The quality of SEO is that searchers are actively looking for your product/service oregon the occupation you solve.

This usually means higher-quality leads, which makes SEO a fantastic lead-generation channel. 

However, it doesn’t mean you tin make immoderate portion of content, gross it, and anticipation that you thrust thousands of leads to your business. 

Neither tin you nonstop these leads to a dedicated autoresponder sequence, and they’ll abruptly beryllium “nurtured” and “ready to buy.”

The buyer’s journey doesn’t enactment similar that successful the real world:

• The buyer’s travel is not linear – Nobody’s searching for a problem, discovering the solution, instantly jumping connected a demo call, and converting into a customer. 
• If you’re creating top-of-the-funnel (TOFU) content, your “leads” are aboriginal successful the marketing funnel – They astir apt don’t cognize they person a occupation oregon conscionable discovered it. So portion they tin technically be considered “marketing-qualified,” the income improvement representatives (SDRs) are going to find them of mediocre prime and a discarded of time. (And these leads volition wonderment wherefore SDRs are calling them!)

That’s why, successful this post, we’re going to research a amended mode to make leads via SEO. 

How to usage product-led contented to make leads via SEO

Product-led contented weaves your merchandise into the communicative to assistance lick a problem. It’s not a hard sell. You’re not trying to aggressively transportation your product. You’re inactive trying to supply adjuvant advice, with the objection of presenting your merchandise oregon work arsenic the champion solution.

Product-led contented is the main mode we make leads and customers astatine Ahrefs. And it works:

It works good arsenic pb procreation because:

• For astir businesses, determination is simply a radical of radical who are looking for solutions oregon acceptable to buy. These radical marque large leads. You’d privation to people them archetypal earlier going up the funnel. Our process of creating product-led contented chiefly targets specified keywords.
• Product-led contented shows your merchandise oregon work successful action. It encourages a elemental adjacent measurement for them to motion up for a trial, demo call, or more.

So however bash you make product-led contented that generates leads? Here’s how:

1. Do keyword research

Product-led oregon not, you request a mode for radical to observe your content. Given that 53.3% of each website postulation comes from integrated search, Google’s a bully spot to start.

But if you privation to get hunt postulation from Google, you request to people topics that radical are searching for. That’s wherever keyword probe comes in. 

Keyword probe is the process of discovering invaluable hunt queries that your people customers benignant into hunt engines to look for products, services, and information. 

The easiest mode to statesman is to usage a keyword probe instrumentality similar Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer:

1. Go to Keywords Explorer
2. Enter 1 oregon a fewer applicable keywords
3. Go to the Matching presumption report

Look done the study and prime retired the keywords that are applicable to your site. 

Don’t deliberation astir whether you tin make product-led contented for those keywords yet. We’ll bash that successful the adjacent step. For now, absorption connected collecting arsenic galore applicable keywords arsenic possible.

2. Assign each keyword a “business potential” score

To marque product-led contented work, the champion mode is to people keywords with precocious buying intent. 

The mode we place these keywords is to delegate each of the keywords we discovered successful measurement 1 with a “business imaginable “ score. 

By prioritizing lone topics that people astatine slightest a “2,” we marque definite that each notation of our merchandise is natural.

3. Create product-led contented that ranks

This is the astir hard portion of the process. That’s due to the fact that creating a large portion of product-led contented isn’t simply whipping up a 1,000-word blog station and adding a nexus backmost to your proceedings oregon consultation call. 

It often requires heavy merchandise knowledge, creativity, and astute copywriting. Essentially, the writer needs to: 

• Understand what Google and searchers are looking for—and match it.
• Understand the merchandise oregon work so well that they tin weave successful usage cases naturally.
• Add unsocial nuggets of accusation truthful that the station not lone stands retired connected the SERPs but besides encourages radical to nexus to it.
• Make definite the contented is engaging and not “oversell” the product.

Let’s look astatine what’s involved:

Match hunt intent

If you privation to fertile precocious connected Google, you request to recognize why the searcher is looking for a peculiar topic. This is known arsenic hunt intent and you tin fig it retired by analyzing the SERPs for the three Cs:

• Content type – Are they blog posts, merchandise pages, landing pages, oregon thing else?
• Content format – Are they tutorials, listicles, how-to guides, recipes, escaped tools, oregon thing else?
• Content angle – Is determination a ascendant selling point, similar debased prices oregon however casual it is?

For example, if we’re targeting the keyword “inbound marketing,” the 3 Cs will be:

• Content type – They’re each blog posts.
• Content format – They’re each definition-style guides.
• Content angle – No peculiar standout space for this keyword.

So if you privation to fertile for this keyword, it’s apt you’ll person to make a definition-style blog post. 

Cover important subtopics

If determination are subtopics that astir of the top-ranking pages cover, it’s apt they’re important and searchers expect to see them.

We tin find retired what these subtopics are by looking astatine communal keyword rankings:

1. Enter your keyword into Ahrefs’ Keywords Explorer
2. Scroll down to the SERP overview
3. Select 3 to 5 top-ranking articles (make definite they’re similar)
4. Click Open in and take Content gap

We’ll past prime the Intersection dropdown and take “4, 5” to spot lone the astir applicable subtopics:

In this example, it’s apt we’ll person to cover these:

• What inbound selling is
• Examples of inbound marketing
• Inbound selling strategies

They volition marque bully subheadings for the post.

Insert unsocial nuggets of information

Links are a confirmed Google ranking factor. 

But if you privation radical to nexus to your content, you request to springiness them a crushed to. Here are immoderate reasons wherefore radical link:

1. Data – You person archetypal data, numbers, oregon statistics. This tin beryllium from your company’s interior data, surveys, oregon polls. For example, we studied our database to observe that 66.5% of links to sites successful the past 9 years are dead.
2. Expert investigation and insights – You person insights from manufacture experts that nary 1 other has entree to. These tin beryllium in-house oregon external. For example, our post connected ChatGPT usage cases for SEO is based connected our knowing of however the AI instrumentality tin and cannot help.
3. Personal experience – You person a unsocial acceptable of experiences that nary 1 tin replicate. For example, our post connected what an SEO agency does was written based connected Chris Haines’ 10-year acquisition moving successful an agency.
4. Strong opinions – You person a acceptable of opinions that is contrarian, alternative, oregon simply antithetic from different experts. For example, Patrick Stox’s post astir however going viral doesn’t assistance with SEO generated immoderate debate and controversy.
5. New and unsocial products oregon services – You’ve created a merchandise oregon work that is uncommon, unique, oregon solves an important problem. For example, our beta motorboat of our hunt engine garnered rather a fewer media mentions.

You’ll person to find ways to insert specified unsocial nuggets of accusation into your content. 

Weave your merchandise people into the content

Wherever it makes consciousness wrong the content, see your merchandise usage cases. With step-by-step details (using screenshots, GIFs, and videos), amusement your readers however to lick problems with your product.

There is nary “right” mode to bash this nor is determination a “correct” fig of usage cases you should include. It depends connected your product, the occupation you’re solving successful particular, and your copywriting skills.

You’ve seen however I’ve people included galore Ahrefs usage cases successful this post. Here’s different illustration wherever Chris has integrated Ahrefs usage cases into his post. 

It’s earthy due to the fact that of the topic—it’s hard to bash rival investigation without Ahrefs.

Final thoughts

Does this mean that you should not make TOFU content?

No. TOFU contented inactive has its place.

I asked Bryan Casey, the manager of integer astatine IBM, and this is what helium has to say:

B2B buyers aren’t successful the marketplace for products 95% of the clip but they’re successful the marketplace to get amended astatine their occupation 100% of the time. So, that postulation is not looking to beryllium routed to a income rep the next week. 

But if you tin marque the assemblage “sticky” by getting them much connected to the marque truthful you tin scope them perpetually, you’re top-of-mind and that’s a large outcome.

The extremity of TOFU contented is not to make leads. It’s for marque consciousness and gathering a narration with them. You tin inactive promote them to motion up for your newsletter, but this is not a income play. You’re simply getting your marque to beryllium apical of caput for them.

Any questions oregon comments? Let maine cognize on Twitter.