How to create content that matches your audiences search intent

One of the major reasons for a brand to build its digital presence and indulge in content marketing is to cater to the informational needs of their audiences and eventually emerge as an industry leader. This could potentially mean enhanced lead generation and better sales.

But how do we deliver content that is accurate and directly meets the needs of the audience?

The answer lies in the search intent of the audience.

What is search intent and how it affects Google ranking?

Search intent refers to the purpose with which an audience searches for information. When they find the right content in the right format, it satisfies their search. Matching the content with the user’s search intent boosts the SEO performance and ranking of the given website.

For example, if someone is looking to read about various types of syringes, a webpage that simply sells these syringes and does not give out information about the different types does not meet the search intent. So, when the user opens the webpage and leaves immediately due to the lack of relevance of the page, Google makes a note. This affects the ranking.

In short, the more your audiences find your content useful, the longer they will stay on your website, thus sending signals to Google for better ranking.

Getting straight to it, let’s understand each type of search intent and how to develop content around it.

• Informational Intent

In this case, intent is solely for the purpose of gathering information. Keywords used by audiences could be – ‘how to’, ‘best way to’, ‘steps for’ and so on. So, are they looking to buy something? The answer is no. This is an excellent opportunity to create a compelling piece of content and emerge as an expert.

One of the best ways to meet the need to build knowledge around a topic, product, procedure, service, or place is through blogs. Blogs can include infographics, diagrams, tables, or steps. Say you are a manufacturer of home-use syringes, you could post blogs on how to use them and what their benefits are.

• Navigational Intent 

This search intent is to find out the exact URL of a particular website, reach a particular webpage, or even reach a physical location. The audience would typically type the name of the brand whose website they are looking for. For example, the audience could type ‘Ethosh customer service number.’

Here, it is important to get the details right for each webpage of your website. This includes the URL being easy to read, the webpage including necessary and relevant details of a product or service, contact details, a call to action, sections on the page being clearly labelled, and a clear organization of the title, subtitle, and main body.

• Commercial Intent

Here, audiences are in the process of scrutinizing every bit of detail before the actual purchase. They need just the last bit of information to decide on the final choice. They would use keywords such as ‘review’ or ‘price of’ or ‘compare’.

From a marketer's point of view, the content should be such that it helps audiences convert. You could depict information in a user-friendly way, such as with infographics or tables for product comparisons, pricing and plans, benefits, etc. Its success depends on how well they weaved with the most current keywords used.

• Transactional Intent  

This search intent is to perform a definitive action. It could be to buy a product, subscribe to a newsletter, sign up for an event, etc. They know what they are looking for and would most likely type the brand name.

For transactional intent, using transactional keywords is essential so that your webpage appears in the search results. The webpage must contain all the required information to help the audience complete the action, be it registration details, product details, and so on. The CTA must be clear, leaving the audience satisfied with the action completed.

Along with search intent, taking a close look at Google search engine results page gives further cues on improving ranking. 

• You could type your target keywords in the search field and learn how your audience thinks and what the trending keywords are. Keywords change with time, so it's good practice to update them in your content too.
• You could open the top search results for your topic and note the format in which the information is given and what questions it answers. Incorporate these into your content. For example, if the most popular pages use lists or infographics, you know for sure that readers and Google are appreciating this format.
• You can also check out the other related questions that come up when you search for a particular query and then include that information in your content. Typically, this is the ‘People also asked’ section on the Google results page. Including this information will make your content stand out, as it will be the one-stop place for all the answers.

As you keep fine-tuning your keywords and content as per the search intent, you improve the relevance of your page and move up the Google ranking.

Useful SEO Audit Tools

Here is a list of tools that are super handy for doing an SEO audit yourself: Google Page Speed Insights, Google Search Console, Google Analytics, SEMrush, Ahrefs, Screaming Frog, GTmetrix, etc.

Once you have a thorough understanding of how your website is performing in terms of driving traffic and user experience, you can take the next step of rectification. The good news is that the tools mentioned above will also walk you through the steps

Reference and Citation-

1. https://backlinko.com/google-ranking-factors
2. https://datareportal.com/global-digital-overview#:~:text=The%20vast%20majority%20of%20the,of%20the%20world's%20web%20traffic