Creating a successful content strategy is really hard. Competition is growing and Google continuously refines its understanding of relevance and authority.
Blogs are the wrong approach to tackle that challenge. Instead, I want to propose Microsites as a vehicle.
In this presentation, I’m using examples from Atlassian, G2, Backlinko, and others to show how Microsites 2.0 are being built, why they’re the better framework and how you can set them up for yourself.
63. Part I: The problem with blogs
Part II: Microsites 2.0
Part III: How To Do It yourself
64. Microsite 2.0
Hub page
1
3
2
4
6
Article 1 Article 2 Article 3
Article 4 Article 5 Article 6
CTA
Landing
page
5
Blog
Thought leadership, news
Static topics
Text
Article
Text
Navigation
Prev Next
CTA
CTA
Author
65. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
https://www.kevin-indig.com/a-better-approach-to-keyword-research-for-content-marketing/
68. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
70. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
71. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
Floss
Medication
Diet
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3
How to floss
How diet affects breath
How to find right
medication
4 5
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
78.
79. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
Floss
Medication
Diet
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3
How to floss
How diet affects breath
How to find right
medication
4
Comparison
5
Best toothbrushes
Best floss
Foods causing bad
breath
Best medication for bad
breath
80. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
81. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
Floss
Medication
Diet
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3
How to floss
How diet affects breath
How to find right
medication
4
Comparison Conversion
5
Best toothbrushes
Best floss
Foods causing bad
breath
Best medication for bad
breath
Buy toothbrush
Buy floss
(Buy medication)
82. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
Floss
Medication
Diet
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3
How to floss
How diet affects breath
How to find right
medication
4
Comparison Conversion
5
Best toothbrushes
Best floss
Foods causing bad
breath
Best medication for bad
breath
Buy toothbrush
Buy floss
(Buy medication)
Greater Intent
Immediate Intent
83. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
84.
85. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3 4
Comparison Conversion
5
Best toothbrushes Buy toothbrush
Article
Video
Article Video
Images
List Landing Page
86. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
87. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3 4
Comparison Conversion
5
Best toothbrushes Buy toothbrush
“bad breath”
“halitosis”
“bad breath cure”
“bad breath treatment”
“how to brush teeth”
“best toothbrush”
“best electric toothbrush"
“buy toothbrush”
“buy {model}”
Article
Video
Article Video
Images
List Landing Page
88. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
89. Problem Solutions
Topic: Toothbrush 🦷
How to brush teethBrushing teeth
How to
Bad breath
1 2 3 4
Comparison Conversion
5
Best toothbrushes Buy toothbrush
“bad breath”
“halitosis”
“bad breath cure”
“bad breath treatment”
“how to brush teeth”
“best toothbrush”
“best electric toothbrush"
“buy toothbrush”
“buy {model}”
Article
Video
Article Video
Images
List Landing Page
quip.com/bad
-breath
quip.com/bad-
breath/brushing-teeth
quip.com/bad-
breath/brushing-teeth/how-
to
quip.com/toothbrushes/bes
t-toothbrushes
quip.com/toothbrus
hes/buy
90. 1. Identify the problem
2. List solutions
3. Create how to’s
4. Help users compare products
5. Define conversion touch points
6. Choose the right format
7. Select main query
8. Map to URLs
9. Create and Launch!
Posts on Wordpress
CMS marketshare: 60%
>33% of internet traffic
-> it’s not even close
Google = king of referrers
Anybody else = not even close. Not even Facebook.
Parsely
BuzzSumo 2018 traffic report
AHREFs study (2018) of 920 web pages
https://ahrefs.com/blog/search-traffic-study/
Principle 1: every piece of content counts
Principle 2: excellent or nothing
Principle 3: maximize every click
10y experience in search
- we've been using the same format for almost 3 decades now
make two slides, put at beginning
make two slides, put at beginning
Blog: Random publishing sequence
Microsite 2.0: structured publishing. Every user journey is covered from a to z. You don’t move to the next topic before you’ve covered the first 100%
Blog: articles connected through internal links + related articles
Microsite 2.0: articles connected through a sequence. Much better use of direct traffic.
Blog: CTAs driven by funnel stage
Microsite 2.0: better CTA at end of series and pre-qualified traffic
Blog: hard to facilitate that level of relevant internal linking
Microsite 2.0: relevant anchor text for internal linking, which shows google stronger authority.
I recently conducted a meta analysis of 7 ranking factor studies
Search metrics
Semrush
Backlinko
-> check link at bottom
And I came to that result
Also looked at patents and google rater guidelines
I want to show you 9 microsite that are good examples
I think those 9 microsite rank well because they fulfill a lot of the ranking factors
Start with nerdwallet
only 9 pages
hotjar
10 pages
Authors in article = E-A-T
Atlassian agile microsite
In-article videos -> best of both worlds
Connect video + text, increase engagement
Mom learn microsite
Coschedule agile microsite
17 top 10 rankings since march
22 ref domains
7 pages
Atlassian git microsite
Rei expert advice microsite
Atlassian it unplugged microsite
Atlassian cd microsite
-> What it comes down to
Optional: add a blog
Static pages vs. news-worthy and thought-leadership content
-> add to next section
research main query
Let’s pretend we build a microsite 2.0 for quip
topic: toothbrush
Start with the problem (always)
People want to solve problems on search engines
Problem = microsite topic
Solutions = user journey paths
Can be lots of how to’s for each solution
how to apply solution to the problem
Answerthepublic
AHREFS questions
SEMrush questions magic keyword tool
Check out related questions
Check out tree nav for taxonomy
Always check the SERPs
Be weary of PLAs + Knowledge Graph
Conversion landing pages
Immediate intent: what am I trying to do right now?
Greater intent: what am I trying to do it for?
Check serps
Decide right format to match user intent or you won’t rank