SEO
What It Is & How To Use It
Link attributes abound in the world of SEO, including link title, alternative text, and others.
In fact, there are newer rules you need to use if you wish to remain up-to-date on your link optimization.
These types of attributes are important. Not only do they help clarify the context of your link, but they also help to control how Google perceives it.
Whether it’s a paid link or free, you need to make sure you are using the correct attributes so Google does not misunderstand the meaning of your links, resulting in substandard results.
And SEO is all about results!
The way you get to better results is by applying best practices and ensuring that you don’t run afoul of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
Using duplicate alternative text as the link title text is not an okay practice, for example. There are different ways to use alternative text and title text, both of which an SEO pro must pay attention to.
The following includes an overview of the link title attribute and the things you need to know about it in order to be successful.
Let’s dive right in!
Link Title Attribute Best Practices
You should use a link title when you are providing more information about the link.
Don’t use a link title to provide the information over again, as this is a usability fail that will only result in annoying your users.
Have you ever run into an incident where the exact link title showed up when you hovered over it?
You didn’t need to know something that’s already visible on the page, right?
Some of your users may think that way, as well.
The best question you can ask yourself when optimizing is: Will this add information to my link or will it just annoy my users with duplication?
Focus On Optimizing For Users, Rather Than Search Engines
Optimize for your users, rather than search engines.
Yes, this is nothing new. But it is effective.
Don’t:
- Overstuff the link title attribute with keywords.
- Duplicate the topic title.
Do:
- Write the link title so that something unique pops up for users.
- Write the link title with users in mind.
The link anchor text is supposed to be the name of the link itself.
The link title attribute is supposed to provide more information about where the link will send the user who clicks on that link.
How, Exactly, Should You Be Using The Link Title Attribute?
Google’s Search Advocate John Mueller has detailed this in a past Google Webmaster Office Hours Hangout. This discussion begins at the 00:42 point.
Google uses both the title attribute and anchor text together within the link in order to increase their understanding of the context of the link.
He explains that you can test this with a word that you made up, and add it as a title attribute.
Then, you can wait a bit for things to be indexed, and then you can examine the results of that after it has been indexed.
Ideally, one could use the title attribute in order to cover information that’s missing in the anchor text. And Google will use these two attributes together when crawling your links.
Does The Link Title Attribute Help Support Accessibility?
There is some disagreement among SEO pros as to whether accessibility should not be included in SEO best practices.
I’m of the opinion that accessibility, while not a direct ranking factor, is one of those indirect ranking factors that are indisputable in terms of their value.
This will help improve your client’s site and their bottom line by reducing accessibility lawsuits for not including basic accessibility items like alternative text.
(Being inclusive also expands your audience and customer base.)
Alternative text, or alt text for short, is an image attribute that gives text to screen readers for the blind.
In principle, you would think the link title attribute works in a similar way.
However, this is not the case.
The W3C states the following:
“Current user agents and assistive technology provide no feedback to the user when links have title attribute content available.
Some graphical user agents will display a tool tip when the mouse hovers above an anchor element containing a title attribute. However, current user agents do not provide access to title attribute content via the keyboard.
The tool tip in some common user agents disappears after a short period of time (approximately five seconds).
This can cause difficulty accessing title attribute content for those users who can use a mouse but have fine motor skill impairment, and may result in difficulties for users who need more time to read the tool tip.
Current graphical user agents do not provide mechanisms to control the presentation of title attribute content.
The user cannot resize the tool tip text or control the foreground and background colors.
The placement and location of the tool tip cannot be controlled by users, causing some screen magnifier users to be unable to access meaningful portions of the title attribute content because the tool tip cannot be fully displayed within the viewport.
Some user agents allow access to supplementary information through the context menu.
For example, the keystroke combination Shift+F10 followed by P will display the title attribute content, along with other supplementary information in Mozilla/Firefox.”
It’s not perfect, so it is almost impossible to provide a good way to implement accessibility in this scenario.
This is why it is important to take a more in-depth look at guidelines for these elements.
They don’t always work the way you think they should and, in some cases, changes to the elements can happen in a flash also.
How to Use The Link Title Attribute: An Example
Here’s an example of how to use the link title attribute correctly:
<a href=”https://www.searchenginejournal.com/” title=”This is a link to the Search Engine Journal website”>SEJ</a>
What Do The Search Engines Say?
We can speculate all day long, but at the end of the day, the final word of the search engines on the link title attribute is this:
“The ‘title’ attribute is a bit different: It ‘offers advisory information about the element for which it is set.’
As the Googlebot does not see the images directly, we generally concentrate on the information provided in the ‘alt’ attribute.
Feel free to supplement the ‘alt’ attribute with ‘title’ and other attributes if they provide value to your users!”
This is what Bing has to say:
“Think of the anchor text as your primary description of the linked page.
But if you do inline linking within the paragraphs of your body text, you need to maintain the natural, logical flow of the language in the paragraph, which can limit your link text description.
As such, you can use the title attribute to add additional keyword information about the linked page without adversely affecting the readability of the text for the end user.”
What Do Other SEO Professionals Say?
Based on the opinions of several people who have done SEO for years, the link title attribute carries no weight on search engines.
There is also some usability concern when it comes to the link title attribute.
For most browsers, it will show up when you move your cursor over the link.
Because of this, you don’t have to copy the anchor text within a title attribute. If the title attribute is unable to provide additional information, you should not use it.
“Do not add link titles to all links: If it is obvious from the link anchor and its surrounding context where the link will lead, then a link title will reduce usability by being one more thing users have to look at.”
The Rise In Accessibility Lawsuits: Should You Be Concerned?
On January 4, 2019, it was reported that Beyonce.com was sued over accessibility issues.
Target has also been sued over accessibility issues in the past.
Accessibility should always be a concern for SEO professionals because you are supposed to be driving revenue and increasing ROI for your clients.
When an accessibility lawsuit happens, your client loses money, or ROI, from the lack of these efforts. In addition, they are usually not happy about your website.
Your efforts as an SEO should include making sure that link title attributes and links are visible and usable by your users, regardless of their abilities.
Focus On Your Users, Not The Search Engines
When writing link title attributes, be sure to write for users, and don’t create spammy text just for the search engines.
Because, it will be users who are – primarily – going to be using this title text.
At the end of the day, accessibility matters:
- Don’t make links hard to read.
- Don’t make link titles difficult to use, or understand.
Make things look great while focusing on the user experience in order to make sure that your users are happy and elated to be on your website.
TL;DR: Key Takeaways
The key takeaways include the following:
- Don’t use duplicate alt and title attributes in your links.
- Do focus on your users when writing these, but also focus on what the search engines will crawl.
- Do focus on what missing information will be added by using the title attribute.
- Do optimize your links if the title attribute adds new information.
- Do not use the title attribute if it does not add new information.
- Make sure that you use these attributes in such a way that fosters great accessibility for users with disabilities.
- Don’t over-optimize. Avoid adding title attributes to links that don’t need them.
If you are in doubt about whether a link title attribute is something that is going to benefit you, it’s probably best not to use it. And instead, consult John Mueller or another SEO professional that you trust.
John is known to hang out on Twitter and answer burning questions from SEO professionals around the world, in addition to his office hours hangouts.
More Resources:
Featured Image: BestForBest/Shutterstock
SEO
How to Build a Fandom by Talent-Scouting Great Content
At a time when anyone can create content, the real challenge—and opportunity—is in saying something new.
I think content curation can help with that.
Curation is all about finding undiscovered stories and repackaging ideas in ways your audience really respond to.
In this article, you’ll learn why content curation is great for growth, and how to talent scout quality underground or left-field content.
Gathering and sharing content is a popular social media tactic, but content curation extends to mediums and channels far beyond social.
Let’s take a look at some examples:
| Example | Type | What is it? |
|---|---|---|
| The Pudding | Article | A data journalism publication that curates a range of rich media (e.g. social comments, headline snippets, literature reviews) to tell compelling visual stories – like this one. |
| Ahrefs’ digest | Newsletter | Our Senior Content Marketing Manager, Si Quan Ong (SQ), curates key SEO/marketing news, accompanied by snappy annotations. |
| Near Media Memo | Podcast | Conversations at the intersection of search, social, and commerce. Hosts curate and discuss the latest industry content. |
| KFC’s “Bucket Bangers” Spotify Playlist | Playlist | A playlist curated by KFC as part of a PR campaign, containing 46 tracks that name drop the brand. |
| Campaign Inspiration | Image carousel | This LinkedIn page curates visual examples of existing PR campaigns to inspire marketers. |
Newsletters, in particular, have become the go-to platform for curation, since they’re fairly cheap to run and easy to set up.
The numbers back this up. A quick look at Site Explorer shows newsletter platform Substack experiencing a 373% leap in organic traffic from September 5th, 2023 to September 5th, 2024.
You can see some great examples of curated SEO newsletters here: I Subscribed to 72 SEO Newsletters. Here Are My 11 Favorites.
Now you know about content curation in all its forms and guises, let me tell you what’s so great about it…
From saving money, to building traffic, and cementing your authority, content curation comes with plenty of benefits.
1. Content curation saves time and money
At Ahrefs, we follow The Pareto Principle: the idea that 80% of the reward comes from 20% of the effort.
If you want to improve your effort:reward ratio, curation is a great option.
I asked SQ about the benefits of content curation, and he had this to say:
“One benefit is that I don’t have to write an essay from scratch each week (which is what most newsletters are).”
While content curation has the potential to save you time, resources, and money, I do want to add two important caveats:
- Curating niche, underground content examples can still take time – especially when you’re first finding your sources.
- If you’re doing deep-dive investigations into those examples, you may spend just as long curating as you would creating.
2. Curation helps you build links, traffic, and engagement
Marketing Examples is a goldmine of curated marketing snippets.
Founder, Harry Dry, doesn’t just gather content — he dissects real-world marketing copy, name drops the creator, and breaks down their winning formulas, making it easy for readers to replicate that success.
As a result, his site has earned fairly consistent links and traffic over time, growing organically by 88% in the last two years.
Curating content is an example of what I call “awareness you prepared earlier”. Your chances of driving traction are vastly improved when you crowdsource ideas.
Not only do your audience consume your curated content, they publicize it to their own network via social posts or reciprocal links when they get featured.
Some refer to this as “ego bait”. Obviously there’s an element of flattery involved, but in my experience, the top curators prioritize content that genuinely helped or inspired them, rather than chasing big names with the widest reach.
3. Curating content is great for EEAT
Few people have direct experience with every topic they’ve ever written about.
But, since 2022, first-hand experience has become a prerequisite for ranking in Google.
Curating others’ lived experiences and knowledge in your content is a powerful way to build your EEAT and improve your rankings.
4. You become credible by association
We tend to categorize people according to their social group memberships – this is known as social categorization.
If you’re regularly associating yourself with respected thought leaders, your audience is more likely to group you with them, and hold you in higher regard as a result.
Mixing in your own content and opinion is important for building credibility, but be careful not to overdo the self-promotion.
Back to SQ:
“I don’t tend to include all of the blog posts we publish on our blog.“
5. You get closer to your customers and community
When you curate, you consume content holistically –like your customers– and stop being so introspective.
If you’re only consuming content from your brand or brand “friends”, there’s a limit to the value you can bring to your audience.
Content curators turn to their community to source content, so curating bridges the gap in two ways: by helping them consume like their customers, and by giving them a reason to connect.
6. When you curate, your content gets better
To create is to curate. All ideas are shaped and borrowed from somewhere – that’s how knowledge is acquired.
If I don’t curate, I tend to find my own content stagnates.
Curation introduces me to new ideas, reminds me of the things I have forgotten, allows me to build deeper, more informed arguments, and ultimately helps me produce better content – with a lot more in the way of information gain.
For instance, this blog started out as a simple list of content curation benefits, thunk up by yours truly.
But as I came across cool examples of novel content curation, it evolved into a more comprehensive (and hopefully, more interesting) guide.
“Another benefit of content curation is that I get to keep abreast of anything new in SEO and marketing, which informs my own work”
7. You build your personal “brand”
Curation gives you the chance to platform your own expertise and assert yourself as a thought leader.
Take a look at the search volume for one of the most prolific curators in SEO: Aleyda Solis.
Aleyda curates SEO news and insights across her newsletter, SEOFOMO, her podcast, Crawling Mondays, her owned social media channels, and industry talks.
As a result, her name now drives ~600 monthly organic searches, according to Site Explorer.
And over 19K “in content” mentions, according to Content Explorer.
Curation is about piecing together unrelated content to reveal new ideas and information.
You’re giving someone else’s content another shot at engagement – sometimes after a “failure” to launch.
“The same core information can be made more or less valuable by changing its format. Great ideas are sometimes locked away in places that render them inaccessible to people that would benefit from them.”
Here are 9 ways you can “talent scout” novel content, and carve out your own curation USP.
1. Pay attention to lesser-known voices
In every industry there are sources that audiences defer to for information and ideas.
Look beyond them.
Scout for “rising stars” and underground sources to give your curation exclusivity.
Mark Williams-Cook, Director at Candour and Founder of AlsoAsked, does just this when curating his newsletter: Core Updates.
“I’ve made a conscious effort not just to follow the ‘big names’, as there are some truly excellent SEOs that are very quiet on social media. I’d always recommend following someone if you see them putting out solid advice, even if you’ve never heard of them. I’ve made some good friends and excellent connections that way!”
This is probably something you’ll have to do manually at first.
I try to pay close attention to people leaving savvy comments on social media posts and industry communities.
2. Build an X list of “ones to watch”
Once you’ve found the right “ones to watch”, you can start building a list to refer back to whenever it’s time to curate.
SQ uses X lists and subscribes to others’ Substacks:
“I have my own Twitter list of marketers (getting poorer these days sadly) and follow other people’s substacks/newsletters and see if there are any links they recommend.”
3. Mine niche and atypical sources of information
Nicole DeLeon, Ed Zitron, Marie Haynes and other tech curators recently mined Google’s DoJ trial documentation to investigate “buried” information on how the search engine ranks content.
Search Engine Roundtable founder, Barry Schwartz, is always extracting content from Google rep social comments, Google developer docs, and Google’s Office Hours video series to curate hot-off-the-press news.
Techemails mines leaked tech company emails from court filings and curates them across social media and their website (p.s. they are preeetty eye-opening).
Finding and teasing out obscure information is a great skill to have when it comes to content curation.
Here are some more ways you can do that:
- Track updates in company documentation (e.g. brand Ts & Cs, Google Developer Docs, Anthropic Release Notes)
- Mine Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request databases
- Monitor government data via fact finding bodies (e.g. Indeed curates content from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to inform content in their Hiring Lab)
- Study public datasets released by research institutions (e.g. Harvard Dataverse)
- Mine “hidden” or ephemeral content (e.g. podcasts, webinars, industry talks, seminars etc.) to curate quotes and promote relatively unheard information
- Monitor public announcements and press releases from organizations
4. Track down new and trending content
Be the first to break and curate news in your industry. Start by searching for industry-specific keywords in Content Explorer.
Then add filters to make sure you’re seeing the freshest and highest quality content.
In my experience, I find that:
- Adding a minimum Referring Domain of “30”
- Adding a minimum word count of “300”
- Sorting by “Date: newest first”
…shows me the newest and best SEO related content, but you should play around until you find what works in your industry.
Tip
When it comes to filtering, don’t get too prescriptive about it – remember, you want to find novel content that usually flies under the radar, so avoid being overly strict with minimum thresholds.
This next part is really important. Once you’re happy with your configuration, hit “Save filters” so that you can repeat this analysis for the next instalment of your newsletter, podcast, social post, article, or whatever else you might be curating.
With the Content Explorer, you’re searching for instances of a keyword in the title, content, URL or all of the above.
But relevant content won’t always contain the exact keywords or topics you’re searching for.
In which case, try searching for keywords in the anchor text linking to that content.
There’s a preconfigured search for this in Ahrefs’ Web Explorer. Just hit the “examples” tab, and select “Most quoted newly published pages about ChatGPT”:
This will load a full report of the most linked to pages about the topic “ChatGPT” over the last week. Then all you need to do is update the report with your chosen topic, and adjust any filters.
And hit “Save report”.
Another tip for breaking news was recently disclosed by SEO expert and founder of SEO blog Detailed, Glen Allsopp, on the Ahrefs Podcast (it’s a great episode – I highly recommend a full listen!)
He spoke about a technique that he refers to as the “iPhone Link Building” method.
“The reason I call it this, because it doesn’t matter who you are, it doesn’t matter how old your website is, it doesn’t matter how long you’ve been around. If you have a photo of the iPhone 16 before anyone else and you put that on [your site], the whole tech world is going to talk about it, right? You’re going to get links from every tech website on the planet. Doesn’t matter that [your site] has nothing to do with tech and gadgets. You’ve got the first iPhone link. People are going to talk about it. So I refer to it as the iPhone link building.“
To carry out “iPhone link building”, Glen sets up an alert using Visual Ping. This sends him a notification as soon as there’s an update on one of the webpages he’s tracking. If something new or interesting has changed, he’ll work this into his next piece of content.
5. Ask your network
Turning to your social network for examples of existing content is a great way to curate.
Here’s Chris Haines, Ahrefs’ Senior SEO Specialist, doing just this on LinkedIn…
And here I am posting in Women In Tech SEO (my #1 community) for contributions to my article: So You’ve Been Asked To Humanize AI Content
Often, Slack communities will dedicate a channel to self-promotion. This is another handy way to find new content to curate.
“In the Women in Tech SEO Slack group, we have a hashtag channel (#wts-amplify-me) that serves as a space for members to promote their work, and it’s wholesome to see lots of our members use it to highlight the work of others! This channel helps me curate content for our weekly WTSNewsletter. As newsletter creators, we are responsible for amplifying diverse voices, which was the driving force behind starting WTSNewsletter. The lack of diversity in industry newsletters motivated me to create our very own weekly newsletter that showcases the brilliant work of underrepresented individuals.”
Community content sourcing doesn’t begin and end with LinkedIn or Slack. Check out other pockets of the internet, including niche forums, Subreddits, Facebook groups, and Mastodon instances.
6. Bookmark everything
Some of my best articles have been inspired by the posts I’ve bookmarked.
Here are my top tips for bookmarking curated content:
Use web highlighters
Use a web highlighter plugin to bookmark interesting content for future curation.
Organize examples in a note taking app
Use a note taking app like Notion or Obsidian to organize your content examples.
Bookmark your saved social media content
You’ll undoubtedly have banked some great content on social media over the years, but navigating back to those archives can be a bit of a faff.
I bookmark mine to my browser so I can easily jump back in (e.g. LinkedIn “Saved”, X bookmarks, X advanced searches, TikTok saved, Instagram saved etc.)
7. Set up author notifications
Follow creators and journalists that inspire you. Subscribe to their channel, turn on notification bells on LinkedIn and X, and set up RSS feeds to get alerted whenever they push out new content.
Tip
When you’re searching for new content in the Content Explorer, check out the Authors tab for ideas on which thought leaders to follow in your industry.
8. Set up keyword alerts
Get notified as soon as on-topic content is published, with Ahrefs “Mention” alerts.
9. Use AI to extract and annotate content
AI broadly summarizes outdated content, and has a habit of forgoing (or entirely fabricating) references. In other words, it’s pretty terrible for curating unique content.
Instead, use it to extract, summarize, and investigate the content you’ve selectively curated.
Extract nuggets from “hidden” content
I used AI to extract quotes and insights from webinars, interviews, and YouTube videos. The post I wrote for SpinSucks was inspired by content mined from interview transcripts and bookmarked social media content, using Claude AI.
Reverse-engineer successful content formulas
I fed ChatGPT examples of top-performing blogs to understand patterns of success, and inform my opinion of what “good” content looks like, while updating the post: 6 Simple Blog Post Templates (Download & Edit Along.
We’ve covered a lot of ground, but there are a few extra details worth mentioning before you jump into curation.
Make sure you have a clear theme
Curation isn’t just about sourcing and presenting the most unique content you can find.
Value also comes from carefully selecting content that fits a central concept or theme.
“[Content curation] helps build my taste, which in my opinion, is the hardest part of curation, because most people don’t seem to understand the concept of “curation”, i.e. selecting the best, or what fits a theme. They just seem to shoehorn every article on the internet.”
Build your exclude list
Be discerning about the content you create. Set out rules as to the content or people you will/won’t include, using your brand guidelines for inspiration.
Repurpose your knowledge
Content curation is usually cheaper and easier to produce, but don’t treat it as a “one and done” activity. Repurpose the things you learn both internally and externally.
“We actually use the news – that Jack (Chambers-Ward) and I curate for the Core Updates newsletter – internally at Candour during one of our weekly meetings when we are discussing changes in the industry. So it’s been a helpful task to make sure the agency is always up to date!”
Final thoughts
Content curation isn’t a “set it and forget it” tactic. It’s an ongoing process that demands a reasonable amount of effort, but the payoff is worth it. That’s because:
- It’s a traffic magnet: Curated content can outperform original content in terms of organic traffic, because you’re cherry-picking the best ideas.
- It builds your E-E-A-T: By sharing valuable experiences, you’re signaling to users and search engines that you know your stuff. This can boost your rankings across the board.
- It’s a networking opportunity: When you share others’ content, they notice. We’ve built relationships with industry giants simply by featuring their work on our blog or weekly digest.
Great curation is about adding value. You can just reshare content verbatim, but you’re missing out on a valuable opportunity to add your own insight, and explain why the content you’ve painstakingly curated matters to your audience.
In a world where 70 million blog posts are published every month, skilled curators stand out. They don’t just share content – they build communities, spark discussions, and become go-to resources in their niches.
If you’re giving content curation a try, experiment with different formats and track what resonates (our Content Explorer can help with that too), then watch your influence grow.
SEO
Stop Overcomplicating Things. Entity SEO is Just SEO
“Entity SEO”.
Sounds scary, doesn’t it? Not only does the word “entity” sound foreign, it feels like yet another thing to add to your never-ending SEO to-do list. You’re barely afloat when it comes to SEO, but ohgawd here comes one more new thing to dedicate your scarce resources.
I have good news for you though: You don’t have to do entity SEO.
Why? Because you’re probably already doing it.
Let’s start from the beginning.
In 2012, Google announced the Knowledge Graph. The Knowledge Graph is a knowledge base of entities and the relationships between them.
An entity is any object or concept that can be distinctly identified. This includes tangibles like people, places, and organizations, and intangibles like colors, concepts, and feelings.
For example, the footballer Federico Chiesa is an entity:
So is the famous British-Indian restaurant Dishoom:
Entities are connected by edges, which describe the relationships between them.
Introducing the Knowledge Graph helped improve Google’s search results because:
- Google could better understand search intent — People search for the same thing but describe it in different ways. Google can now understand this and serve the same results.
- It reduced reliance on keyword matching — Matching the number of keywords on a page doesn’t guarantee relevance; also it prevents crafty SEOs from keyword stuffing.
- It reduced Google’s computational load — The Internet is virtually infinite and Google simply cannot understand the meaning of every word, paragraph, webpage, and website. Entities provide a structure where Google can improve understanding while minimizing load.
For example, even though we didn’t mention the actor’s name, Google can understand we’re looking for Harrison Ford and therefore shows his filmography:
That’s because Hans Solo and Harrison Ford are closely connected entities in the Knowledge Graph. Google shows Knowledge Graph data in SERP features like Knowledge Panels and Knowledge Cards.
With this knowledge, we can then define entity SEO as optimizing your website or webpages for such entities.
If Google has moved to entity-oriented search, then entity SEO is just SEO. As my colleague Patrick Stox says, “The entity identification part is more on Google’s end than on our end.”
I mean, if you look at the ‘entity SEO’ tactics you find in blog posts, you’ll discover that they’re mostly just SEO tactics:
- Earn a Wikipedia page
- Create a Google Business Profile
- Add internal links
- Create all digital assets Google is representing on the page (e.g., videos, images, Twitter)
- Develop topical authority
- Include semantically related words on a page
- Add schema markup
Let’s be honest. If you’re serious about SEO and are investing in it, then it’s likely you’re already doing most of the above.
Regardless of entities, wouldn’t you want a Wikipedia page? After all, it confers benefits beyond “entity SEO”. Brand recognition, backlinks from one of the world’s most authoritative sites (albeit nofollow)—any company would want that.
If you’re a local business, you’ve probably created a Google Business Profile. Adding internal links is just SEO 101.
And billions of blistering barnacles, creating all digital assets Google wants to see, like images and videos, is practically marketing 101. If you’re a Korean recipe site and want to be associated with the kimchi jjigae entity, wouldn’t you already know you need to make a video and have photos of the cooking process?
When I started my breakdance site years ago, I knew nothing about SEO and content marketing but I still knew I needed to make YouTube videos. Because guess what? It’s hard to learn breakdancing from words. I don’t think I needed an entity SEO to tell me that.
Topical authority is an SEO concept where a website aims to become the go-to authority on one or more topics. Call me crazy, but it feels like blogging 101. Read most guides on how to start a blog and I’m sure you’ll find a subheading called “niche down”. And once you niche down, it’s inevitable you’ll create content surrounding that one topic.
If I start a breakdance site, what are the chances I’ll write about contemporary dance or pop art? Pretty low.
In fact, topical authority is similar to the Wiki Strategy, which Nat Eliason wrote about in 2017. There wasn’t a single mention of entities. It was just the right way to make content for the Internet.
I think the biggest problem here isn’t entities versus keywords or that topical authority is a brand-new strategy. It’s simply that many SEOs are driven by short-sightedness or the wrong incentives.
You can target a whole bunch of unrelated keywords that have high search volume, gain incredible amounts of search traffic, and brag about how successful you are as an SEO.
Some of the pages sending HubSpot the most search traffic has barely anything to do with their core product. A page on how to type the shrug emoji? The most famous quotes?
This is not to single out HubSpot—I’m sure they have their reasons, as explored by Ryan here—but to illustrate that many companies do the exact same thing. And when Google stops rewarding this behavior, all of a sudden companies realise they do need to write about their core competencies. They need to “build topical authority”.
I don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater because I do see value in the last two ‘entity SEO tactics’. But again, if you’re doing something similar to the Wiki Strategy for your site, chances are you would have naturally included entities or semantically relevant words without thinking too much about it. It’s difficult to create content about kimchi jjigae without mentioning kimchi, pork, or gochujang.
However, to prevent the curse of knowledge or simply to avoid blindspots, checking for important subtopics you might have missed is useful. At Ahrefs, we run a page-level content gap analysis and look out for subtopics:
For example, if we ran a content gap analysis on “inbound marketing” for the top three ranking pages, we see that we might need to include these subtopics:
- What is inbound marketing
- Inbound marketing strategy
- Inbound marketing examples
- Inbound marketing tools
Finally, adding schema markup makes the most sense because it’s how Google recognizes entities and better understands the content of web pages. But if it’s just one new tactic—which I believe is already part of ‘standard’ SEO and you might already be doing it—then there’s no need to create a category to define the “new era” (voice SEO, where art thou?)
Final thoughts
Two years ago, someone on Reddit asked for an SEO workflow that utilized super advanced SEO methodologies:
The top answer: None of the above.
When our Chief Marketing Officer Tim Soulo tweeted about this Reddit thread, he got similar replies too:
And even though I don’t know him, this is a person after my own heart:
You don’t have to worry about entity SEO. If you have passion for a topic and are creating high-quality content that fulfills what people are looking for, then you’re likely already doing “entity SEO”.
Just follow this meme: Make stuff people like.
SEO
Assigning The Right Conversion Values To Make Value-Based Bidding Work For Lead Gen
Last week, we tackled setting your data strategy for value-based bidding.
The next key is to assign the right values for the conversion actions that are important to your business.
We know this step is often seen as trickier for lead gen-focused businesses than, say, ecommerce businesses.
How much is a whitepaper download, newsletter signup, or online quote request worth to your business? While you may not have exact figures, that’s OK. What you do know is they aren’t all valued equally.
Check out the quick 2-minute video in our series below, and then keep reading as we dive deeper into assigning conversion values to optimize your value-based bidding strategy.
Understanding Conversion Values
First, let’s get on the same page about what “conversion value” means.
A conversion refers to a desired action taken by a user, such as filling out a lead form, making a purchase, or signing up for a newsletter.
Conversion value is simply a numerical representation of how much each of these conversions is worth to your business.
Estimating The Value Of Each Conversion
Ideally, you’d have a precise understanding of how much revenue each conversion generates.
However, we understand that this is not always feasible.
In such cases, it’s perfectly acceptable to use “proxy values” – estimations that align with your business priorities.
The important thing is to ensure that these proxy values reflect the relative importance of different conversions to your business.
For example, a whitepaper download may indicate less “value” than a product demo registration based on what you understand about your past customer acquisition efforts.
Establishing Proxy Values
Let’s explore some scenarios to illustrate how you might establish proxy values.
Take the event florist example mentioned in the video. You’ve seen that clients who provide larger guest counts or budgets in their online quote requests tend to result in more lucrative events.
Knowing this, you can assign higher proxy values to these leads compared to those with smaller guest counts or budgets.
Similarly, if you’re an auto insurance advertiser, you might leverage your existing lead scoring system as a basis for proxy values. Leads with higher scores, indicating a greater likelihood of a sale, would naturally be assigned higher values.
You don’t need to have exact value figures to make value-based bidding effective. Work with your sales and finance teams to help identify the key factors that influence lead quality and value.
This will help you understand which conversion actions indicate a higher likelihood of becoming a customer – and even which actions indicate the likelihood of becoming a higher-value customer for your business.
Sharing Conversion Values With Google Ads
Once you’ve determined the proxy values for your conversion actions, you’ll need to share that information with Google Ads. This enables the system to prioritize actions that drive the most value for your business.
To do this, go to the Summary tab on the Conversions page (under the Goals icon) in your account. From there, you can edit your conversion actions settings to input the value for each. More here.
As I noted in the last episode, strive for daily uploads of your conversion data, if possible, to ensure Google Ads has the most up-to-date information by connecting your sources via Google Ads Data Manager or the Google Ads API.
Fine-Tuning With Conversion Value Rules
To add another layer of precision, you can utilize conversion value rules.
Conversion value rules allow you to adjust the value assigned to a conversion based on specific attributes or conditions that aren’t already indicated in your account. For example, you may have different margins for different types of customers.
Instead of every lead form submission having the same static value you’ve assigned, you can tell Google Ads which leads are more valuable to your business based on three factors:
- Location: You might adjust conversion values based on the geographical location of the user. For example, if users in a particular region tend to convert at a higher rate or generate more revenue.
- Audience: You can tailor conversion values based on specific audience segments, such as first-party data or Google audience lists.
- Device: Consider adjusting conversion values based on the device the user is using. Perhaps users on mobile devices convert at a higher rate – you could increase their conversion value to reflect that.
When implementing these rules, your value-based bidding strategies (maximize conversion value with an optional target ROAS) will take them into account and optimize accordingly.
Conversion value rules can be set at the account or campaign levels. They are supported in Search, Shopping, Display, and Performance Max campaigns.
Google Ads will prioritize showing your ads to users predicted to be more likely to generate those leads you value more.
Conversion Value Rules And Reporting
These rules also impact how you report conversion value in your account.
For example, you may value a lead at $5, but know that these leads from Californian users are typically worth twice as much. With conversion value rules, you could specify this, and Google Ads would multiply values for users from California by two and report that accordingly in the conversion volume column in your account.
Additionally, you can segment your conversion value rules in Campaigns reporting to see the impact by selecting Conversions, then Value rule adjustment.
There are three segment options:
- Original value (rule applied): Total original value of conversions, which then had a value rule applied.
- Original value (no rule applied): Total recorded value of conversions that did not have a value rule applied.
- Audience, Location, Device, or No Condition: The net adjustment when value rules were applied.
You can add the conversion value rules column to your reporting as well. These columns are called “All value adjustment” and “Value adjustment.”
Also note that reporting for conversion value rules applies to all conversions, not just the ones in the ‘conversions’ column.
Conversion Value Rule Considerations
You can also create more complex rules by combining conditions.
For example, if you observe that users from Texas who have also subscribed to your newsletter are exceptionally valuable, you could create a rule that increases their conversion value even further.
When using conversion value rules, keep in mind:
- Start Simple: Begin by implementing a few basic conversion value rules based on your most critical lead attributes.
- Additive Nature of Rules: Conversion value rules are additive. If multiple rules apply to the same user, their effects will be combined.
- Impact on Reporting: The same adjusted value that’s determined at bidding time is also used for reporting.
- Regular Review for Adjustment: As your business evolves and you gather more data, revisit your conversion values and rules to ensure they remain aligned with your goals.
Putting The Pieces Together
Assigning the right values to your conversions is a crucial step in maximizing the effectiveness of your value-based bidding strategies.
By providing Google Ads with accurate and nuanced conversion data, you empower the system to make smarter decisions, optimize your bids, and ultimately drive more valuable outcomes for your business.
Up next, we’ll talk about determining which bid strategy is right for you. Stay tuned!
More resources:
Featured Image: BestForBest/Shutterstock
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