The Best Type of Content to Engage Readers

There are certain types of content that search engines always seem to reward well. These are generally the types that people enjoy reading the most – and that’s no coincidence.

Since Google’s Penguin and Panda Updates, poorly written website content is now heavily penalised so if you want your website to rank well with Google, it pays to spend a little time researching the type of content that creates a buzz around the web. This article will explain the top five types of content that you can create to help engage your website’s visitors.

Type 1: A List Post

List posts gather information relating to a specific topic; think of them as sub-chapters of a main chapter. Commonly, list posts take the form of ‘top tens’ and are extremely popular due to their condensed and practical style and are particularly useful to ‘newbie’ readers or those learning about your industry or niche. If you want a perfect example of a list post, you’re reading one; this post is a list of content ideas that can help engage your readers.

Type 2: An Interview

Interview someone who inspires or influences you about an idea or topic related to your industry. Not only will you deliver great information that others will want to hear about but you’ll also be tapping into the interviewee’s community which may eventually become integrated into your own. Interviews are a great source of simple-to-create content that have the ability to deliver quality that can send you a massive amount of traffic and interaction from your subscribers.

Type 3: A Video Tutorial (Screencast)

Purchase a screen capture tool such as Camtasia or use a free service like Screenr or Camstudio to record a screencast. A video tutorial is nothing more than a video of your computer screen which shows you doing a particular action or tutorial. People love to watch and share screencasts because they’re quicker to inform than traditionally written articles; for some people, video changes the dynamics of learning, allowing you to relax and learn at your own leisure and pace. Additionally, videos allow you to tap into websites like YouTube which have billions of video views each day; imagine gaining just a fraction of that for your website!

Type 4: A Round Up

Not to be confused with a list post; a round up is more focused on rounding up the best resources on a particular topic. Round ups can be written on pretty much any topic but you’ll usually find them based on the best posts from other websites during a certain week. Other forms of list posts include collections of pictures, quotes, videos or ideas that inspire readers. Round ups are extremely simple to put together but shouldn’t be posted every day – you don’t want to be riding on the coat-tails of other bloggers’ work.

Type 5: A Review

Reviews are great for two things: generating traffic and selling. When people begin researching on the web with the intention of buying a product or service, they often couple their main keyword with the word ‘reviews’ to see what others have to say. If you’ve personally bought a product or purchased a service and have something interesting to say about it then you have the ability to create a highly valuable post that not only ranks well in search engines but has the ability to establish you as an expert in your industry.

Why not experiment with a combination of different types and share your experiences in the comments below?