You’ve probably heard plenty about AI in content marketing.
About how it’ll transform marketing as we know it.
How it’ll change the way we work in profound ways.
And how it’ll unlock massive value for businesses.
All of that is true.
But how the heck do you actually get started with it?
At MarketMuse, that’s a question we hear a lot.
Marketers are excited about AI’s promise and potential. Yet they’re more excited about getting their hands dirty with actual AI tools and use cases.
One big area where you can start using AI is content optimization.
In this post, we’ll break down some common use cases for optimizing your content with artificial intelligence.
These should give you a sense of what’s possible with AI. It’s also designed to inspire further paths of experimentation and questions for vendors.
1. Rank content more effectively.
AI is all about data. These systems are designed to find correlations in big sets of data, and (in some cases) use those correlations to surface insights and offer recommendations.
Some AI systems have been turned loose on data from search engines. Things like keyword data and competition metrics. Using this data, AI can actually determine the best terms to target if you want to rank a piece of content.
Depending on a system’s accuracy, AI can potentially arm you with almost unfair search insights that help you rank more often and more effectively.
2. Identify gaps in your content strategy.
AI doesn’t just identify the best keywords and topics to target. It can also highlight what you’re missing in your existing content.
Remember how we said AI can analyze search data and extract insights?
Those insights include the other pages that rank for a term or topic. In fact, some AI systems can present a map of how your content ranks against competing ranked pages.
These maps highlight what terms the competition ranks well for, and the terms where you might be able to gain a leg up on them.
The result is a competitive matrix that shows you exactly which terms to target if you want to knock competing pages off their perch on page one.
3. Score content as you write.
A great advantage of AI is its sheer speed at producing results.
In fact, AI can actually recommend improvements in real time.
You see this in AI-powered content optimization tools that “score” your content as you write. These systems make sure you include the right keywords and topics in a particular piece of content, to optimize it for search results.
This “machine-assisted” content creation process handles SEO best practices, so writers can focus on telling a killer story.
4. Make sure your content is comprehensive.
It’s all well and good to rank for specific terms and cover certain topics.
But what if you want to own an entire topic category?
It can be daunting to identify all the keywords and topics that matter in a particular category. And even if you do, can you be certain you’re covering everything people are really searching for related to any given topic?
With AI, you can.
Some AI systems can analyze all the keywords related to a topic category, then present you with a list of all the topics you’ll want to cover in your content as part of this larger category.
You can then use this information to methodically and accurately own an entire topic category that matters to your brand.
5. Improve your existing content.
It’s not all about the fresh new content you produce.
Artificial intelligence can also optimize your existing content.
AI systems can “read” your existing website or blog, and identify opportunities to improve what’s already there. Depending on the system, these may include:
- Additional keywords to target.
- Critical SEO updates to make.
- Related content you should link to.
- Related topics you should cover.
This scientific approach to content enables you to quickly make updates that improve your content’s ranking potential.
In fact, at MarketMuse we’ve built a platform that does just that. Our AI-powered content strategy tool helps you both improve existing content and determine what to write next for optimal SEO rankings.
You can see for yourself how MarketMuse analyzes your content here:
Aki Balogh
Aki Balogh is the co-founder and CEO of MarketMuse. Prior to MarketMuse, he worked with the CEO of InfiniDB, a Series B startup that made an analytic database for Big Data engagements. Before joining InfiniDB, he was an Associate at OpenView Venture Partners where he looked at Series B investments in Big Data & Machine Learning. Prior to that, Aki was a software developer and a management consultant in the Data Science practice of Diamond Management & Technology Consultants (now PwC Diamond Advisory).