by:
Champion
.png "HubSpot Employee")
Consider this: How have search engines evolved? They’ve come a long way over the past decade. But today Google reigns supreme, processing millions of search requests per minute.
That’s a lot of people looking for information and answers to questions. And on top of that, there are millions of pieces of content published online every minute. So on one side, you have millions of people searching for content, and on the other side, you have millions of pieces of content being published online. This all makes Google’s job — which is to connect you, the searcher, with the most relevant, high authoritative results possible — increasingly difficult.
Over the years, Google released a series of algorithm updates with the goal of solving for searcher intent. In short, if you want your content to rank on Google, then you need to produce high-quality content search engines will deem authoritative and solve for the intent of a searcher’s query.
Get a copy of the complete Research Paper to learn more.
Explanation of Google’s algorithm updates
One thing I find fascinating about SEO is that everyone’s always trying to figure out how to trick/decode the latest algorithm — but really, every single one of Google’s algorithm updates has been a technological update meant to mirror human behavior even more closely. Therefore, if you take an organized approach and think about how a human would like to navigate a site and how you can make it easier for a visitor to find what they’re looking for, you’re proactively protecting yourself against potential penalties from more algorithm updates.
If you’re curious and want to learn more about Google’s algorithm updates, then check out Search Engine Journal’s article explaining the complete history of Google’s algorithm updates.
Explanation of how search engines find and rank content
In order to come up with a list of results, Google needs to:
- Find your content;
- Understand what your content is about.
To do this, Google sends around web crawlers to grab information about all of the sites it could present in its search engine results page (aka SERPs). You can think of these crawlers as explorers of the internet, going out and finding all that’s out there and reporting their findings back to Google. As a website, you need these crawlers to find all of the content you’re producing that answers the questions your prospective buyers are asking. How can you make sure that happens? Make it really easy for the crawlers to jump from place to related place on your site. That way, they can report back to Google exactly how your site is structured and what it’s all about.
You can also think of links as bridges connecting like-themed topics. You need to give these crawlers the maps to know where to go next plus the physical ability to get there (i.e., the hyperlinks out to other pages on your site).
If the crawler reaches a dead end or a place without a link to a related resource, it’s never going to find that related resource. And similarly, if the related resources aren’t directly linked from a page on your website, your website visitors probably won’t find them, either.
The main point: Crawlers operate like humans looking for something. Make it hard for crawlers to move from place to place on your site, and you’re also making it hard for humans to find what they’re looking for.
Keeping this in mind can help you design a successful long-term inbound content strategy.
A successful inbound content strategy focuses on using content to attract, engage, and delight relevant website visitors by telling a story that educates and inspires them to make a transformation — while putting their interests and needs above your bottom line. The focus of an inbound content strategy is on the word “transform.” Yes, it’s important to create helpful education, but that alone is not enough. To really help your audience transform, you need to help them apply what they’re learning to make the experience a meaningful one. When done correctly, this builds trust. If someone trusts you, they’re more likely to do business with you when they’re ready to make a purchasing decision.
You may be asking yourself, “How do I create content that attracts, engages, and delights my audience while also getting it to rank on the first page of search engines like Google?” This is where the topic cluster methodology comes in as a powerful solution.
What is the topic cluster methodology?
The topic cluster methodology was first detailed by HubSpot Research in 2017. At its very essence, it’s a way to organize a site’s content pages using a clear, deliberate site architecture. Topic clusters rearrange the architecture into clusters of related content linked to a central content pillar. Each content pillar should provide a comprehensive overview of the topic you’re writing about. By linking all of your site’s content within that topic to a content pillar (and vice versa, when it makes sense and provides value), search engines like Google can easily scan your content and understand there is a semantic relationship between the content of the cluster’s pages. The cluster setup also signals to search engines a real breadth and depth in the content, giving the content pillar more authority on the topic. Algorithms like Google’s RankBrain reward this orderly linking with higher search placement.
How can I learn more about the topic cluster framework?
I first started experimenting with the topic cluster framework in 2016. Since this time, hosted a content strategy workshop series through the HubSpot User Group program. The goal of this workshop series was to teach a framework for businesses to create content both humans and search engines will love.
During this time, I worked with various businesses across different industries to continuously improve this content strategy framework; I wanted to make it more clear and actionable for anyone to implement.
I offer a detailed account of the qualitative and quantitative findings in my research paper, The Impact of Topic Clusters on SEO.
I recommend getting a copy of the Google Doc version of this research paper as I’ve included gif walkthroughs of examples that don’t show up in the PDF version. If you don’t have Google Drive, then click here to access the PDF version.
Get a Copy of the Research Paper
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