If you haven’t thought about the quality of the content you are posting to your site, blog or social media, it’s time you did. Everyone has heard that ‘content is king’ but there is still a lot of dodgy stuff being posted out there.  What’s your content like?

Here are three reasons to lift your content game.

1.  Facebook will overlook you if you don’t.

Most businesses have a presence on Facebook but that isn’t enough.  They need to be sharing useful content and generating interaction with their followers.  For the last couple of weeks I have seen this post circulating on Facebook. You’ve probably seen it too:

 “Fans: If you are not an active fan of mine (liking or commenting on photos) as of October 31, 2011 you will no longer see updates from me in your news feed! They will also be removing the “Discussions” & “Reviews” tabs. PLEASE LIKE THIS STATUS if you want to see my POSTS/PHOTOS/OFFERS!”

Hasn’t that sent a flurry through the ranks?  What is actually happening is that those sites who aren’t posting quality content are being overlooked by Facebook‘s Edgerank system.  That’s the one that decides which posts are more interesting to visitors and it bases its calculations on the interaction and response your posts get.  The more interaction, the better your posts will rank.  It’s one way for the system to work out which businesses are posting content that people actually want to read.  Logic says that if you post good stuff people will come to read it, comment and share it with their friends.

This post that is going around is sort of right but in a “scaremongery” kind of way.  Yes, your posts are not likely to be seen by people who don’t interact with you.  So find a way to connect through your quality posts or look for a new audience.

2.  Google will overlook you if you don’t.

Google is in the business of making information easy to find but, as any good business should be, it’s picky about what it shares.  Google has its own algorithm which sorts out the good from the bad.  If your posts aren’t being shared, commented on or linked to, Google will think “Ah, this can’t be much good.”  Google doesn’t just look at the one post; it looks across your whole site.   You can imagine what happens to those sites that are stuffed full of crap or reproduced articles from article directories.  It will see no value in what you are offering.

Make your site into something worth reading by adding useful posts that are what your target market is looking for.  That’s how you’ll get the reaction you need.

3.  Your target market will overlook you if you don’t.

No matter how much weight you place on Google and online ranking, you can’t ignore the human angle.  Why would anyone want to come and read something that bores the pants off them?  They’ll be out of there before they get to the end of the first paragraph.  If you are writing content that people want to read you will be on a winner.  They will love you.  Google will learn to love you.  Facebook will rediscover you and include you in it’s newsfeed.

I know I harp on about this but it’s important to remember that it’s not only robots who crawl through your site.  So do real people.\

If you aren’t already, I would encourage you to think about what you are sharing online and make sure it’s worth doing.  Quality content is the only sort of content you should be producing.