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If you’re a regular on LinkedIn, then you’re probably pretty familiar with the term thought-leaders. And while you might assume this term is reserved for the Steven Bartlett and Richard Branson's of the world, it is a strategy that can be utilised by anyone with knowledge and experience in an industry. But did you know that you can become a thought leader yourself? You can then integrate this into your content strategy, to help attract customers and grow your business. In this blog, we’re looking at the difference between SEO content and thought-leadership content to help you decide which is best for your business. What is SEO content? At Jammy Digital, we spent years designing functional and beautiful websites. And everyone always thinks that’s enough for the business to come flooding in. But the truth is, it’s difficult for your website to rank without a stream of in-depth, informative, and educational content. Google isn't too bothered about how 'pretty' your website is (just that it works!) It’s estimated that the number one listing on Google accounts for 27.6% of all click-throughs. And only 0.63% of all Google searchers continue through to the second page of results. So it’s not only crucial that you create content, but that you create content that ranks on search engines. Otherwise, your potential customers will struggle to find you online. SEO content is well-written, engaging, and informative content, with a primary focus on getting your website to rank on search engine results pages (SERPs). It’s all about creating content your customers are searching for, so you show up higher in rankings. SEO content harnesses the knowledge of SEO and keywords, optimising content for search engines, so the right people find it. Related content: SEO content writer vs SEO agency: which one is best for your business? What is thought leadership content? First things first, let's define thought leadership by itself, before going onto the content. Thought leadership is the delivery of content that uses expertise, insight, and experience to help you become the go-to source of information in your industry. Thought leadership isn’t so much a type of content, but rather an approach to content creation, created by tapping into the expertise, insight, and experience within your business and the wider community. People often think that thought leadership content has to include controversial or outspoken opinions, and it can, but it doesn’t have to. What it does need to be is authentically and recognisably you, with a strong brand voice. No sitting on the sidelines; it’s about letting people know what you think. Thought leader content can include: Stong and/or controversial opinions. Expertise. Experience. Authenticity. A desire to share their knowledge. This type of content helps businesses and individuals build credibility and be seen as an expert. The different types of thought-leadership content marketing. I like to split thought-leadership content into different categories including: Original research content… Business decisions content… Expert interview content… Customer client stories content… Examples of thought-leadership content. 1. Original research content. This could be via surveys or analysis, for example, reviewing websites and reporting your findings. If you do this right, you can become the ‘original source’ for a particular topic, meaning lots of others will link back to your article, which can skyrocket your rankings. An example is from Backlinko, which analysed 3.6 billion pieces of content to better understand evergreen content. 2. Business decisions & strategies content. Want to stand out as an expert? Give a little insight into your business and the decisions and strategies that you have implemented. You can detail why you made those decisions and whether or not they worked. If not, you can let people know what went wrong - and what you learned from it. In this example, Orbit Media shares its 15-year-old content strategy, detailing what worked and what didn’t. It’s a great way to showcase their expertise in SEO and content strategy - the service that they offer. 3. Expert interview content. As much as you would like to be, you probably aren’t an expert in everything. So, why not capitalise on the expertise of others and bring that knowledge to your audience? This can be done via guest blogs, but a great medium for this type of content is podcasts. A great example is Steven Bartlett, Diary of a CEO podcast - where Steven interviews different leaders and CEO, bringing you their top tips, learnings, and insights from their careers. 4. Client stories content. You can tell your potential clients how great you are, but it’s much more believable if it comes from someone else. So, why not let your clients do the talking? This blog from Buffer puts one of their clients at the forefront and lets her write her own case study on how she used the scheduling tool. It’s common for people to write blogs on product and service features, but this type of blog talks about them in a way that actually teaches potential clients something. It’s a powerful way to show the impact that your product or service could have on a business. SEO content vs Thought leadership content: what results do they get your business? Results! Let’s face it, most of us aren’t creating content (thought-leadership, SEO, or otherwise) just for fun. As exciting as creating content can be, I’d personally rather be eating chips on the beach or reading a good book (or both). Content is all part of a wider marketing effort to increase traffic, leads, and ultimately sales. If your content is not getting you results, then it’s a waste of time and energy - two things you don’t have to spare running a business. So, in order to compare the two, we need to understand the results that you can get from each. What does SEO content help you achieve? When creating SEO content, it’s all about getting your website to rank on search engine result pages (SERPs). The goal is to discover exactly what your potential customers are searching for and create content to answer those questions. As the stats show, if you don’t rank your website within the first couple of search results, then it’s unlikely people will click on your website. So, great SEO content should help you to: Increase your search engine rankings for a variety of keywords. Increase your website traffic. Increase your backlinks from high-authority websites. Plus, there are the intangible benefits of SEO content, that enable you to attract the right customers and have better quality conversations. But ultimately, the primary goal of SEO content is creating content that helps you rank highly and get found online. Related content: How to 10x your website traffic The results of thought leadership content. Unlike SEO content, thought-leadership content is not about what people search for. It’s about building authority and positioning yourself as a subject matter expert. However, while the content is not focussed on ranking, it does still have some pretty incredible results when it comes to traffic and conversions. According to SEM rush, 81.4% of thought leadership content results in organic traffic. And if that’s not enough, 47.6% generates the all-important leads and sales. Why? It’s partly down to the fact that by the very nature of thought-leadership content. It’s WAY more likely to get you backlinks from other content creators. For example, let’s relook at “original research” content - one of the types of thought-leadership content previously mentioned. This is a style of content that Brian Dean at Backlino has absolutely nailed. He carries out in-depth research on relevant topics and creates content with details and specificity that no one else has covered. Thought leadership is not necessarily an SEO strategy. However, it increases the likelihood of backlinks (we’ve even used some in this article), establishes expertise, and optimises the website for rankings. Therefore it does benefit SEO, although it’s not targeting that. The mechanisms that enable thought-leadership content to drive your business include Brand credibility and authority. Generates backlinks, shares, and mentions. Attract potential customers. SEO content vs thought-leadership content: when should you use it? Content is sold as the be-all-and-end-all when it comes to growing your business. But the truth is, there is no one size fits all, and not everyone will need to implement the same content strategy. But which one is right for you? When should you use SEO content? Relying on referrals to grow your business? Struggling to bring in leads? SEO content is all about utilisng and capturing the existing search traffic within your market in order to drive revenue and grow your business. And it’s extremely valuable at helping you rank and convert when correctly implemented. This is why we recommend that all businesses implement an SEO content strategy, assuming you have the following in place: 1️⃣ An up-to-date website (that wasn’t designed in the 90s) 2️⃣ A website that's easy-peasy to navigate (no use getting loads of traffic to your website if all those people end up getting lost and then leaving.) 3️⃣ Decent and clear website copy 4️⃣ Products or services that sell right now (great content will not make up for a bad product/service) 5️⃣ Access to your actual website and blog (ie. your web design company isn’t holding it hostage) Assuming you have these things, you can get started on creating a successful SEO content strategy that helps you will all the benefits we’ve already discussed. Start by thinking about what your potential customers are searching for and create content around that (or hire us to do it for you). Related content: Why referrals are bad for business (and what to do instead) When should you use thought leadership content? As we now know, the point of thought-leadership content is not to rank, but to influence and gain...

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