7 hallmarks of useful, compelling content

To make your work worthwhile, write for a specific audience, optimize it for search, offer tangible takeaways and distribute it strategically.

The volume of content online is staggering—and there’s more of it every second.

It’s getting harder to get your messaging to stand out, land and resonate. It’s difficult, not impossible.

Effective content shares seven traits:

1. Good content is written for a specific audience. Compelling writing is rarely generic, vague or impersonal. You can’t be everything to everyone, so write to a specific group of people. Ideally, craft content geared toward your buyer personas. Before writing anything, think carefully about whom you’re addressing, what their needs are and how your content can benefit them.

2. It’s optimized for search and social media. A major part of the game today is getting your content found. Inserting the right keyword phrases—as naturally and as judiciously as possible—eases discovery of your content via search and online networks.

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