The Ultimate Guide to Never Writing Another Ultimate Guide

The Ultimate Guide to
Never Writing Another
Ultimate Guide.
Planning an e-commerce content strategy with impact.
@oliviaday__ /in/olivia-day-seo/

Most e-commerce blogs are
a little bit shit.

We rely too heavily on the
“ultimate guide method”.

a little bit shit.
❎ They only focus on one stage of the user funnel

a little bit shit.
❎ There’s little thought for how they ﬁt into the wider customer journey

a little bit shit.
❎ They contribute little to overall commercial goals

a little bit shit.
❎ They are created in a silo, separate from all other marketing channels

a little bit shit.
❎ They are created to “create topical authority”

a little bit shit.
❎ They are repetitions of other content on the internet

a little bit shit.
❎ They don’t provide value to the user

a little bit shit.
❎ They don’t provide value to the user
❎ They are created purely “for SEO”

Source: Ahrefs (2023)

According to
Digitaloft’s
State of
E-commerce
SEO Report*...
84% of SEOs regularly produce
blog content as part of their
e-commerce SEO strategy
*so far

A survey of
2,000
consumers
by Digitaloft
revealed...
64% of responders had
bought a product after
reading informational
content from a brand.

So what makes an e-commerce
blog strategy a little bit less shit?

There are many common traps
that a lot of blogs fall into.

Trap #1 - People don’t understand
the purpose of an e-commerce
blog.

Blog posts bring a multitude of beneﬁts
from a lot of angles, not just SEO…

Building a brand
persona

Building a brand
persona
Answering key
customer questions

Building a brand
persona
Answering key
customer questions
Bringing in organic
traﬃc

Building a brand
persona
Answering key
customer questions
Bringing in organic
traﬃc
Encouraging
conversions

Building a brand
persona
Answering key
customer questions
Bringing in organic
traﬃc
Encouraging
conversions
Boosting the
rankings of
priority categories

And it’s this support for category pages
that is often misunderstood…
Boosting the
rankings of
priority categories

When done properly, an e-commerce blog
can…
Boosting the
rankings of
priority categories
➔ Showcase experience, expertise, authoritativeness and
trustworthiness around a topic.
➔ Build topical authority - by talking regularly about a topic,
you can build that association that you are a business
specialising in your niche.
➔ Highlight product and category pages as valuable and
important - via a targeted internal linking strategy.
➔ Drive traﬃc to revenue-driving pages - when carefully
considering CRO.
➔ Earn valuable backlinks, which can pass authority to
priority pages.

Particularly for an e-commerce blog,
informational content is as much about
supporting revenue-driving pages as it is
about drawing in traﬃc of its own.

Trap #2 - Blog strategies are
created solely oﬀ keyword
research.

1 in 5 searches on
Google are being
searched for the very
ﬁrst time…

1 in 5 searches on
Google are being
searched for the very
ﬁrst time…
…if you’re relying
solely on keyword
research, you’re
missing out on a LOT
of valuable topics.

A successful e-commerce blog must
understand its audience…

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?
What
questions are
they asking
customer
service
teams?

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?
What
questions are
they asking
customer
service
teams?
What are they
searching on
platforms like
Reddit? What
are their pain
points?

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?
What
questions are
they asking
customer
service
teams?
What are they
searching on
platforms like
Reddit? What
are their pain
points?
What’s the
main reason
people are
reluctant to
try your
product?

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?
What
questions are
they asking
customer
service
teams?
What are they
searching on
platforms like
Reddit? What
are their pain
points?
What’s the
main reason
people are
reluctant to
try your
product?
What else is
going on in
their lives?
What are their
priorities? How
much time do
they have?

What features
do people
rave about in
product
reviews?
What
questions are
they asking
customer
service
teams?
What are they
searching on
platforms like
Reddit? What
are their pain
points?
What’s the
main reason
people are
reluctant to
try your
product?
What else is
going on in
their lives?
What are their
priorities? How
much time do
they have?
What
questions are
TikTok
comments
asking?

Trap #3 - You’re creating blogs
you don’t need.

Many blog strategies still fall into the
trap of thinking more = better.

Many blogs still fall into the
This can often take one of two forms:
Creating lots of little
blogs that should be
one one big blog.

Many blogs still fall into the
This can often take one of two forms:
Creating lots of little
blogs that should be
one one big blog.
Casting your net too
wide with irrelevant
content.

Creating blogs that don’t need to be
blogs…
Is an issue because it causes cannibalisation issues, duplicated or thin content,
and confusion for users.

blogs…
If you’re an online pharmacy,
how do you know if you need
separate blogs to target “side
eﬀects of aspirin”, “aspirin
dosage”, “can you give aspirin
to dogs” etc.?

blogs…
If you’re an online pharmacy,
how do you know if you need
separate blogs to target “side
eﬀects of aspirin”, “aspirin
dosage”, “can you give aspirin
to dogs” etc.?
➔ Google your target keywords, or put them into
a keyword clustering tool such as Keyword
Insights.
➔ This will tell you if two keywords need to be
separate blogs, or can be answered by one
longer guide.
➔ This is the approach the “ultimate guide” tactic
tries to employ (but fails to) - blogs can target
multiple keywords, but not everything.

Casting your net too wide and creating
irrelevant content…
Is an issue because it causes a lack of focus, a dilution of authority and confusion
for both users and search engines.

➔ Many sites fall into the trap of creating content
tangentially related to their niche (e.g. a car
insurance company posting a guide to Formula One)
in the hope it’ll earn them topical authority (in this
case around cars).
➔ This dilutes the focus of the site and can bring in
irrelevant traﬃc, negatively impacting engagement
signals.

The Google
documentation leak
told us of a
siteFocusScore that
denotes the extent to
which a site remains
focused on one core
topic.
➔ Many sites fall into the trap of creating content
tangentially related to their niche (e.g. a car
insurance company posting a guide to Formula One)
in the hope it’ll earn them topical authority (in this
case around cars).
➔ This dilutes the focus of the site and can bring in
irrelevant traﬃc, negatively impacting engagement
signals.

As an
e-commerce site,
your blog’s focus
should always be
on your product.
This means:
➔ Product and user guides
➔ Gift guides and roundups
➔ Showcasing features and
how they ﬁx customer
issues
➔ Cleaning, maintenance and
aftercare advice
➔ Storage advice
And supporting users at every
stage of their buying journey.

Trap #4 - Your blog content
exists in a void.

Making blog content work harder means
making it multi-task.

Once you’ve
created blog
content, it can
be repurposed
for…

Once you’ve
created blog
content, it can
be repurposed
for…
➔ Digital PR - and it should be good enough to
gain natural backlinks, too.

Once you’ve
created blog
content, it can
be repurposed
for…
➔ Email marketing - it should be providing
genuine value to users at all stages of the
funnel.

Once you’ve
created blog
content, it can
be repurposed
for…
funnel.
➔ Social media - is it engaging enough?

Once you’ve
created blog
content, it can
be repurposed
for…
funnel.
➔ Social media - is it engaging enough?
➔ Customer service teams - your blog should
answer all key customer questions.

Collaboration with these teams
starts with the ideation.
What
questions are
coming up
regularly in
customer
calls?
Before you’ve even begun to plan a blog strategy, you can ask…

What
questions are
coming up
regularly in
customer
calls?
What topics
are coming
up on
Instagram
comments or
DMs?

What
questions are
coming up
regularly in
customer
calls?
What topics
are coming
up on
Instagram
comments or
DMs?
What content
has
previously
received lots
of backlinks?

What
questions are
coming up
regularly in
customer
calls?
What topics
are coming
up on
Instagram
comments or
DMs?
What content
has
previously
received lots
of backlinks?
What topics
are
journalists
writing about
in our
industry?

What
questions are
coming up
regularly in
customer
calls?
What topics
are coming
up on
Instagram
comments or
DMs?
What content
has
previously
received lots
of backlinks?
What topics
are
journalists
writing about
in our
industry?
What were
the biggest
customer
pain points
this time last
year?

This is also a good quality
benchmark: Would this blog get
shared via social media or email?

Trap #5 - You create content,
then forget about it.
(It’s also just really, really bad).

Regularly auditing your blog content is
key to keeping it valuable.
300+ pieces of informational
content deleted

Poor quality content is most likely
doing more harm than good.

Google’s documentation
leak in May showed the
existence of a
QualityBoost signal which
looked at a site’s overall
quality. If your site is
littered with poor quality,
out of date content, it may
be harming the visibility of
your valuable pages.

leak in May showed the
existence of a
QualityBoost signal which
looked at a site’s overall
quality. If your site is
littered with poor quality,
out of date content, it may
be harming the visibility of
your valuable pages.
➔ If a blog is not receiving meaningful traﬃc, it’s
not working hard enough.
➔ From this point, you can decide if you a) want
to delete it, or b) improve it.
➔ A blog post can be considered for deletion if it
has never performed well, it is out of date or
no longer relevant.
➔ If you’re conﬁdent a blog is needed, you can
work to improve its quality.

Poor quality content is an incredibly
common issue.
leak in May also revealed
that Google uses LLMs to
estimate the “eﬀort”
going into article pages.
This is part of its overall
PageQuality score.
Poor quality content may look like…
➔ Content that doesn’t answer the user’s question (or
not well enough).
➔ Content that oﬀers a poor user experience.
➔ Content that copies what’s already on the internet.
➔ Content with poor internal linking (too much, none
at all, or poorly thought-through).
➔ Content that doesn’t prioritise information gain.

A lack of focus on information gain is an
increasingly important issue.
Information gain = how unique your content is compared
to what’s already ranking.
➔ It used to be enough to just copy what ranked #1 and
make it a bit better - not anymore.
➔ Focus on what unique insights you can oﬀer.
➔ This goes hand in hand with EEAT.
➔ Hunt for expertise, use quotes from your experts, and
speak to internal teams for unique insights.
For further information, visit https://digitaloft.co.uk/information-gain-in-seo/

Time to recap…

Time to recap…
a little bit shit.

Most e-commerce blog strategies are a little bit shit.
And there are a few reasons for this:

Lack of
understanding

Lack of
understanding
Over-reliance on
keyword research

Lack of
understanding
Over-reliance on
keyword research
Creating unnecessary
volumes of content

Lack of
understanding
Over-reliance on
keyword research
volumes of content
Keeping blog
content in a silo

Lack of
understanding
Over-reliance on
keyword research
volumes of content
Keeping blog
content in a silo
Old content is
ignored

A handful of principles underpin an
eﬀective e-commerce blog strategy.

A handful of principles underpin an
eﬀective e-commerce blog strategy.
➔ Understanding that informational content is also there to support
rankings for revenue-driving pages.
➔ Prioritising content quality, information gain and showcasing EEAT
signals.
➔ Keeping on top of content quality with regular audits.
➔ Keeping it relevant to your business and your product.
➔ Supporting users at every stage of their buying journey.
➔ Making content work harder across all channels.

Thank you!
There’s still time to complete
Digitaloft’s State of
E-commerce SEO Survey! You
can ﬁll it in here:
https://forms.gle/Nsc9ggkDuc
yeo5pz9

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