ASM Development - taking websites beyond design

Content Development – How Unique Does Your Content Need To Be?

Content development is one area where many website owners often start to lose focus. One complaint that often appears in forums comes from owners who feel they have run out ideas for their content. Why? Because it has all been said before and they know their content has to be unique.

The question then for today is how unique does your content really have to be? There are a lot of emails flying around lately hawking systems that create instant blogs. The method they use is to simply aggregate content from other sites. Their rationale is that content doesn’t have to be unique at all. They cite Google and YouTube as top ranking sites that have no unique content on them. I could argue the opposite when it comes to YouTube, but then I could also throw in Twitter and all the other bookmarking sites as having no unique content.

The arguement is valid to a point. Search engines don’t have unique content nor does Twitter or the social bookmarking sites. However, they do provide a service and while the content may not be unique, the way they provide their service is, to an extent, unique.

I could use the same arguement for most websites. You may sell red widgets – and so do a hundred other websites. You could write an article on how to install a red widget – but, of course, it has already been done a hundred times on the other websites. However, they won’t have your exact article. To all intents and purposes, anyone landing on your site and buying a red widget normally would expect to see the installation instructions on your site. They certainly shouldn’t have to search for those instructions from another site, nor should you send them to another site. For that visitor/buyer, those instructions are unique to your site.

The web does repeat itself, however, when sitting down for a content development session, take the approach that your site is the only site producing content for that niche. Develop your content for your visitors or customers first based on what their needs are. The ideas and suggestions may not be totally unique, however, the way you put those words together will be. Provide what your visitors want and they will show their appreciation.