There is a lot of talk about Content but is it just that and if it is not, then how does one go about reaping rewards. A brief examination follows. Simply put, without content you have nothing but banners and graphics. You cannot get traffic on those alone. I repeat, you cannot get traffic on those alone!

The very best traffic is search engine traffic because of the price tag. Practically ZERO!

For the most part, search engines react to search terms. Results for search terms are contained within content or text, with the only exception being metatags in general, and domain names. Even those will rarely do it. Rarely!

Keywords or search terms are “matched” with similar words within the text, and the incidence of them. If an engine holds such “words” from a site within its database, you are much closer to getting free traffic. That is a fact.

Now there are two ways to accomplish that. 1.Create your own content. 2.Use someone else’s.

Creating your own content is not for everyone, but it is always a good idea to give it a try. You will likely succeed with time, research and experience. Few people are born with esoteric knowledge, however it seems, and are more likely to have applied themselves over time.

Using the content of others should be a consideration also, and is volume dependent. One person alone is limited when a high volume is the expectation. Originally, ghostwriters were employed to make someone look good in a literary sense. Pay person X to write article Y, and the employer retains the copyright. This is widespread, no secret, and perfectly acceptable. This process is very like the way that your boss will exploit your services in return for a fee. It is commerce.

Anyway, the search engines don’t really care who writes something or anything, as long as it is written. Their primary job is to find it, index it, and return it. In a modern context, the copyright regarding the content, is retained by the author, unless otherwise agreed.

What this really means is that you can use content that is relevant to your site and take any credit that is due to you. The more keywords that are mingled within it, the higher the likelihood that your site will gain ground as an authority on the product. The engines will recognise it, and loyal visitors will have more information on the product as well.

The very best method is to target articles that are theme-relative. If your site is selling shoes, then source articles on shoes and its materials, uses, colours, or anything pertaining to the product. Unless you have done something to upset the search engines, this will always help with few exceptions. If the spiders or bots register a change in a sites content, they are more inclined to revisit. The main advantage to having fast spider return, is to get new “news” out in the public domain. This may offer a time-advantage over competitors. The very same strategies apply to blogs, which can often be more effective than regular sites, due to their superior structure, internally, and with respect to linking.

Even without a particular targeting exercise, increased content should bring some “incidental traffic” that may often occur as a consequence of the content. In other words; your content may not always be theme related, but the engines could return your site as a match for any keywords that it doesn’t find a more suitable match for. It is up to you to “grab” such traffic, any way that you can. This is not ideal by any means, but anything is better than nothing, and somewhat cumulative.