46 Expert Tips For Creating Addictive Content [INFOGRAPHIC & EBOOK]

It’s a shiny, brand new year for you and your business. What are your resolutions to supercharge your content marketing strategy?

Web 2.0 is a fast-paced and constantly changing landscape. It’s important to keep an ear to the ground for new content trends, but it can be difficult to know what approaches will stick and what approaches will cause your content to go unnoticed. It’s a sad fact that the 50% of content created goes unread. With this being the case, businesses can’t afford to waste time and resources on content that doesn’t achieve its marketing goals.

In order for your content to stand out from all the background noise, it needs to be addictive. Addictive content pulls readers in over and over again and can generate plenty of backlinks, shares and organic traffic. Addictive content offers readers real value through actionable tips and advice and through entertainment and genuine human connection.  

But how do you create addictive content? You could pay for professional SEO services. Or turn to Google–Google searches will yield thousands of often contradictory results, making it difficult for marketers to know which information will be beneficial to them and which information they should pass on. That’s why the Venngage team made it our goal for the new year to make it easier for businesses to extract the right information from the sea of content.

We asked 140 highly successful content marketing and SEO experts the questions, “What makes for good content?” and “What is your #1 SEO tactic?” We then compiled the exclusive answers of 46 of those experts into one beautiful ebook and infographic.

These exclusive answers offered by each expert will act as the springboard that businesses need for developing a content marketing plan that works. Some of their approaches may differ but you will quickly notice some overarching trends for what works. We’ve pulled and gone over these trends in more depth in the “Takeaway Tips” section at the end of the ebook.

These tips are tried and true. They’re a compass for any business looking for direction.

This comprehensive ebook is completely FREE and contains the in depth and exclusive statements of these 46 content marketing and SEO experts. Just download it using the button below. No email required!

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

To accompany the ebook, we also created this infographic and blog post which highlights some of their quick and actionable tips for easy reference. After all, infographics are what we do best! You can embed the infographic on your site using the code below.

Embed this infographic by copying and pasting the code below.

<img class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-3845" src="https://venngage.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/EXPERT-SERIES-INFOGRAPHIC-resize-2.png" alt="Addictive Content Infographic" width="1200" height="13533" /></a><p style="text-align: center; font-size: 14px; padding-top: 4px;"><a href="https://venngage.com">Infographic made with Venngage</a></p>

1) Neil Patel @neilpatel

Founder of NeilPatel.com

“Research what all of your competitors are creating and one up them. Make your content more detailed, more actionable, and wrap it up with a pretty design.”

2) Jeff Bullas @jeffbullas

CEO of JeffBullas.com

“Our top strategy at jeffbullas.com is to create 1,000+ word blog posts that add value to our readers and to become such a great resource that we get inbound links from other websites and blogs.”

3) Lee Odden @leeodden

CEO of TopRank

“Create highly relevant, useful, visual, informative and entertaining (info-taining) content that’s easily shareable and answers the kinds of questions people have relevant to your company, products or services.”

4) Guy Kawasaki @GuyKawasaki

Author and Speaker at GuyKawasaki.com

“‘Post good shit and let Google find it.’ That’s my entire approach!”

5) Chester Branch @storynotes

Transmedia Architect at MediaShift

“The key to creating addictive content is through a compelling story.”

6) Michael Keshen @MichaelKeshen

Content Marketer at Hover 

“Don’t create content just for the sake of content. It’s better to write one amazing blog post a week than ten that no one will care about.”

7) Susan Payton @eggmarketing

President of Egg Marketing PR

“The secret to creating content people actually want to read and share is to make it really valuable and irresistible. What problems can you solve for your audience?”

8) Eugene Woo @wooyi

Chief Data Scientist and Co-Founder of Venngage and Vizualize.me

“I always ask myself, will this content be relevant in 1 year? How about in 10 years? This is the test of longevity and relevance.”

9) Andrew Davis @TPLDrew

Author of Brandscaping

“The new SEO (Social Engine Optimization) is my priority. Good content is content that provides value to your audience.”

10) Erika Heald @SFerika

Vice President and Head of Content at Highwire PR  

“Put together an editorial calendar, a quarter at a time, that provides a variety of content types that will keep you top-of-mind as a useful resource for your audience.”

11) Barry Feldman @FeldmanCreative

Founder of FeldmanCreative

“My formula’s a two-parter. One, make content that solves a real problem you know potential customers grapple with. And two, make the experience of consuming that content fun.”

12) Arnie Kuenn @ArnieK

CEO of Vertical Measures

“We are counting on organic traffic. So create content people are searching for, optimize it, keep creating it and be patient.”

13) Neal Schaffer @NealSchaffer

Social Media Keynote Speaker at Maximize Your Social

“My top strategy for creating good content is to focus on the customer and what content they need to be educated or inspired about before they even know it.”

14) Chris Kubbernus @ChrisKubbernus

Marketing Leader and Entrepreneur at ChrisKubbernus.com

“Many customers in many industries don’t spend time sharing content. Flip it around and start creating content for those that do share and you have an opportunity to get it out there through those influencers.”

 15) James Reynolds @FollowJames

CEO of SEO Sherpa

“Use website’s like Alltop or Buzzsumo to find influencers in your niche.”

 16) Ted Rubin @TedRubin

Social Marketing Strategist and Keynote Speaker at TedRubin.com

 “I like to say the best content is conversation, and empowering that to happen requires being in touch with results, listening, and allowing your team to adjust accordingly.”

 17) Steve Wiideman @seosteve

SEO Expert at SEOSteve.com

 “Start by using question-based keywords, bundled into groups by similar user intent, and prioritized by search volume.”

18) Jen Van Iderstyne @Vanetcetera

Senior Strategist at Overit

“The quality of presentation matters. If you’re going to do text content make sure it’s not just a block of text, but make it scannable and attractive.”

 19) Larry Kim @larrykim

Founder of WordStream

 “I’ve found that paid social media advertizing on Facebook and Twitter is more scalable and easier than doing link outreach by email or leveraging expensive PR firms.”

20) Danny Dover @DannyDover

SEO Consultant at Intriguing Ideas

“Diversify your efforts outside of traditional SEO. Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in particular are already massively disrupting traditional SEO.”

 21) Shane Barker @shane_barker

Digital Marketing Consultant and SEO Specialist at ShaneBarker.com

 22) Eric Enge @stonetemple

CEO of Stone Temple Consulting Corporation

 “By getting your content featured on the top sites covering your space, you are sending clear signals to users (and Google) that you are one of the top authorities in your space.”

23) Siddarth Bharath @siddharth87

VP of Growth at Thinkific

“Whenever possible, present your readers with data, case studies, real examples, and step-by-step instructions to achieve something so that when they finish reading, they have an action plan.”

24) Brenda Stoltz @BSStoltz

Founder of Ariad Partners

 “Map the questions a prospect would have at each stage of the buying process. Give them the content that maps to the stage they are at.”

 25) Oli Gardner @oligardner

Co-Founder of Unbounce

“Reuse, reuse, reuse – turn content into an ebook, infographic, webinar, guest blog post on sites with similar followers, Medium, Slideshare, podcast, speaking topic.”

 26) Brad Hess @fresholdidea

Senior Digital Marketing Manager at Ceros

 “Be unique. There is nothing worse than regurgitated listicles and how to articles.”

 27) Ian Cleary @IanCleary

Founder of RazorSocial

“People get more engaged with video, imagery and interactive content than text so you need to have a mix.”

 28) Cassandra Jowett @cassandrajowett

Content Marketing Manager at Influitive

 “The best way to create engaging content is to get your customers involved in the content creation process.”

29) Ryan Hoover @rrhoover

Founder of ProductHunt

“Be authentic. Say what others aren’t saying. Add value to the conversation.”

 30) Meryl K. Evans @merylkevans

Content Maven at Meryl.net

 “A top strategy for creating valuable content is to tell stories. They’re more memorable and let your target audience get to know one of the company’s most important assets: its people.”

 31) Alina Bradford @alinabradford

Contributing Writer at CNET and Tech Writer for MTV

 “Make sure your content is something people are actually searching for. Type a couple keywords into the Google search bar to see what auto-populates.” 

32) Scott Stratten @unmarketing

Unmarketer at Unmarketing

 “We tell stories and we share emotions. We relate to things. Creating content is sometimes about finding the stories that tell customer experiences, and also employee stories.”

 33) Michael Brenner @BrennerMichael

CEO of Marketing Insider Group and Head of Strategy at NewsCred

 “Identify and answer your customers’ top questions and address their biggest challenges. If you provide the best answer consistently, then you will rank for the search terms your customers are using.” 

34) Lauren Moon @elmoonio

Content Manager at Trello

 “Creating good content is about educating your users on subjects they actually care about, rather than always trying to sell them something.” 

35) Christine White @christinew603

Co-Marketing Manager at HubSpot

 “Repurpose your content because what may start out as an ‘ok’ ebook may end up doing better for lead-gen as a SlideShare, blog post, or webinar.” 

36) Leo Widrich @LeoWid

Co-Founder/COO of Buffer

 “Every single piece of content is the only one that matters. We give it all of our attention.” 

37) Evan LePage @EvanLePage

Content Marketer at Hootsuite

 “Perform your own searches, read the top posts and identify the holes in their content. You’d be surprised how much great content can be created simply by seeing where the top-ranking posts are falling short.”

38) Nadya Khoja @NadyaKhoja

Director of Marketing at Venngage and Founder of thisisnadya.com

 “Most people look for content that offers Practical value, is Entertaining, is Awe-inspiring, and is Credible. P.E.A.C. content is good content that people actually want to read.”

 39) Pratik Dholakiya @DholakiyaPratik

Founder of The 20 Media

“Even if I focus on the topics that are not fresh, I share some tips/ideas/strategies which are very new and in general would help users to think from a different perspective.”

 40) Melissa Lafsky Wall @Lafsky

Co-Founder and President of Brick Wall Media

“At Brick Wall, we customize our definition of “good content” for every client, for the simple reason that “good content” is a different thing for every market, product, and audience. Good content for one of our clients isn’t good for another.”

41) Kevan Lee @kevanlee

Content Crafter at Buffer

“My hunch is that when things are actionable–when people leave with something new to try–there’s likely a lot of positive emotion that comes with that, which will end up leading to shares, traffic, promotion, etc.”

 42) Danny Ashton @dannyashton

CEO of NeoMam Studios

“One approach we take in our process is to test all our infographics on Imgur before we ever publish them on our clients site. We get valuable feedback from a large audience that we can then use to improve our content and design.”

 43) Hana Abaza @HanaAbaza

VP of Marketing at Uberflip

 “Bottom line: relevance. Great content comes down to truly understanding your audience and creating content that they care about.”

 44) Sara McGuire @sara_mcguire

Creative Content Specialist at Venngage

“Back up your points with concrete examples in the form of images, links to articles, and case studies. This classic writing rule rings true: show, don’t tell.”

 45) Ann Smarty @seosmarty

Founder of MyBlogU.com

“My definition of high-quality content is basically the content that you, the creator, the publisher or the content marketer, find good enough to share on your own Facebook wall.”

46) Adam Connell @adamjayc

Founder of BloggingWizard

“The truth is that the web is full of good content, so your content needs to be better. It needs to be more detailed, more usable, more engaging and readability needs to be a high priority.”

We hope that these expert tips will point you in the direction of addictive content marketing success. Let’s rock 2016!

What are some of your content marketing and SEO tips? Let us know in the comments!