Did you know that people are highly unlikely to click to the second page on search engines?
If you found your way to search about SEO content analysis, you probably already knew it. After reading this article, you’ll learn how to do a proper analysis in order to create high-quality content in a consistent way. It’s time to improve search results!
In this article about seo content analysis, we will go through:
What is SEO content analysis?
Common problems with SEO content
Advantages of content analysis
Disadvantages of content analysis
The best practices for content analysis - step by step
Conclusion
Without further ado, let’s get started!
In order to understand why to execute SEO page content analysis or what are primary reasons for executing such analysis, it is necessary to understand what is meant by SEO content analysis.
Essentially, SEO content analysis describes the overall process of evaluating the content requirements for target keyword or phrase to achieve the best possible position in the search results.
Its intent is to delve deep into the content to analyze everything from search intent, keywords and narrowing a topic all the way to nitpicking about grammar and making sure the content is easy to read. It requires you to put the researcher hat on when scrutinizing and nitpicking the content competitors’ content structure, words, phrases and overall semantics. SEO content analysis also requires you to have a creative mind to consider ‘what kind of new information or value can I bring to the table?’
If you want to check your website - try our free SEO audit , which will show your SEO score and errors on your website.
While the content analysis in qualitative research has some similarities with SEO content analysis, there are solid differences that distinguish the regular content analysis process from the one designed for SEO purposes.
The SEO content analysis methodology consists of a combination of qualitative and quantitative content analysis. It is as much about being able to create unique content backed up by data research, rankings and keyword difficulties. It requires you to be able to add certain terms and phrases to the content while ultimately serving the core purpose of the search intent. By executing a comprehensive SEO analysis for content, you are likely to answer the question the searcher has and, at the end, satisfy their needs in the best way possible.
The end goal of any SEO content analysis of websites and pages is to make sure that the content, for example a blog article, gains or improves its overall ranking score and thus its position in the search engine results.
The better position your content has, the more you gain traffic. The more you gain traffic, the more you are likely to see conversions .
The reason to learn about SEO page content analysis processes arises usually from the fact that the efforts put by the team to the content are not yielding profitable results in organic sales or other conversions . In most cases, the issue lies either in creating only a mediocre SEO content analysis or not doing it at all.
Now, let me tell you, the most common problems are not bad heading or meta title being too long . They usually are one (or more) of the following: - Poor keyword targeting - No relevance to the SERP/intent - Insufficient information - Poor quality of writing
Find out which apply to your challenges with SEO content in order to understand the underlying issues in your SEO content performance.
One of the most common challenges with SEO content is poor keyword targeting. Poor keyword targeting happens usually like this:
Making a mistake like this is understandable - hey, even I’ve been there. Understanding how to avoid this requires SEO page content analysis and the knowledge of the types of keywords there are.
So you say that I need to know the types of keywords - but how do I do that? Stay tuned, we will teach you how to choose the right keyword to target in this article.
While keyword targeting is where many fail, some struggle with understanding the question of relevance to the SERP/search intent. The core question here is:
What kind of information people expect to find when they utilize the given search term or phrase?
The easiest way to understand what the search intent is is to basically do a search with the given term . If the results on the 1st page include mainly links to products, you should also utilize it for the product card or other product-related page on your website. Writing a blog post is sadly not likely to make it even if that piece of content is highly optimized. Similarly, a search term for ‘birthday party ideas for 3 year olds’ is going to showcase
Lastly, the SEO optimized page you’ve worked hard on could simply have insufficient information. But what does that mean?
Simply put, it means that your page contains either: - Too little content, - Irrelevant content, or - Unclear content
Depending on the issue, the fix could be easy or difficult. If you have too little content compared to what competitors are doing, adding more content could have an impact on the results. Fixing unclear content is also easy to fix. Add headings, re-organize the content, add a list (or two), include bullet points… Fixing irrelevant content, however, requires the execution of a thorough SEO content analysis and most often requires the content to be rewritten.
As a search engine, Google increasingly values the usefulness of the content created. One profound example of this is the Helpful Content Update, which pinpoints the fact that Google’s algorithms are becoming significantly more capable of detecting whether the content was written for the primary intent - that is, for the search term - or for the search engines.
So yes, while we rave for executing SEO content analyses and complying them, no amount of analyzing can truly save a poorly written content if there is any competition for the given search intent (and if you somehow have found a search intent without some intense competition, you’re lucky). Therefore, it is an absolute necessity to either invest in a talented SEO copywriter or, if working on your own, put an extra thought to it.
Here are a few tips on how to overcome poor writing quality :
The final step is often undervalued. However, if you think about it, it goes like this: if your friend from a whole different field is able to understand at least most of your piece of content, it is highly likely that the target audience will comprehend your content as well.
Executing a website content analysis for SEO purposes has numerous advantages and benefits compared to creating content without a proper analysis supporting it. Here are the top 3 advantages of conducting a content analysis as a standard practice:
Oftentimes, the marketing departments are challenged to prove their point and demonstrate the reasoning behind certain actions in case the resources given do not showcase the expected results as fast as imagined.
By being able to execute a thorough SEO page content analysis plan for each and every piece of content created, you are validating the content creation process . Additionally, you and your team will feel more confident and relieved in publishing useful yet researched content.
Touching upon the previous point, the approach is by default systematic given that the SEO specialist and copywriter follows the same content analysis methodology consistently. This allows your team to become more confident and efficient in experimenting with new types of content once the basic building blocks exist. Although nothing is certain in the world of SEO in 2023, there is at least backed up research and approach behind each piece of content published.
In the age of artificial intelligence copywriting tools, it may seem that the blank page anxiety shouldn’t be an issue. Yet it still is. While the copywriting tools have become wizards in both generating ideas and polishing the content , the initial start on what to write and how to set up the correct tone comes (still) from the human brains. And while the AI tools are capable of producing somewhat coherent content in English, some languages (like my native one, Finnish) are just too complex for the AI minds to make any sense.
Having a semantic core sorted out is like having a tool that allows you to simply choose the topic based on the queries found (this is especially true with informational keywords). Simply execute the SEO page content analysis and you BOOM! You practically have the structure, keywords, LSIs and other aspects sorted out. Then you just simply write.
In most cases, conducting a SEO page content analysis is beneficial. However, there are three situations where a website content analysis may be disadvantageous:
Maybe a bit obvious, but it has to be said. Learning the proper content analysis methodology takes time. While it may seem easy to evaluate what well-ranking competitors are doing, there are various details in the process of analysis to take into account.
It takes time to do well. The same is true for anything related to SEO content analysis. While the process of executing the SEO content analysis is tedious (I mean, it may seem a bit frustrating to add lists of LSI keywords to your plan and bang your head against the wall about each heading), it usually pays off. And naturally, since you’ve planned it all thoroughly before even writing, less editing is required.
Finally… nothing is foolproof, you know. There is a possibility that you do everything by the book - apply the best content analysis methodology, make sure to have an impeccable structure and include visual content, yet still it just doesn’t work out the way you wanted to. It happens even to the best of us. Those are the moments where a long-term goal should be kept in mind. Okay so, this SEO article flopped, but five others were a success. Let’s keep going.
Having learned what SEO content analysis is, the usual challenges with SEO content, and what the advantages and disadvantages are, it is time to learn how to execute the SEO page content analysis to achieve the best position possible.
Throughout the steps, we will help you understand the process of how to execute SEO content analysis:
At first glance, choosing the right keyword may seem easy. By utilizing a keyword tool, you get a list of hundreds or thousands of keywords or phrases. Then you see the volume of each keyword and choose it as your target keyword.
But what you need to realize is that that query already has fierce competition which may be extremely difficult if not impossible to beat if you are not already an established website where SEO optimization has been taken into account for years. Then again, there is not much purpose to choose a keyword that has zero to none volume, unless you expect it to become the next hot thing to search for. So, for most cases, the correct target keyword lies somewhere between the very broad and very narrow ones volume-wise.
Choosing the right keyword really depends on whether you already have an established website or not. If you already have it, the simplest way to evaluate which keyword to go for is to utilize SEO tools such as Ahrefs and Semrush to see which keywords the page ranks for . This is a standard practice for any SEO content analysis of websites and you’ll see many recommending this approach.
However, I must argue that it is not necessarily a foolproof method. Just think about it; if the page you plan to write content on hasn't been optimized at all, what are the ranking keywords like? There could be relevant ones, but there is also a great possibility that you’ll either see keywords and phrases totally irrelevant to your target audience or keywords that have zero volume . If that is the case, it may be a good idea to approach that page from a similar perspective to where the content analysis process starts for a new website.
If you are starting from scratch, then it is recommended to do a proper keyword strategy as a whole and utilize the SEO content analysis once the content production is at its planning stage.
A proper keyword strategy allows you to take the whole scope of keywords and phrases (known also as semantic core) into account when planning everything from front page and navigation to category and product pages as well as blog content.
Basically, your aim is to group various search terms into various content categories . What type of keywords are linked with purchase intention? What kind of product or service do you provide? What kind of steps the customer usually takes before committing to a purchase and how can you help the customer to go through the funnel with the correct content at each stage?
A simple SEO content analysis is unlikely to do it. Combine it with a more holistic content plan and you have something more robust to work with.
This step can usually be combined with Step 1. A content analysis tool basically allows you to find topics and themes as well as other keywords that are often used together with your target keyword.
Almost all common SEO analysis tools have a tool for analyzing the content. While it is possible to do a content analysis without any tools, it certainly is more time efficient to utilize one. The tool goes through SERP and picks up the information you need for your SEO content analysis to proceed to the next step: analyzing user intent.
Once you have your keyword map or semantic core set and you have utilized a SEO content analysis tool to create topic clusters while gaining valuable insights, it is time to analyze the user intent.
Analyzing user intent refers to the process where you research what type of content or information people are hoping to see when they utilize the given keywords or phrases.
For instance, people searching for a pizza oven for home are probably looking to purchase the item, which makes it a commercial keyword , whereas best pizza recipes for home are likely to direct you to a blog article, making it an informational query . Besides the following two, the query could be transactional or navigational.
In my experience, evaluating the user intent is at the heart of SEO content analysis. You will save yourself a lot of time and money by knowing what people hope to see with each query.
I mean, imagine writing a long, researched blog article for a keyword that is 100% commercial and then banging your head on why this article has such a poor ranking. Yup. Been there, done that. Not recommended.
One of the most common questions our clients give us is ‘how many words or characters should the article be?’
And this is where we inherently get the SEO content analysis process wrong. While it is oftentimes better to have more than less, it ultimately comes down to one thing: covering the topic thoroughly .
Write enough to cover all necessary aspects of the topic yet optimize the text so that you don’t get repetitive and are able to stay within the topic. With product pages, being concise and clear is usually the way to go, whereas blog articles and other types of informational pages may require a more lengthy approach - especially if they cover a broad theme.
But if you need a concise number of words or characters in order to start somewhere, analyze the length of your SEO content competitors’ articles that answer to the search intent you are aiming to rank for.
Page title and description are your time to sell the content to the one looking for information via search engines. After all, its primary intent is to attract a search engine user to your website. But that does not mean that you necessarily need to be pushy about it.
Instead of stating something like “Best ever (product/service) - Super amazing - Buy now” in your meta title, it is a good idea to see what kind of meta titles and descriptions your SEO content competitors have and try to top that out. Some general guidelines for a good page title and description exist:
As said, these are general guidelines. In fact, Google experiments with their own metas if they consider your own ones to be poor, and these titles and descriptions are sometimes longer than the guidelines.
This is my favorite step when it comes to any SEO content creation (and quite honestly, I prefer doing this before step 5). Creating a comprehensive heading structure is the first concrete step towards actually writing the piece of content. It is basically a list of headings that are based on your content analysis research. There are many ways on how to do this step, but here is one suggestion:
The 5th point is more essential than you may think. Although the algorithms on search engines like Google are not on the human level (yet), they scrape the heading structure similarly to us. If the structure does not provide enough information for your friend to comprehend the topic, it probably is a good idea to optimize the heading structure before writing any SEO page content.
So, you’ve now done everything you could before doing the actual thing - writing that piece of content, be it a product page or an informational page.
Now, there are various ways to approach this topic. One analytic way of approaching SEO content writing is to utilize the Content Gap tool . This tool enables you to see where your competitors lack in terms of the content within that topic. All the most common SEO tool providers, such as Ahrefs, Semrush and many others, have a tool like this. Since each tool operates slightly differently, we simply suggest you have a look at a short tutorial of the tool you are planning to use. However, you do not have to have fancy SEO tools to find the content gaps.
Do the tools make it much easier? Yes. But can you still find novel content gaps? Absolutely. Dive deep and analyze your content competitors. Do they have customer reviews? Do they explain the assembly process in detail? Are there other ways you can bring extra value to the reader? Seize the opportunities through executing website content analysis .
Finding relevant questions should also be part of your SEO content analysis. Consider it as a concrete way to give solid responses to what people are actually looking for. Depending on the possibilities of the site and many other things, you may either want to create a FAQ or simply list a Q&A type of section. My favorite tools for this are the beloved Answer the Public and yes, Google itself. But other useful SEO exist for this purpose too, so try and see what works for you!
Writing a conclusion should be relatively straightforward; the conclusion should include the key message of the article in a sweet and short manner. It is always a good idea to go back to the beginning and address:
In most cases, including a CTA (call to action) is essential in order to keep the user on the page for a little longer and even convert, if possible. For most e-commerce stores, including a CTA to the products or services mentioned within the text is a common practice. But you may also decide to add more value by having a link (or a few) to an article or other piece of content you expect them to be interested in.
So, that’s it - now you know how to execute SEO content analysis. With this step by step approach, we are sure that your work with content optimization becomes more efficient. However, if you are still unsure on how to start with SEO content marketing, make sure to drop us a message - let’s see how we can help you!
Share:
SEO Page Content Analysis is important because it helps to ensure that a web page is optimized for search engines, which can help to increase its visibility and ranking in search results. This can lead to more traffic and potential customers visiting the website.
Some common elements that are analyzed during SEO Page Content Analysis include keywords, meta tags, headings, and the overall structure and organization of the content. Other elements such as images, videos, and internal links may also be analyzed
SEO Page Content Analysis is typically performed by using specialized tools and software that can scan and analyze web pages. These tools can provide detailed information about various elements of the page, such as keyword density, meta tags, and headings, and can often make recommendations for optimization.
The frequency of SEO Page Content Analysis will vary depending on the website and the industry it is in, but it is generally recommended to perform an analysis at least every 3-6 months, or whenever significant changes are made to the website's content. Additionally, monitoring the website's performance and keeping track of changes in search engine algorithms is also important for staying current and making adjustments accordingly.