The Adpearance Method: Content Planning for Website Success

There is a reason why this particular website planning model begins and ends with content. When it comes to website planning, your shiny new website—proudly planned by the Nerdherd—will live or die by the quality of content that is offered, the way it is structured or architected, and the ability of users to understand your content in context.

Design is a plan for arranging elements in such as way as best to accomplish a particular purpose.

Charles Eames

When it comes to web design and social media marketing, written content is the element that does the heavy lifting. Google and other search engines become the ubiquitous gateway to the web and their algorithms are becoming a proxy for quality analysis. That means, subjectively and objectively, your content must be good, linkable and in context.

GOOD
Creating quality content is as easy as understanding your objective—and the Oxford comma.

“Good content” can be measured as a function of purpose. Does this content achieve its objective? Additionally, content should generally be grammatically correct, and professional in tone (or irreverent in the case of outdoor-gear purveyor Moosejaw).

Usually, the trick is defining the objective.

As part of the Adpearance process, we will sit down with you to define measurable objectives for your site. We will also help define the pathways and content that will achieve that objective, before turning it over to you to write glorious, flowing prose.

If creating content isn’t your speed, Adpearance also offers content writing services. Our team of writers can produce website copy, blog content, product descriptions, newsletters, and much more.

LINKABLE
Well-constructed information architecture is the key to linkable, sharable awesomeness.

There’s a reason why webmasters can submit a sitemap directly to Google. It is important to build navigable relationships between pieces of information online. Google, and your site visitors, need to be able to access the content they need, when they need it.

Google Webmaster Tools include instructions for structured data types and rich snippets that will help search engines identify and display pieces of information—such as concert listings, products and recipes—in search results.

Cleaning up cluttered URLs and optimizing social sharing—by adding tags that help sites like Facebook grab preview content, as well as adding “share” buttons—help users interact with the web, find what they need, and link to your content easily.

IN CONTEXT
Don’t take the opportunity to get a last word in. 

When writing content for your site, don’t pepper in irrelevant information where it’s not needed. Site visitors don’t appreciate embedded, irrelevant copy—especially advertisements. Google has seen enough and now demotes sites that practice keyword stuffing.

It can manifest fairly innocently as well. It’s OK to be proud of the fact that your company raises boatloads of cash for charitable causes, but it doesn’t belong in product descriptions or in a checkout process. Stay on point and keep your copy clean.

Proper prior planning—besides preventing poor performance—can help you here. Understanding your SEO keywords and creating landing pages that speak to those search queries directly will help you rank instead of flop. Adpearance can help you create opportunities to share your various messages in relevant, welcome and personal ways.