Marketers and business owners often turn to metrics such as open rates, bounce rates, and clickthrough rates to measure content quality. But is traffic and engagement really an indicator of quality content?
Think about some of your favorite books or movies. While some might be bestsellers or blockbusters, there are also probably hidden gems and less-renowned titles on the list. Just because they aren’t as well-known, or widely seen, doesn’t mean they are of lesser quality. And to the right audience they may resonate and be more impactful than popular content.
This example helps us underscore why quality content is important. When your content is great, it inspires audiences to the same enthusiasm about your brand that you feel when you get to tell someone all about your favorite book, movie, or tv show that they have never heard of.
Quality content doesn’t just attract users to your website, it inspires them to do business with you—and keeps them coming back as a loyal reader or viewer, or even a repeat customer.
This is why you need to measure content quality by its deeper impact on your business and bottom line, not surface-level signals such as clicks and likes. Here is a little more about how to measure content quality, from the metrics that can let you know if you’re succeeding in the eyes of audiences to the specifics of good writing.
It’s difficult to overstate the importance of content in digital marketing, but you can’t go wrong starting with metrics like:
Gaining an understanding of the type of content your prospects and customers are interested in is the best method for identifying topics that are likely to perform well. DemandJump helps companies know exactly what content to create to connect with customers and establish your brand as an authority on a given topic. Our platform helps companies break into the all-important page one search rankings on Google and other search engines.
So, when it comes to content marketing efforts, how do you identify quality content? Though content performance metrics like open rates, clicks, and likes may not be the best indicators to measure your content quality, there are some metrics that can help you get a general picture of your current content quality. These are:
Looking at these metrics might give you a boost in confidence about your content quality, or cause you to take a step back and evaluate your content strategy. Remember, just because you start in a good place doesn’t mean you can set it and forget it—and just because things aren’t going well now, doesn’t mean you can’t take steps to improve content quality.
Writing quality marketing content is an area where people often lack confidence. How do you know if writing is actually good? How can you edit it yourself, or help others on your team give you useful feedback before publication or filming? What might help is to consider these five main characteristics of good writing:
These five characteristics don’t just apply to written content like web pages and blogs, but to visual content like videos and infographics. For more tips about writing great content, take a look at our content writing guide.
Content in your marketing arsenal will be shared on social media, and how it performs there will let you know if it’s good quality—that we have already covered. But how do you know if your social media posts themselves are good. What are three qualities of good social media?
High-quality social media content across industries and social channels has a few things in common:
For more about content marketing media and social strategy tips, check out our social media resource that provides insight into which content types are best for social media, and statistics about different social channels.
Quality content succeeds when all these elements of structure, writing, and intention come together to answer the questions and concerns of your audiences. But if you’re just guessing about the information your audiences are looking for, even the best content won’t attract their attention.
We created DemandJump as a hub for marketers to get the information necessary to confidently create high-quality content. Current keyword trends, competitor analysis, and your real-time marketing analytics are all centralized in one place. The time you save collecting this information can be spent on quality and strategy. Try it free today—we’re confident that in just one week, you will be able to improve content quality and see a tangible return on using our product.