great to writing blog article around could start with a question ‘How to…’ So if you are a mummy blogger and want to find some questions to write articles around that affect children, you could put ‘how do children’ into Ubersuggest and see what it returns:
- how do children learn
- how do children get worms
- how do children learn to read
- how do children learn through play
- how do children learn best
- how do children acquire language
- how do children form attachments
- how do children get meningitis
- how do children learn to write
- how do children celebrate diwali
A treasure chest of long-tail keyword phrases that you could write a juicy blog article around. There’s something for everyone in Ubersuggest. Researching your market is a great way to make your blog a success. Some people might call it cheating, as blog articles should come from the heart and not from an online tool, but there’s no harm in writing the content that people are interested in. Think of it as doing a public service. While you’re here, why not take a look at some of Custard and Crumble’s beautiful nursery furniture, gifts and vintage-style ride-on cars.