Design. SEO. PPC.

Over the last two weeks, we talked about SEO vs. Content and how SEO lives on using the metaphor of “Content is King, and SEO is his vizier.” But the truth is that there’s a lot more to content marketing than just content and technical SEO — so we decided one more week’s worth of this analogy would be worth everybody’s time. Today, then, we’re talking about the King’s Court — all of those other parts that feed into both SEO and Content in the modern paradigm.

The Cast of Characters: Elements of Modern SEO and Content Marketing

Your King has to have a lot of people backing him up to do his job right:

• The Royal Architect: Desktop and Mobile Web Design. Without a solid platform on which to display your content (and to perform ‘tax collection,’ but we’ll cover that next week), all of the other work your King and Vizier do is useless. If your website doesn’t instantly promote a sense of trust and a relationship with the end user — and if it’s not easy and intuitive for the end user to use — your content (and the SEO that goes with it) is useless. If your platform isn’t available on mobile devices, it’s missing out on just under half of your audience — and it’s the just-under-half that is most inclined toward taking action when they go online, so it can end up being MORE than half of your future client base that you’re missing out on.
• The Tactician: Metrics and Analytics. The data flow that runs ‘uphill’ from end-user to the business is crucial to determining how various kinds of content are being accepted by the end-users. Without someone to continuously find new ways to obtain that data, process the data as it comes in, and use it to (correctly!) determine what it is about a given piece of content that made it work (format, subject matter, timing of release, etc.), the King might just waste weeks and months making content that no one really cares about. With a trusted Tactician among his advisors, the King can move confidently knowing that his choices will be seen favorably by all who witness them.
• The Scribe: Documentation and Records. Simply put, an undocumented marketing strategy is no marketing strategy. Fail to plan and you can plan to fail. The scribe might seem like a minor role — and in fact in many instances, other members of the Court will step in to fill the scribe’s shoes — but it’s a critical one to any kingdom’s long-term success.
• The Nobility: Outreach and Relationship-Building. The King’s content might be absolutely stunning in its depth and breadth; in its displays of insight and its calls to action — but if only the King’s people are talking about what the King is saying, it’s going to look a lot like the King isn’t really all that influential. Thus, it’s crucial to get other people hosting the King’s content — and there’s where the nobility comes in. The outreach/relationship-building expert connects with other influencers within the industry’s online sphere and establishes a rapport with several that will allow the King’s content to show up in places obviously outside of the King’s normal influence. This is the heart and soul of Content Marketing — there’s a reason we give this particular area the importance of our metaphorical nation’s aristocracy.

You might think we’ve now taken our SEO/Content Marketing metaphor and stretched it to cover every aspect of modern Internet marketing — but you’re wrong. There’s still one more critically important element of turning a profit on the Internet. Come back next week for a look at the King’s most moneyed allies — the tax collectors!