How interesting is the content that you write? Is it boring to read or is it stimulating and interactive?
Will it make it to the first page of Google listings, or be lost in the long line below?
Getting an article ranked to the first page of any search engine is extremely important to web marketers.
Google does share their search algorithm and other tools to help us understand how their ranking is done, but the main point of it is that content of any article should be relevant and interesting to the reader.
How is this possible?
Does the article answer a question? Does it give the answers the reader is looking for about a certain subject? Does it keep them interested long enough to keep them reading? Interactive content can do all these things.
What is interactive content?
To really understand what interactive content is, it may be easier to explain what it isn’t.
Interactive content isn’t static. Most website content is static. Think about your homepage, your bio, and service pages. It is likely static content that requires the visitor to your site to read mindlessly through the content.
In today’s busy world, people need stimulation. To capture a reader’s attention, you need to challenge them. Make them think. That is what interactive content is.
Interactive content should be stimulating, challenging, and require the interaction of the reader. People reading the article should have to think and truly delve into the reading to understand and use the content. Interesting articles should engage and educate readers.
While there are many ways to make your content more interactive, you could include one or more of the following ideas:
- Videos: Engaging an audience with video that includes questions, surveys, polls, and other interactive devices make interaction fun and more attractive to those watching. Many people learn easier visually as opposed to reading an article.
- Quizzes: This type of interaction has been proven to be extremely effective at getting peoples’ attention. A question-answer format gets attention and can create ideas in the ensuing discussions that can be shared to others.
- Surveys: These can take a variety of forms and do a really good job of getting information from the users. Getting information from the clients helps you understand the needs and wishes of the buyers, thus making your product or service more viable to them.
- Infographics: Let the viewers move within the graphics where they wish. Let them find and learn about specifics for their business without viewing things irrelevant to their use. Infographics may also be able to feature additional interactive components such as surveys and polls.
- Contests: Everyone loves a challenge and a chance to win something. A good contest can engage clients, thus allowing client information to be collected via the application while the challenge to win is included.
- White papers and e-books: While sometimes necessary, when articles are longer a good index or table of contents at the beginning can allow readers to get straight to the articles or sections they are interested in without reading the entire paper. Quizzes and other types of assessments can be built into these options for further engagement.
- Assessments: Self-assessments by the readers can result in recommendations or ideas that otherwise might be overlooked. These results may be more informing than ever before realized. Some of the best services you offer can be turned into assessments rather than static content so that your readers stay interested and you catch the attention of Google.
- Calculators: Using a Blood Alcohol (BAC) calculator, or other type of multiple-choice questions could be asked, and immediate responses would result in immediate data as well as stimulating discussion. This would clearly need to be adjusted to suit the services your law firm provides, but any type of calculator that would interact with your calendar is a great step forward in the interaction game.
Compared to static, mindless reading, interactive reading is better at involving your audience and educating clients.
Stepping up your interactive content helps single you out of the crowd of competitors, and it makes sharing ideas and information more effective. Going beyond your website, other social media such as Facebook or Twitter could be used. E-mail newsletters, paid ads and campaigns could add to your audience.
Studies have shown that engaging content reaches some 70% of your audience as opposed to static content that only reaches some 36% of your target crowd. Content that is interactive is also more likely to be shared, 38% vs. 17%, and we all know that when it comes to sharing your content, the more the merrier.
Content may be king, but it depends on the content.
With any company, stepping up the marketing efforts of those involved can differentiate the company from others. Many lagging companies are losing clients to the firms who are drawing attention to themselves by better marketing practices.
Traditional law firm websites are no longer attracting clients. Potential clients are growing tired of these and see these websites as out of date and not as trustworthy.
Interactive content of any nature included in your ad campaigns can help boost potential clients’ attention to your company. To start using some of the suggestions mentioned will catch the attention of potential clients, draw them in to research your company, and help make your company a growing success.
