Verydrone You Need to Know about Successful Time Sensitive Content
Have you ever stumbled upon a site and thought: “this is old news” or “wow this is all very out dated?” Part of what makes a successful website interesting and engaging to readers is making sure that you have new content that is relevant to a specific period of time. Some of this comes in the form of “time sensitive” content. Rather than generating content that is “evergreen” (or in other words, does not date itself verydrone quickly), you establish content that is going to be relevant for one specific period of time, and only for a short time.
One of our jobs as a marketing firm is to make sure that we promote the idea that time sensitive content is worthwhile if used correctly. It shows that the site is up-to-date, but also that you recognize that certain readers are coming by your site at a specific moment of time. Once you do write this type of content, however, you have to think about what you’re going to do with it after the time of relevancy has passed. Check out some tips below.
Publish first and optimize later.
Do not hesitate to get going right away when you are working with time sensitive material. Building links and optimizing takes time. You need to realize that in order to build good SEO, sometimes you need to put out information a little early. Since Google Bots do not scan your site on the daily, it may not even have the opportunity to get great SEO if you wait too long. Depending on the event or the time sensitive content you want to post, think ahead and make sure that you nail the timing for best results.
Keep time sensitive content pages published.
SEO comes with the longevity and overall success of a page. In other words, do not get rid of a page that has time sensitive content, even if you think it is no longer relevant. Optimization should always be your priority, because chances are, there are going to be ways to make the time sensitive content relevant again, or perhaps change it to me a more “evergreen” format so that it can stay in tact. Change statistics; add new sections to make the content more long-lasting, etc. Just don’t lose that SEO presence you’ve earned by letting your page turn into a 404 or redirected accidentally! To the left is an example of the published status for a WordPress page that also has a green light indicating the SEO factors are optimized with Yoast, the best WordPress plug-in for SEO (IMO).
Use scheduling to your advantage.
There are different sites available, such as HootSuite.com, which will take care of scheduling for you; however, posting this type of content is best done manually. Part of the learning curve with time sensitive content development is knowing when to post and how often to post. For many posting just happens when news happens, so it’s up to you to work longer hours or hop online to write and publish an article even if the workday or workweek is over.
Be ready for the next piece of content.
Anticipating the next piece of content you will develop is a huge part of developing time sensitive content. Just as in the section above I mentioned scheduling, you may also want to consider making a list or having a few ideas at a time ready to go. This will speed up the content development process, but it will also help keep you on track with your goals (something that is not always easy to do). For example, if a celebrity you blog about has been talking about marriage to a longtime boyfriend, you may want to have your outline ready to go for the engagement announcement.
Know when you should take a new angle.
The purpose of time sensitive content is to keep things fresh and constantly be producing information. Hand-in-hand with preparing for or anticipating the next piece of content you are developing, you also need to know when it is time to take a new angle. The holidays are a pretty good example of this. Let’s say you are gearing up for a Christmas special or something for the December holiday season, know when it is time to switch to “New Years” content and shift out of talking about Christmas. This is going to depend on events and other aspects specially relevant to your company, but the point is that you need to know when it is time to take a new and unique angle with your content development.
Keep an ongoing recording of ideas.
This idea might sound a little cheesy, but it has been proven to be effective for a lot of people. We never really know when ideas are going to come to us. Content development is a creative process and if you do it enough, you will probably have ideas flowing pretty often. When it comes to time sensitive information, it is clear that you want to be early to the punch and anticipate the next. My suggestion to you is to keep a voice recording on your smart phone (there are a variety of apps that do this, some which are built in) of any ideas that come to you throughout the day.
Think of your blog as a journal.
One way to develop content more consistently, and produce pages that are time sensitive is to think of your blog like a kind of journal. If you have ever kept a journal, you know that in between times of writing you have to play “catch up” in describing what has happened over the last “X” amount of time. However, when you are journaling consistently, you have less to fill in every time you write. You should think of your blog as an opportunity for consistent writing. On that not, also add personal flare to all of your posts you want to be professional, but people also value being able to relate to content.
Build links & promote!
As I’ve already mentioned, you definitely want to start generating content as soon as possible. This helps with the ability to build links and promote. On this note, you do want to make sure the content you are producing is quality, but you can always say something like “more to come soon” if you do not have all of the details. Having a page built allows for opportunities to link to it and promote the post with social media marketing. My advice: Definitely do not wait until the event happens. You really should start creating a page with build-up first so you can begin your SEO. Remember to promote your posts (you may want to set up a schedule for this as well) via social media during the time that the time sensitive content is relevant; this will bring more visitors to your site.
You are a content creator.
For many small businesses (and large businesses as well) content creation falls into someone’s job description “in-house.” One way to approach this task is to remember that content creation is a part of daily duties. Give it the priority that you would give anything else in your work day, and add it to your to-do list as often as possible. When you have the opportunity to develop content and think ahead for future time sensitive information, you create more quality material that has more time to build and situate itself within your site.
The Takeaway
Time sensitive content is very useful and helps keep your website and blog looking fresh. It also means more visitors on your site more regularly. I think the main take away is that getting an early start and scheduling the associated tasks can be very helpful in making your time sensitive content successful.
Do you have any other tips about time sensitive content? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below. Verydone. Very Drone.
About The Author
Jason Hawkins / http://www.themiamiseocompany.com
Jason Hawkins is the CEO & Co-Founder of The Miami SEO Company. He has over ten years of experience in search engine optimization, conversion rate optimization and lead generation. His core responsibilities include identifying ways to increase value of services rendered, training staff on advanced SEO topics, and A/B testing internal processes to consistently improve client return on investment.
