How do you define your SEO content goals and audience?

Before you start writing SEO content, you need to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve and who you want to reach. Without a well-defined content strategy, you risk wasting time, money and energy on creating content that doesn't rank well, attract traffic or convert visitors. In this article, you'll learn how to define your SEO content goals and audience in six simple steps.

1 Understand your business objectives

The first step is to align your content goals with your business objectives. What are you trying to accomplish with your website? Do you want to generate leads, increase sales, build authority, raise awareness or educate your audience? Your content goals should support your business objectives and be SMART: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound. For example, if your business objective is to increase sales, your content goal could be to increase conversions by 10% in the next quarter.

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Bhavik Sarkhedi 🪜

I Help Founders, CEOs & C-level Executives Increase ⬆️ Online Presence Organically via LinkedIn, Content Marketing, and SEO 📈| Personal Branding Consultant & Serial Entrepreneur ✍️ with 2 Exits: Write Right & Dad of Ad
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the quest to conquer the digital realm! Imagine yourself as an Indian cricketer setting goals for a match. Similarly, as a marketer, define your SEO content goals like a master batsman setting targets. Determine what you want to achieve—more visibility, higher rankings, or increased conversions. Then, study your audience like a perceptive captain analyzing opponents. Understand their desires, pain points, and quirks, and craft personalized content that bowls them over. That's how you hit a six in the SEO game!

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Joel Davidge

Discover how leading events professionals bring their events to life | One Amazing Experience newsletter
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I agree, and would add that mostly people think of SEO as "ranking for target keywords" which is correct to a level, but where the strategy comes in is why you want to rank for those keywords and what impact it will have for your business. If your aim is to rank for awareness stage keywords then you could judge success as increasing page views by X% in a time period. However, if your aim is to increase conversions then you'll need to target keywords mapped to the bottom of the sales funnel.

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2 Analyze your current situation

The second step is to assess your current content performance and identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. You can use tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Moz or SEMrush to gather data on your traffic, rankings, keywords, bounce rate, engagement and conversions. You can also conduct a content audit to evaluate the quality, relevance, accuracy and consistency of your existing content. This will help you understand what works well, what needs improvement and what gaps you need to fill.

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3 Research your target audience

The third step is to define your target audience and create buyer personas. A buyer persona is a fictional representation of your ideal customer based on their demographics, psychographics, behaviors and needs. You can use surveys, interviews, social media, online forums or customer reviews to collect information about your audience. You can also use tools like Google Trends, AnswerThePublic or BuzzSumo to discover what topics, questions and keywords they are searching for. By knowing your audience, you can create content that matches their intent, preferences and pain points.

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Joel Davidge

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Never forget the power of simply asking your key targets what they like. Look for a customer which fits your ideal persona and ask them where they hang out online, what their interests are, and what made them buy from you. This is vital information which you can use to tailor your content to that persona.

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4 Map out your customer journey

The fourth step is to map out your customer journey and align your content with each stage of the funnel. The customer journey is the process that your audience goes through from becoming aware of your brand to making a purchase decision. It typically consists of four stages: awareness, interest, desire and action. Each stage requires different types of content that educate, inform, persuade and convert your audience. For example, in the awareness stage, you can use blog posts, videos or podcasts to attract attention and generate interest. In the action stage, you can use landing pages, testimonials or case studies to motivate action and drive conversions.

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5 Choose your content formats and channels

The fifth step is to decide what content formats and channels you will use to deliver your message and reach your audience. Depending on your goals, audience and budget, you can choose from a variety of content formats such as text, images, audio, video or interactive. You can also choose from a variety of content channels such as your website, blog, social media, email, search engines or third-party platforms. You should consider the advantages and disadvantages of each format and channel and how they fit into your content strategy.

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6 Measure and optimize your results

The sixth and final step is to measure and optimize your results. You need to track and analyze your content performance and see if you are meeting your goals and satisfying your audience. You can use tools like Google Analytics, Google Search Console or other metrics platforms to monitor your key performance indicators such as traffic, rankings, keywords, engagement, conversions and revenue. You can also use tools like Google Optimize, Hotjar or Crazy Egg to conduct A/B testing, heatmaps or user feedback to improve your content quality, usability and conversion rate. By measuring and optimizing your results, you can refine your content strategy and achieve better SEO outcomes.

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Bhavik Sarkhedi 🪜

I Help Founders, CEOs & C-level Executives Increase ⬆️ Online Presence Organically via LinkedIn, Content Marketing, and SEO 📈| Personal Branding Consultant & Serial Entrepreneur ✍️ with 2 Exits: Write Right & Dad of Ad
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Without doing the necessary optimization, everything I do would go in vain. Optimization is like QA. If our seo content goals are not aligned, then the output will be useless and without quality. I generally use Hotjar, Crazy Egg to know and test A/B method.

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7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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How do you define your SEO content goals and audience?

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1 Understand your business objectives

2 Analyze your current situation

3 Research your target audience

4 Map out your customer journey

5 Choose your content formats and channels

6 Measure and optimize your results

7 Here’s what else to consider

SEO Copywriting

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