Are blog posts the best SEO strategy today?

Summary

Neil Patel and an assistant discuss whether blog posts are still an effective SEO strategy today. They conclude posting more content alone won't work anymore. Instead, they recommend focusing on building free online tools to generate natural backlinks. For sites with existing high authority and traffic, updating old evergreen content performs better than creating new posts. Overall, provide utility through free tools, update existing content, and mix in new trending articles for the best results.

Takeaways

• 😀 Simply writing more blog posts doesn't work well for SEO anymore
• 👉 Focus on building free tools and assets to generate natural backlinks
• 🔎 Regularly audit your content to identify and update outdated posts
• 📈 Updating old content can significantly increase traffic over time
• 🗞 Incorporate fresh data, stats, images etc to make content more timely
• 🏆 Having high domain authority helps, but isn't essential for good SEO
• 📋 Free tools that provide utility can build tons of quality backlinks
• 😮 Quality and originality standards have increased over the years
• 💰 Infographics don't generate as many backlinks as they used to
• ⚠ You may need to invest more time and money into assets and tools now

Q & A

What does Peter Caputa say is the problem with ramping up content production to get more search traffic?

Peter Caputa says that simply publishing more blog posts to get more search traffic doesn't work anymore like it used to back in 2010.

What does Neil suggest first focusing on if you already have good existing SEO traffic?

Neil suggests first focusing on updating your existing content to keep it fresh rather than only producing new content. This helps generate more traffic from your current content.

How can you determine which existing content to update?

Neil suggests using Google Search Console to analyze your existing content and see where traffic has decayed over time. Prioritize updating any content that has seen a traffic decline recently.

What are some ways to update existing content?

Some ways to update existing content include: add more images/videos, improve conversational tone, fill in any gaps in information, address what competitors rank higher are doing better, and overall improve the quality and value for users.

Why does Wikipedia tend to rank well?

Wikipedia ranks well not because it necessarily has the best quality content, but because the content is kept very fresh and continuously updated.

What does Neil say used to work well for YouTube videos 5-6 years ago?

The quality bar used to be lower on YouTube, so the tactics for getting views 5-6 years ago worked better back then. The expectations have since risen.

What kind of assets does Neil say tend to be more linkable than just creating content?

Neil suggests free tools and products you can offer tend to attract more links over time than just creating content alone.

Why doesn't spending a lot on infographics work as well anymore?

Infographics used to reliably generate many backlinks 5-10 years ago, but Neil says the tactic doesn't work nearly as well anymore for getting quality links.

What does Neil say is the advantage of free tools for link building?

Free tools can continually build links over time without as much ongoing effort as content. The residual effect keeps generating more and more traffic.

What data does Neil suggest analyzing to determine decaying traffic?

Neil suggests using Google Search Console to analyze traffic over time, comparing to traffic levels from 1 year ago and 3 months ago. Any significant declines in those periods indicates decaying traffic.