My Boss tells me personal narrative content isn't read online and bad for SEO, anyone else disagree? b/c I do!
-
I am in a constant debate that content 1st person or 3rd person doesn't make a difference in terms of SEO and what people on the web want to read. What do you all think? Does it make a difference?
-
I couldn't agree more! I believe the only reason that they didn't want personal narrative is because of some bad information about that style being bad for SEO; but as I have expressed to them, it's not!
Appreciate your response!
-
Gonna be blunt... a travel writing contest that doesn't allow first-person stories is simply ridiculous. (Disclosure: I work predominantly in tourism/travel too)
Travel is an incredibly personal experience. A travel guide that lists attractions of a city is one thing, but an inspiring, exciting, or moving storing of how one person experienced that city is far more likely to actually inspire others to start thinking about visiting there as well. It's the personal stories that allow a reader to start to visualize themselves doing and enjoying the things the writer is talking about.
Travel is aspirational and emotional - people don't do it because they have to but because something inspires them to do it. That inspiration doesn't come from a logic-based laundry list of places and events (facts), but the ability of the visitor to imagine themselves in and enjoying the destination (emotions). And that comes in large part from reading others' experiences. Even most travel fiction is based on first-person narrative for that reason.
Sure, once you've captured their attention in the dreaming phase, you need solid guidebook-like info for followup. But even then, people are looking for personal connections to assess the validity of the guidebook recommendations. One need only to look at the explosion of TripAdvisor over the last couple of years to see that even guidebook info is more effective when accompanied by personal stories (reviews).
The writing contest is a great idea for generating interesting real content. Don't neuter it by removing the emotional connection to the stories.
There's more than my $.02
Paul
-
Hi Kane,
You are spot on, there is room for both types of content! We are in a panic mode to get as much content up as we previously lacked pretty much any type of content being a directory!
I like your suggestions with museums, I think that is a good strategy!
-
Dear Jonathan,
Moosa and Kane have given nice insights. Here are my two cents. No matter what, an original piece of content which is unique, fresh, relevant and link worthy, always gets great traction online and goes viral with little to no help. So all that we need is try and come up with such content. All the SEO goodies will follow it after...
Best regards,
Devanur Rafi.
-
Hi Jonathon,
This won't cause any problems. The only argument one could make to support this theory is if one type of content tended to earn more links. An example would be authoritative content like Wikipedia. I don't believe this to be the case. 1st person voice can be just as link-worthy and perhaps more likely to get shared socially.
Honestly, there's room for both types of content on your site: a resource page written in 3rd person tone about a subject, and a blog article in 1st person with a personal recount about the area. Use the 3rd person content to target a keyword phrase like "Museums in Rome" and the 1st person content for a phrase like "Best Museums in Rome".
Hope that helps.
-
Yup, I mean personal experiences, specifically to a travel experience, as we are a travel website. We are creating a writing contest and they are wanting to restrict 1st person experiences, doesn't make sense to me!
But I agree the more personal and a piece of content that hits the user emotionally will be the most impactful!
As you said, content that is straight 500 words with links, is dead content these days!
Thanks for the feedback! I am mostly hoping for responses so I can prove my point! As with all SEO'er it is easier to convince with data!
-
From personal Narration if you mean a story about something that happened to you and how you feel about it. Then in that case i am with you... The world is moving towards personalization... even in the SEO world people love to hear personal experiments, tests instead f theory articles!
Technically speaking content that have a touch of personalization tend to go more viral as compare to the one that only talks about boring theory...
I think if you boss want straight 500 words of article and a link at the end to get SEO benefits.... so the time is over for that... today if you are not creating valuable and engaging content you are almost wasting your time as far as SEO is concern!
Hope this helps!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
SEO Questions & Help
I have a woo commerce shop in the firearms industry which makes advertising even more difficult because no FB, IG, or Google campaigns. I do have other sources of advertising but I'm a complete noob when it comes to SEO and the like. I know it exists and its important and that's the extent of it. I was thinking of hiring someone on Upwork to take care of this on my website but what kinds of questions/things I should look out for to keep from getting scammed? Any tips would be appreciated
Content Development | | chrisjordan0i10 -
How important is content production in the online store of gas coolers?
HiI am the manager of a store site in the field of online air conditioning store at a novinmarket.com address Not much content can be produced for the air conditioner Is it important to produce content on store sites as well?
Content Development | | sarairan0 -
Kickass Tool for Content Writers
I have been a writer for a long time. I have done a lot of writing. Many excellent teachers, professors, bosses, colleagues, and editors have helped me. I've responded to a lot of red ink - a lot of red ink. A few days ago, I found a tool that has been extremely helpful. It has significantly improved the clarity of my writing. Using it on a piece of work makes me more confident about it at publication time. It requires a lot of work to use (at least it does for me) but the results are well worth the time. People who are serious about writing well will understand this tool immediately. http://www.hemingwayapp.com/ I don't own this website (I wish I did) and have no affiliation with it. Today they released a desktop version that they are almost giving away. I have not tried it yet but plan to instal it today.
Content Development | | EGOL6 -
How to Get Rid of Duplicate Content Captured on Article Lists
We have a ton of articles and blog posts on our site. Currently, we display summary lists of articles that contain the first paragraph of the article in the summary list. However, in my reports, this is coming back as duplicate content with the full article itself. How do I fix this? Ex: article main page- http://www.robots.com/articles/10 First article on that page- http://www.robots.com/articles/viewing/grippers-for-robots (which shows up as duplicate content with the main artilce page). With our blogs, we have the most recent 5 blogs (in the same summary format) listed on our main blog page. We then have categories that people can sort by. But again, this is causing us duplicate content because those pages show the first paragraph of the blogs related to that category. Ex: blog main page- http://www.robots.com/blog. First blog listed on that page- http://www.robots.com/blog/viewing/robots-and-automation-bringing-jobs-back-to-the-united-states (which then shows as duplicate content with the main blog page). And then you can also select categories to see related topics: http://www.robots.com/blog/category/buying-a-robot which is showing as duplicate content also. Help! How can I prevent this? Thanks! JWanner
Content Development | | jwanner0 -
What are the best widgets to use on Wordpress? And what is most useful on Wordpress for content syndication?
We are in the process of researching the best plugins and widgets for our clients' blogs. It appears that SEO by Yoast is most popular for 2013 so far. Any recommendations on which widgets we should be using or plugins for content syndication? If we use something like the Jetpack plugin, would this do the trick?
Content Development | | qlkasdjfw0 -
Is it OK to delete a blog from a blog site and post it somewhere else ?
I posted a blog on blogger 4/5 days back, though blog is good quality but site is useless and i want to remove it and put it some other site. Is it ok for Google ? I believe it might be indexed already
Content Development | | Personnel_Concept0 -
Promoting blog content
I've created a pinterest board, which kind of serves as a blog also as it tells people how they can save money on their heating bills this winter. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to promote it as a backlinking opportunity? Would it be good to also feature the content on our website? Guest blogging? Any suggestions would be welcomed. Thank you.
Content Development | | AAttias0