What is original content in SEO?

To stand apart you need to be authentic. It applies to every stream of work, let alone digital marketing or SEO. The importance of original content in SEO is unparalleled. It not only helps search engines like Google put your online presence in a more authoritative state but also provides your website visitors something new to engage with. The more authentic your content, be it website, blog, or product description, the more enhanced your online reputation becomes.

Being authentic is just not another vanity metric anymore, it is beyond that. In fact, after updates like Hummingbird from Google, duplicate content is severely penalized and can even land your website in Google’s sandbox, recovering from which is a mission, truly impossible. So, if you think you can get away with duplicate or plagiarized content, hold up! Think again, because it can have severe implications. Through this article, we throw some light upon the necessity of original content in SEO. If you seek to grow online, you have to know how high authenticity is ranked over other factors by search engines — a lot. With the advent of artificial intelligence and machine learning, getting away with duplicity is out of the question. So, we understand how you can create original content and why is it so important after all?

What is original content in SEO?

To fully encapsulate the necessity that is original content you must understand what it exactly is and why one must emphasize it.

Original is what it says. It's authentic. Something that has not been published or put up online, ever, before. It's something fresh.

However, being original doesn't mean you cannot do something that has already been done. For example — if you run a movie review blog, it cannot be that a review you write of a movie will be the only review online. In other words, original content in SEO is more about giving a fresh perspective, rather than just blatantly copying someone else's work and putting it up online.

Now, plagiarism can be incidental as well. After all, with billions of content pieces floating around the web, your content may have some similarities with content from other sources that you might not know about. While you might think your piece is original, for search engines, it might just not. So, there are plagiarism checkers like Copyscape that scan your content against all the content on the internet to detect any similarities, if there are, you can amend those and make your piece 100% authentic. Creating original content is as technical as it is creative.

Further, gone are the days when keyword stuffing and meaningless content topped SERPs. Today, Google has become smarter. By being original, your content has to be both plagiarism-free and contextual. It has to be relevant and contain meaning that both the crawl bots and your visitors understand. Your site won't rank if you stuff keywords a hundred times, anymore. You have got to be relevant when doing content in SEO.

Why Original Content Is Important?

Creating original content of any kind be it an image, text, or video takes time and effort to create. So, any kind of content is valued very highly not just by search engines but people too. So, copying content is not just a legal offense but also ethical. Here is why original content is so important —

Original content puts you in the good books of search engines. publishing original content regularly allows Google to understand that you are not on the web just to earn a quick buck or indulge in black hat techniques, rather you want to inform, entertain and engage with its audience by helping them with new information. This also enhances the possibility of you being ranked ahead on pages.

When you are original, others follow you. Creating original content builds authority. People in your industry share your content on social media, link their content with yours creating more backlinks for you which makes your page much more valuable. This is again another factor that ultimately helps you rank ahead of your competition.

When you take it offline, originality gets you more business. When you are authentic, people come to you, again and again. And ultimately when their trust builds, they shop from you or listen to your recommendations. For example — if people trust your movie reviews, they come to you to decide if they should watch a movie or not. So, you are ultimately impacting people’s lives.

How do you make original content?

Creating original content is an art and science. Conducting research using a source is one thing, pulling information from the source is another. In other words, the latter is plagiarism, and there sometimes, the line between original and plagiarized content can be blurry.

Start by finding your audience and being relevant. For example — if you write movie reviews, help your audience with quality movie reviews rather than talking about movie gossip. Create an audience base for yourself by being relevant to your audience and search engines.

Once you have found your niche, you have to be up to date. Rather than creating content that you are interested in, take a minute and research what your audience is interested in. Google trends are one good platform that helps you find what's trending in your niche, online in the region your target audience exists.

Once you know what you want your content to be about, the next thing is doing thorough research. Find relevant keywords that you can use in your article and research the topic you want to explore. For example — watch the movie you want to review.

Once you have the content ready, scan it for plagiarism. No, you might not have copied, but why take a chance. If your work is 100% plagiarism-free, go ahead and publish it.

Remember, you need to be relevant and to rank better, trendy.

Why do we need original content?

Enquiring why you need original content is asking why we need electricity? It's paramount for the way the world functions today. Without original content, there is nothing on the web that makes any meaning.

Original content is important for your online growth. The more original content you produce, the better your search engine ranking gets.

Original content gets you social shares and backlinks which is an important element to building trust and authority online.

Over time original content can generate leads, sales and grow your business. Once you have built trust with your audience, they are more inclined to turn to you for purchases than others.

Original content also leads to building a positive brand image that only helps your business in one way or the other. After all, being accused by someone of copying content is good for any business, at all.

SEO original content is important both from an ethical and legal standpoint. Plagiarism can sue you, and original content can help you build authority. However, the latter can take time, and sometimes, building original content for months might not help you see results if your SEO is not on point. So, patience is key. Doing everything right can also take time. Don't expect results from day one, and don't stop either. Be persistent and you will grow with original content.