Article Rewriting Improves SEO and Builds Audience
Article rewriting for SEO is a fast way to improve search engine optimization and user experience at the same time.
Imagine the possibilities with article rewriting: Higher search rankings, lower bounce rate, increasing pages per visit, more social shares and more return visits.
It really isn’t too good to be true.
Start with a simple scenario. Imagine an article on a site was published three years ago. At the time, work was especially busy and the article didn’t get much attention.
Maybe it was only 300-400 words long. It didn’t have any photos or graphics. It also didn’t have any related links. Keywords were not well defined. If it did have a photo, the alt tag was missing.
That said, the topic of the article has lasting value. In other words, it is evergreen content with the potential for more audience.
The fact that is is evergreen content about a popular topic automatically makes it a candidate for a rewrite. What makes it an even better candidate for a rewrite is its current rank in search engines.
If the article doesn’t appear on the first 10 pages of search results, the potential for meaningful improvement of course is much weaker. But what if it is appearing on page four or five despite being sloppily written? That almost certainly makes it a candidate for rewriting.
1) Fix the Length
The length of an article is a well-known factor in getting better results from search engines.
It’s not that length by itself matters, because a badly written long article will not engage readers anymore than a badly written short one. If they exit the page after just a few paragraphs, search engines will note the quick exit and penalize it.
But a well-written long article that provides depth, insight, good grammar and high-quality information will increase engagement and potentially the rankings.
Think of it this way. Will search engines rank higher a longer article with more information or a shorter article on the same subject with less information? Logically, they will go with the longer, more informative and more authoritative article.
2) Fix the Style
Credit: Pixabay
A highly informative article can still suffer from a poor style. In other words, the flow of the sentences can be awkward or smooth.
Try reading the article out loud. Does it sound stilted or natural?
The length of paragraphs also can matter. People are more likely to skim articles online than in books, magazines or newspapers because they tend to harvest or cherry-pick information.
Depending on the type of article, sometimes it can be enhanced with humor or personal anecdotes.
3) Fix the Presentation
Online media is more visual than books, magazines and newspapers and somewhat less visual than television.
A 1,000-word article without photos and graphics, no matter how well written, will be less engaging than one with photos and graphics.
Again, more by itself is not necessarily better. Higher quality increases engagement and time on page.
4) Fix the Navigation
Navigation is not just a navigation bar at the top of the page. It also includes links to related content within the body or at the bottom of the article.
Links within the body of the article should be scattered evenly throughout to create multiple, well-spaced exit points. Use enticing and relevant keywords to attract clicks.
That approach seems to work better than a box of related links place randomly within the article.
Finally, links at the bottom of an article will attract fewer clicks for the obvious reason that many readers don’t scroll that far. But they do attract clicks from at least some readers. If it’s a great article, they will scroll more.
Putting It All Together
Anecdotal evidence shows that search engines do respond positively to articles that have been rewritten for SEO and improved if done correctly.
There are no guarantees the article will jump to the top of page 1 in search results or even that the ranking will improve at all. At some point, competition from other sites may keep the ranking low. But some articles will see an improvement.
Even if rankings don’t improve, the odds of better performance will climb in the form of a higher engagement rate, more social shares and lower bounce rate (the number of people who come to the page and leave again without looking at another page). The lower bounce rate will increase pages per visit. For sites with ads, that also means more revenue.
One other step with article rewriting matters in the long run. That step is reviewing performance for existing articles on a regular basis to see which ones have improved and which ones have lagged. Use those insights to revisit the laggards and try again.
Promise Media offers online business tips and best practices for content-rich websites. 