Is Your Blog Called “Fluffy”?
While scouring the Web looking for great content I have noticed that there are generally four levels of content. You could probably break down those levels into sub-levels within them, but for the sake of this blog post I’m not going to do that.
I’m just going to keep it at four broad levels. Here are the content levels that I’ve seen across the board:
- Super Content – This is highly charged blog content, the type that you’ll just about every day on any A-list blogger you’ll find. Examples include Problogger, Copyblogger, and several others that are considered A-listers. This is the cream of the crop.
- Excellent Content That Builds Readers – This type of content isn’t quite what you’d find on an A-list blog, but it’s close. There are a huge number of blogs that you’ll find that fall into this category, considerably more than what you’ll find in the Super Content category but not as many as you’d find in the next two categories. Excellent content is good for business because it builds trust while building value.
- Fluffy Content – This category is simply what it sounds like. The content isn’t great. It’s readable. The primary focus seems to be on SEO rather than communication of important knowledge of information. This kind of content could rise to the level of Excellent Content, but most of it won’t. That’s because the bloggers are not committed. They’ve hired a ghostwriter to focus on keyword-rich content and that’s what they get or they’ve read an e-book that attempted to teach them solid SEO principles and they took that to mean you should write keyword-focused fluff, so that’s what they do. Either way, the content is “fluffy” and will likely not get them very far. They may get a few readers and they may make a few sales, but overall the blog is just a “fluffy” blog.
- Rot Gut Content – In this bottom-feeder category are spammers, scrapers, malicious malware pushers, and various and sundry other ne’er-do-wells. This content is beyond fluffy. Fluff doesn’t fit into this category because it does contain some value, but not much. The Rot Gut Content has no value at all. It’s just there.
I could have added one more category, but I wanted to keep it simple. The Average Content category really falls between “Excellent” and “Fluffy”, but for the purposes of this blog post I’m categorizing it as fluffy. Average content is well-written content that is keyword-rich, but it isn’t excellent. The blogger may not optimize every blog post, but the content is well-written. Fluffy content, however, is content that is keyword-rich content that may hold some value because the writer is not necessarily a bad writer, but not great either.
So why this taxonomy? Because I want you to start thinking about your content. Is it “fluffy”? Do you throw keywords in just for the sake of throwing keywords in? Do focus on anchor text, h2 tags, and SEO elements over and beyond good writing skills? If so then you probably fall into the fluff category.
Of course, I’m not saying that optimization is wrong for a blog. What I am saying is that well-written content is far more valuable. And there is no reason you can’t have both.
7 Responses to “Is Your Blog Called “Fluffy”?”
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I am so glad I can say I am in the excellent category and make sure to teach that in every class I teach! There is SO much out there on the internet now that you have to give real value to get eyeballs..:)
@Tara Jacobsen – Thanks for reading and the comment. Yes, I agree there is so much online that there HAS to be real value!
“Excellent” article. “Super” headline. I’ve been meaning to write in my blog about a phenomenon that you touch on. While social media has revived writing, there is an impetus to use language that speaks to search engines rather than audiences.
Excellent article Nick. I have heard some SEO gurus actually advising people to write for the search engines over people. That is bunk.
I hope my blog is in the excellent category. I do not think I am fluffy but honestly, sometimes I feel pressure from other marketing gurus to do things in a way that would lead to fluffiness. Like the constant advice to hire ghost writers at 10 bucks an article. They seem to place no value on good writing. What decent writer would work for 10 bucks an article?
I constantly hear gurus telling people to create content by hiring cheap ghost writers, ripping off wikipadia or writing simplistic, quick and easy “top ten” lists. all that leads to crap content.
When I tell people I sometimes spend 2-3 hours writing a blog post and way more if a video is included, they look at me like I am a fool.
For so many people, their content is nothing more than “buy my product” A sales pitch disguised as worthwhile educational content. It’s not. It is impossible-to-learn-from, biased sales talk that does nothing to help me learn. To learn anything of true value, you have to spend the money. I understand that is how they become rich, and that is supposidly the point here, but I sure get weary of it.
@ Lorraine Grula – Thanks for reading and your comment! I agree with you, good quality user focused content is so very important and is worth much more than $10 an article! I think your content is on the excellent side of things
Hi Nick, Excellent points! Another thought: Be sure your landing page answers the question the searcher is asking. If the information isn’t clear and concise, it won’t matter where you’re ranked: The searcher will back arrow and click another site. Best, Suzanne
@ Suzanne McDonald – Thanks for reading! This is very true, good quality content, articles or a blog posts all need to answer questions the searcher is asking and complete the goals of each page…