How To Craft SEO-Friendly Content Outlines: A Detailed Guide
Do you want your blog posts and other website content to rank high in search engines?
There are many ways to make this happen, and one of the most important is a content outline. Specifically, an SEO content outline.
It is absolutely critical if you want to get more website traffic, which could lead to more income.
Read on to understand the step-by-step approach to creating a content outline to drive your business to the top of the SERPs.
Let’s start with understanding what a content outline is and why it’s a critical tool for SEO success.
What is a content outline?
A content outline is a plan or blueprint for your article that highlights the main points and subtopics the article will cover. It is crucial for creating a well-structured piece of content. A content outline helps ensure that all the points flow smoothly and naturally.
Why is it essential to have a content outline?
The benefits of a content outline are numerous; you might not realize this until you’ve written a piece of content with and without a content outline.
1. Produces better content
A content outline enhances the readability of your blog posts. It helps you organize your thoughts and ensures that you cover all the necessary points in a logical order.
Besides, y breaking down your content into headings and subheadings, you make it easier for readers to navigate and skim through the article.
This improves the overall user experience and encourages readers to stay engaged with your content.
2. Search engine optimization
A detailed content outline is the product of extensive keyword research. An outline ensures that you incorporate relevant keywords into your headings and subheadings, as well as your content.
Besides, with a detailed content outline, you can ensure you cover the information the articles at the top of SERPs already contain, as well as more/ more relevant information not already covered.
This helps search engines can better understand the context and relevance of your article and rank you high.
3. Saves time and effort
A content outline streamlines your writing process and helps you focus.
With a structure in place, writing your content becomes easier, as the writer’s work will be to fill out the relevant information in the given structure. That’s different from writing on a blank page without guides or plans on developing your content.
Not only that, but a content outline helps you eliminate the writer’s block that a blank page creates, making you create content faster and saving you lots of time figuring out the next heading.
Furthermore, if you have writers who prepare your content, a content outline saves you the cost of fixing a weak draft.
Sending out topics to writers without a detailed content brief and outline might result in them sending you drafts that don’t measure up to the top-performing articles on the SERPs, costing you time and money to improve the content.
How to create a content outline
Here is a step-by-step guide to follow to create a content outline that puts your content at the top of the SERPs:
1. Research keywords and search intent
The first step in creating a content outline is to choose a focus keyword and relevant secondary keywords to support it.
A focus or primary keyword is the word or phrase your content is centered around. Secondary or long-tail keywords are additional keywords related to the focus keyword. An important consideration in choosing these keywords is the searcher’s intent.
While a primary keyword covers the main focus of the content, secondary keywords provide additional context and clarity on how the content should be angled to satisfy the readers’ intent.
You must perform extensive keyword research using top keyword research tools like Semrush to choose a focus and relevant semantic keywords. Performing detailed keyword research will help you understand what your audience is searching for and what current articles satisfy that search intent.
With information about what your audience is searching for, analyze the articles ranking at the top of the SERPs for those keywords.
The goal is to identify the important pieces of information they’re providing and the ones they’re omitting. This will guide you in creating a detailed content outline that you can use to produce more valuable content than what’s available on the search engine.
2. Create keyword clusters and groups to identify sub-topics
Once you’ve performed extensive keyword research and identified a list of keywords, the next step is to create clusters for the keywords. This entails grouping related keywords together based on their thematic similarities.
With each cluster of related keywords providing insights into a relevant idea, you can create sub-topics that add to the final content. Each keyword cluster represents a sub-topic or section of your content where you can provide in-depth information, tips, and insights.
3, Identify the questions people ask in relation to this keyword
In addition to creating clusters around related keywords, you can flesh out your content outline more by identifying questions related to your chosen keyword that people are asking. This is a necessary step in providing comprehensive content that addresses every query related to the focus keyword.
To find these questions, you can use Semrush, Answerthepublic, Ahrefs, etc. The People Also Ask section on the SERPs is also valuable for getting related questions to your chosen keyword.
4. Divide your answers into sections with headlines
With the keyword clusters and a list of questions people ask on your chosen topic, break down your information into sections using headlines. Each headline should answer a relevant, separate topic, providing more context to the focus keyword and aligning with a final content piece that answers the main question.
You can narrow each headline into sub-topics, providing clarity and helping the reader understand the overall content.
5. Write your content with an SEO writing tool
Once your content is mapped out, you can write by filling out the outlines with the relevant information. This is as simple as providing the relevant answers to the questions on each sub-topic, ensuring they align with the focus keyword.
SEO writing tools like Google Docs, Semrush SEO Writing Assistant, etc., will help you streamline this process and make it easier to structure your content according to the headlines you outlined. With these tools, you can structure your headings into H1, H2, H3, to H6, ranking them into cohesive sections.
6. Write powerful intros and conclusions
With your content outline mapped out, the introduction and conclusions are vital aspects you shouldn’t leave to chance. Your introduction has to be powerful enough to grab attention and should present the angle through which you’ll be addressing the focus keyword.
The conclusion must also be concise and detailed enough to summarize the content in a few lines. Without reading the content, one should be able to tell what the entire content is about by merely reading the conclusion.
If the content is to be handled by your writer, provide additional information on how you want the introduction and conclusion to appear. Should the introduction come in from a specific angle? Should the conclusion be plain or have a call-to-action (CTA)? State it in your content outline to guide the writer.
Option: Alternatively, use content outline builders
In place of manually creating your content outline, you can use content outline builders like Semrush and Surfer SEO to draft extensive content outlines. The process is quite simple; you only need to fully understand what you want your final content to look like.
With a content outline builder, you can generate a content outline by typing your focus keyword into the tool.
The AI tool will automatically scan the web and analyze thousands of articles ranking for that keyword, showing you all the related keywords they have in common.
It will also display the headlines and subheadings of the top-ranking articles while giving you insights into the ideal word count for such content.
A content outline builder simplifies your keyword research process and suggests the relevant keywords you must include to outrank the top-performing articles.
Content outline examples
Content outlines will look different for the different types of web content, such as how-to posts, listicles, opinion pieces, expert roundups, product reviews, etc.
Here are a few examples to guide your content outline creation process:
Example #1: Content outline example for a “how to” content on the keyword “create images”
Title: Detailed guide on how to create original images for your blog
H2: Introduction
H2: Why is using original images for your blog posts important?
H2: Steps on how to create original images for your blog posts
H3: Determine the image requirements
H3: Choose the right image creation tools
H3: Design the image
H3: Edit and enhance the image with your style guide
H3: Incorporate typography and text
H3: Optimize the image for search engines
H3: Export to your media folder
H2: Copyright and Legal considerations you must consider while creating your images
H2: Conclusion
Example #2: Content outline example for a listicle on the keyword “image creation tools”
Title: 10 top image creation tools for your blog images
H2: Is it important to create original images for your blog posts?
H2: Top image creation tools for your blog images
H3: Adobe Photoshop
H3: Snappa
H3: GIMP
H3: Piktochart
H3: etc… to the tenth image creation tool
H2: Which image creation tool is best for you?
H2: Conclusion
Example #3: Content outline example for a product review article. Product: Canva.
Title: A Comprehensive Review of Canva: Your Ultimate Branding Tool
H2: Introduction
H2: What is Canva?
H2: How does Canva work?
H2: User interface and design tools
H2: Template library and customization options
H2: Collaboration and teamwork tools
H2: Integrations and compatibility
H2: Canva pricing plans
H2: Pros and cons of Canva
H3: Pros of Canva
H3: Cons of Canva
H2: Customer reviews
H2: Conclusion
Tips for creating a solid content outline
Here are some tips to help you create an extensive content outline:
1. Understand your objectives
You must clearly understand what you want to achieve with the content and how your marketing message will be received.
This will help you create a content outline that captures your tone and comprehensively covers the focus keyword.
2. Conduct thorough keyword research
Detailed keyword research is vital for producing a content outline that helps produce content that satisfies both humans and the search engine.
Analyze the top-performing articles, and gather relevant information, data, and materials that will form the structure of your content. Also, conduct in-depth keyword research to find the keywords your target audience is searching with when checking out information on your topic.
3. Use a hierarchical structure
Your content should follow a hierarchical structure, with the key points forming your main headings. Then further break them down using subheadings or bullet points.
This structure ensures your ideas flow well and look organized.
4. Ensure logical progression
Most readers will stop along the way if there’s a bridge in the natural flow of your content.
Therefore, you must arrange the sections and subtopics logically and coherently. Consider how each point should lead to the other, from the introduction to the conclusion.
This natural flow of your content makes it enjoyable for the reader and keeps them glued to it until the last full stop.
5. Balance depth and breadth
Different content formats work for different content ideas. You must be flexible in creating your content in a format that best suits the message you want to convey.
Provide enough detail to cover key points, but avoid overwhelming the outline with excessive information.
6. Keep it organized
Use bullet points, numbering, or indentation to maintain a visually appealing and organized outline.
7. Incorporate supporting details and examples
Add supporting details like statistics, examples, case studies, or other relevant evidence that strengthens your argument.
This is vital in helping you or your writers create content that easily wins the reader’s trust.
Content outline template
Here’s a plug-and-play template to guide you in creating a detailed content outline for your blog posts.
FAQ: How to create an SEO content outline
How do you write a content outline for a website?
Writing a website content outline is similar to writing a content outline for a blog post.
- Identify the main sections/pages needed for the website.
- Outline key points and subtopics for each section.
- Ensure logical flow, easy navigation, and alignment with the website’s goals and target audience.
What is the most common outline format?
The alphanumeric outline is the most commonly used outline format.
It incorporates numbers and letters to organize the content in a hierarchical order, indicating the different levels of information in the content.
What is the objective of a content outline?
The objective of a content outline is to provide a clear and structured plan for creating content. It helps ensure that important points and subtopics are included, improves organization and coherence, and guides the content creation process.
Ultimately, the objective is to enhance the quality of the content and effectively communicate the intended message to the audience. This also helps the content to rank high in SERPs.
Why is a content outline an important stage in the website design process?
For many reasons, creating a content outline is an important stage in the website design process.
It helps organize information on the website to enable visitors to easily locate the information they’re looking for. A content outline also guides the website design process, highlighting the website’s layout, structure, and navigation.
Other major reasons why a content outline is important for the website design process are its role in facilitating user experience and helping SEO efforts. Logically organizing information on a website creates a cohesive and intuitive user journey.
A detailed SEO content outline for a website increases the site’s ability to attract organic traffic from search engines as keywords are professionally optimized.
Develop strategic content outlines and enjoy the results
Content outlines guide you through creating comprehensive content that doesn’t just satisfy search engines and rank at the top of the SERPs but also satisfies human intent and attracts high-quality leads to your business.
Ensuring you always work with a strategic content outline is also vital to streamlining your content production process, increasing your efficiency, and the number of pieces of content you churn out within a specified period.
Do you use a content outline for your blog posts and website content? Any other tips you would like to add?
Originally published at https://weignitegrowth.com on June 12, 2023.
