How to Use SEO Evergreen Content to Increase Blog Traffic

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Do you feel like your blog content isn’t bringing in consistent traffic? Or does it seem like your content’s shelf life is way too short? I’m happy to present a solution for you today.

Evergreen content.

Evergreen content is content that stays “fresh” and doesn’t expire. The direct opposite of trending topics, it’s content written about a topic that will always pique people’s interest. Writing evergreen articles is one of the best ways to increase blog traffic and make a longer-lasting impact on your blog posts.

In this article, I’m going to:

1. Thoroughly define evergreen content
2. Give you the benefits of writing evergreen content
3. Show you how to write evergreen content
4. Guide you on how to promote evergreen content through evergreen marketing
5. Teach you how to measure the effectiveness of your evergreen content

 

Does this sound good? Let’s get to it.

What is evergreen content?

Evergreen content is SEO content that remains relevant long after its publication date. Whether it’s read minutes after it’s published or readers stumble upon it several years later, the information in an evergreen article stays fresh and useful. Search engines favor evergreen content and will continue to present them to users who enter relevant search queries.

The benefits of writing evergreen content

The purpose of creating evergreen content and executing an evergreen campaign is to consistently attract evergreen traffic!

Let’s look at some of the ways evergreen content helps bring more visitors to your blog over time.

Your content stays relevant for longer

You’ve written a great article about a trending topic. You immediately see a surge in blog traffic. But after a couple of weeks (or sooner), organic traffic from that article only trickles in until it stops altogether.

What happened?

The interest in that current topic waned and people have moved on.

Bonus point: evergreen articles don’t need constant updating!

Because SEO evergreen content contains fundamental information, just add new findings as they arise. No need to change the content frequently to keep up with trends.

Evergreen content helps improve SEO

From keyword research to choose the best title, SEO is an essential factor in driving traffic to your blog.

So how does evergreen content boost your SEO efforts?

Search engines are more likely to pull up evergreen content in response to a general query. In response to a search query, search engines crawl millions of websites for specific keywords and then index the web pages accordingly. Pages with expired or outdated content that haven’t gotten a lot of recent traffic won’t show up high in the search results for specific search queries.

Because evergreen articles stay relevant and don’t expire, search engines continuously find and favor them on the search engine results page.

How to write evergreen content

Now that you know the benefits of writing content you’re likely ready to learn how to write evergreen content. Any undertaking is easier if you create a system or consistent process for it.

Let’s break down the key steps in writing effective evergreen content.

Start with keyword research

Doing keyword research puts you in the best position for creating well-performing, sustainable content that readers will refer back to repeatedly. Using SEMrush for keyword research is a good way to find long-tail keywords for your evergreen content. This tool will help you learn the terms commonly used in your target audience’s search queries. Start your writing process by identifying which keywords to target. This will give you guidance on the best evergreen topics for your niche.

Use the 3×3 writing process

You’ve completed keyword research and know which topic to explore for your evergreen article.

Now it’s time to write! But where do you begin?

Writing a blog article (especially one meant to stay relevant for years) intimidates the best of writers at times. So make the process easier and use the 3×3 writing process.

The initial step, prewriting, includes the first group of tasks in the 3×3 writing process:

Analyze: Determine your purpose for writing the article. What do you want your reader to receive from this piece? What specific action do you want your reader to take? Think about how you want to format this post. For evergreen articles, consider “how-to” or tutorial style of blog posts. “How-to” articles perform well and are great for SEO.

Anticipate: Here’s where you put yourself in your reader’s shoes. Create audience personas by thinking about various characteristics of your reader. What’s their age, occupation, hobbies? How do you want readers to feel after reading your article? In what ways might they respond to your post?

Adapt: Brainstorm a list of words that you’d like to use in your article. Keep in mind the response you hope to elicit from your readers. Once you have your list of words, now’s the time to decide what writing style you wish to use.

Writing is the next step in the 3×3 process:

Research: Spend time conducting quality research for your evergreen article. You want to ensure that you include accurate information that people can reference. Research the top blog articles you’ll compete against. Study what they do well, but take care not to plagiarize!

Organize:  Create a blog post outline of your research and all the main points for your article. Going into the writing phase with a plan helps the process flow easier.

Compose:  Now comes the fun part: writing! Sit back, relax, and just let the words flow. This is your zero draft. You’ll get the chance to make changes later. Right now, focus on getting the words out. Trust that all the steps you took before this will lead you to a great piece of evergreen content.

The last step of the 3×3 writing process is to revise:

Revise: Look over what you’ve written and find ways to improve your article’s readability. Do you have a lot of run-on sentences? Have you used adverbs excessively?

Proofread: Proofreading and editing are crucial for evergreen content. You expect your content to be relevant and consumed by readers for a long time. You’ll get the best results from your work when your content’s copy is clean, tight, and flows well. Use an automated proofreading tool like Grammarly to check for correct grammar use and readability. Grammarly is affordable, user-friendly, and provides you with comprehensive writing feedback.

Evaluate: You’ve made it to the last task of the 3×3 writing process! Go back through the previous eight steps to ensure you thoroughly completed the process. If everything looks great, hit “publish” and watch your evergreen article provide value for years to come!

Evergreen marketing: How to promote evergreen content

Next, let’s discuss how to promote your blog with a simple process.

You need a content marketing process that will help you execute an evergreen campaign. Professional blogging is not a ‘write, publish, and forget it’ type of activity. Blogging, or any kind of writing, is a discipline that requires some marketing and selling if you want to earn a living. This is why I think it’s crucial that I help you develop a simple content promotion process.

The simple process for promoting your blog is:

1. Get to know your audience: Understanding your audience puts you at a great advantage. When you know where your readers go online for news or the social media platforms where they’re most active, you’ll have a better sense of where to distribute your content.
2. Share your post on social media and other platforms: Cross-posting your article on platforms like Medium, Facebook, or LinkedIn alerts your network about your new post.
3. Reach out to influencers and fellow bloggers in your industry: Connect with blogger peers and do natural link building and blog syndication strategies with each other.
4. Connect with your audience via email: Send out an email and inform your readers about your latest post.

In conclusion

I hope that I’ve convinced you that creating evergreen content is one of the greatest ways to increase blog traffic.

Not only does evergreen content create an opportunity for readers to discover your site, but it also gives you space to indefinitely provide profound value to a large audience. Bookmark this page and revisit this article as you develop and curate your own evergreen content strategy!

Write better evergreen content with the help of industry-leading SEO tools.

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This syndicated article was originally published on InspireFirst.