Do you know what most marketers shy away from? Long-form content pieces. They think users respond better to short and visually engaging content. That’s why they choose infographics, videos, and pictures. Yet, they often neglect all the advantages long-form content brings to the brand. For instance, it builds authority, links, and brand awareness and generally increases the website’s value. Businesses looking to establish themselves as leading experts in the field can particularly benefit from long-form content. Here is a list of some long-form content advantages.
It’s Used as a Reference Material
When writing any type of content, writers use relevant references or sources to add value to their content. If your blogpost is positioned high in the search engine rankings, then they may use it. This means your piece of content attracts third-party links. To increase your chances of being used as a reference, you can use reliable statistical data. No matter the niche they’re writing about, every writer likes to include data in their content piece to make it more believable and relevant. Also, the data gives you the opportunity to rank for various keywords. Being used for external links increases brand awareness and organic ranking.
Target a Range of Keywords
What most writers and marketers like the most about long-form content is the opportunity to target a whole range of topics and keywords. This opportunity means you can reap the benefits from a single content piece for a long time. However, this doesn’t mean you can randomly pick keywords, include them in the content, and expect high rankings. SEO and keyword research still should be your priority if you want to improve your search engine rankings. When you find the relevant keywords for the whole topic, you can use them sparingly throughout the content. It expands your reach and boosts your ranking potential.
Reap Long-term Benefits
When thinking about what topic to cover, you should make sure it’s trendy. Then you’ll be able to update it now and then release it again and take advantage of it in the long run. For example, if you’ve covered industry trends for 2021, you can now go back and update the information with the newest data. Updating visual data is rarely possible, but updating long-form content is a great way to keep it alive and ranking high. Whenever you re-optimize the content, you get the chance to promote it again and attract new users to check it out. Also, you start building authority because users expect you to provide new information for them.
Cover Multiple Angles of the Same Story
Lengthy content pieces are great for PR standpoint as they allow writers to cover various angles of a topic or story. For example, you’re writing about e-commerce, a broad and general topic. However, you can include its definition, history, trends for 2022, growth potential and its future, etc. A single content piece can then be used for various marketing purposes or even internal linking. With different angles, you can reach a larger number of websites. More importantly, in case one angle fails, you have another to benefit from.
Easy to Be Crawled and Indexed
While data visualizations, pictures, and infographics look visually appealing to readers, they seem too complex for search engines. That’s because JavaScript, codes, and data files hide behind this attractive content. Search engines can crawl and index, but understanding the content like a real human being seems quite challenging. It prevents search engines from ranking your content properly and diminishes your website’s value as a whole. However, lengthy content forms are easy to interpret. As such, it adds significant value to the website and helps it fulfil its ranking potential.
Final Thoughts
Marketers usually dislike long-form content. However, if they knew all the advantages it brings to businesses, they wouldn’t feel that way. The content serves as reference material for others, and search engines easily understand them. You get to use a wide range of keywords and cover a story from multiple perspectives. With regular updates, you get to reap the benefits long-term. In the end, your business will improve its ranking and become authoritative and recognizable in its industry.
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