There’s nothing worse than working your tail off on a killer piece of content for your website, clicking “Publish,” and hearing nothing but crickets.

After all, the point of writing valuable content for your website is to drive traffic from as many sources as possible to your site so you can boost your conversions.

That said, anyone actively involved in content development knows that all it takes is one simple mistake to ruin your chances of getting ahead.

But don’t worry, we’re here to share with you some of the top mistakes even experienced content creators make so you can learn from their mistakes without having to fix the mess yourself.

1. Not Having a Plan

Only 30% of all content marketers claim to have a documented plan in place when it comes to content development.

Adding to that, 87% of B2B marketers admit they struggle with producing content that truly engages their buyers.

So, if you don’t have a plan in place, and can’t quite come up with content that engages readers, what’s the point of creating content for your website?

The key to building a bigger following, boosting conversions, and increasing sales are consistently publishing site content that is relevant to site visitors, adds value to their lies, and is entertaining.

If you don’t currently have a content marketing plan, you can start by designing a keyword strategy that will guide the rest of your content development efforts. A simple tool like the Google AdWords Keyword Planner should provide you with all the functionalities you need to find viable and profitable keyword ideas from scratch.

By targeting the right keywords, you make sure you attract the right kind of audience once your content goes live. Just be sure you inject them in the right places when creating your content and building your site.

Here is a list of the specific areas where you should insert your target keyword at least once:

• Title Tag
• Image “Alt Text” Tags
• Meta Description
• Main Body
• URL Slug
• Headers

If you have a new website or is yet to build one, you can get the ball rolling quick by creating or buying a domain name that contains your target keyword. As long as it’s not an exact match, having a keyword in your domain is a great way to get noticed by search engines as well as pique the interest of your target audience.

Once you have a sound keyword strategy, the next step is to invest in an editorial calendar or project management tool to help you organize your content.

If you’re looking for a more robust tool, consider checking out CoSchedule.

CoSchedule is a premium tool that lets you schedule posts, automate social media publishing, integrate email marketing, collaborate with team members, and so much more.

2. Not Optimizing for Speed and Performance

One of the most significant factors playing into how successful your website will be is how fast your web pages load.

Not sure why?

Take a look at these top reasons site speed is so important:

• Website speed is the very first impression (yes, even before web design) you’ll have on-site visitors
• People expect sites to load within 2 seconds of landing on them and will abandon your site after 3 seconds
• Navigating your site is much easier (and a whole lot less annoying) when everything loads fast
• Slow page loading times can kill conversions (even Amazon stated  that with a 1-second drop in site speed they’d stand to lose nearly $1.6 billion a year in sales)
• Your search rankings will suffer if your site is slow to load

If you want to start optimizing your website for speed and performance, first test the loading speed of your site using a free online tool like Google PageSpeed Insights.

From there, you can follow the suggestions Google has given you at the bottom of your analysis. For instance, compressing images, leveraging browser caching, and minifying JS, CSS, and HTML all help boots site speed.

3. Lack of Variety

Content is king and always will be. But one of the biggest mistakes content creators fail to do is add variety to their content.

It’s unlikely your site visitors are all the same. And if they are, there are other things to worry about that go way beyond content development.

The point is, some people prefer to read quick blog posts, some like video content, and others enjoy diving into a lengthy case study full of hard-hitting data and statistics.

More so, some people really love a good infographic, such as the one The Washington Post published about the ideal way to hit a baseball.

Make your content unique and diverse using the best copywriting tools.

If you want to reach everyone that fits within your broad target audience, switch your content up now and then and watch your traffic, conversions, and sales soar.

Online content you add to your website can include:

• Whitepapers
• How–to Guides
• Infographics
• GIFs and memes
• Webinars
• Video
• Checklists
• Social media posts
• Podcasts
• Longform content
• Animations
• Imagery

Try to go beyond blog posts on your site, even if you run an eCommerce shop and feel written content is the best. so you appeal to everyone no matter their personal content preference.

4. Not Analyzing Your Site’s Data

Knowing your site’s metrics is a critical part of your content development strategy.

After all, if you don’t know whether the content your publishing is working for you, what good does it do you?

One of the best ways to track your website’s metrics is to sign up for a free Google Analytics account and connect your site to it.

From there, you can track important numbers like:

• Bounce Rate. Find out what percentage of site visitors land on your website and immediately leave. From there, figure out why. For example, your site might be tough to navigate, your keywords might not place you in the right search results, or your site just doesn’t have what people are looking for.
• Site Traffic. Watch how many visitors come to your website over a period of time and see if the numbers are rising. If they are, you’re doing something right.
• Average Session Duration. It’s not enough to drive a lot of traffic to your site. If they all leave once they land on your site, you’ll never become successful. Luckily, you can measure how long people spend on your website as a whole, and how long they spend on individual web pages to see which content is resonating the most with site visitors.

In truth, there are many other metrics to keep an eye on in Google Analytics.

From the number of transactions to form conversions, the devices accessing your site to the demographics of each site visitor, it can become overwhelming if you don’t stay focused.

However, knowing some key metrics will help you give site visitors more of what they want (and less of what they don’t) so that you continue to grow your following and customer base.

Final Thoughts

And there you have it! Some of the biggest content development mistakes even the most experienced content marketers still make while producing their site’s content.

Don’t compromise your success by not taking the time to invest in some simple content marketing strategies designed to help you drive traffic to your site, boost conversions, and increase sales.

Instead, learn from the mistakes of others and take a proactive approach to your content marketing so that you can establish yourself as an authority that people come to rely on.