What Will Yield Better Results: Content Marketing or SEO for Dispensaries?

October 31, 2017

It’s been almost a year since dispensaries started sprouting everywhere and the way they communicated with their customers went from face-to-face communication, niche directories and word-of-mouth recommendation to websites and Facebook pages and the whole SEO shebang. Many dispensary managers are wondering what’s more prudent for their digital marketing efforts – investing in SEO for dispensaries or content marketing? What will set them apart from the rest and bring in more customers? Before we get to that, let’s see how SEO and content marketing differ, if at all.

OK, so what’s SEO?

SEO includes a variety of actions you take to improve the search rankings of a given website. The spectrum of SEO runs from the website code, over website structure, to content and backlinks. Many people split this range into on-page optimization (keywords, page titles, meta descriptions, load optimization, etc.) and off-page efforts (backlinks).

The technical side of SEO ensures that a website can easily be crawled by Google. However, a website doesn’t report only to Google. Actually, Google will take into account how Internet users react to your website. The treatment you get from users (your website visitors) is directly related to the user experience you provide. What you want, what Google will take as a plus for you, is if visitors spend time to explore your content, if they interact with your website and if they share your content on social media, among other things. To achieve that, your website has to load fast, to have responsive design, to adapt the design and content to the delivery platform and have a structure that makes it easy to navigate. How do you take your website there? With a lean code free from plugin bloat and lossless lightweight images.

Put simply, SEO is the full scope of measures you take to improve the website’s ranking for specific keywords. Content marketing is an inherent part of it, but when people want to contrast SEO and content marketing, this is what comes out as most salient about SEO:

  • Tweaking the code to make the pages easily crawlable
  • Reducing the number of website plugins to ensure the website loads as fast as possible
  • Optimizing images so that they don’t slow down load speed, but ensuring they retain the quality
  • Building a network of backlinks from high-authority websites
  • Streamlining website structure and architecture to ensure it’s interpreted correctly by Google (including pruning and enhancing URLs)

And what’s content marketing about?

The catchphrase “content is king” has become completely dulled and blunted from overuse, but it’s still undoubtedly true. Content will never fall by the wayside, because content wins battles on two fields:

You need content to rank for keywords. (Content tells the search engines who you are and what you do.)

Content allows you to tell your story to your customers and consumers. (It also speaks to the people.)

You can’t really separate content marketing from SEO. They blend and support each other on many levels. For example, website structure is the number of pages and their topics, as well as the way they connect to each other. Website structure rests on two pillars: knowing what pages you need and what interlinking scheme and meta data so that search engines understand what you’re telling them, but also knowing what you need to tell your visitors so that they turn into customers. The first is knowing the technical side of SEO and the latter is developing a content strategy grounded in thorough keyword research. Mind you, content is not only words. Visuals are a vital part of any up-to-date content marketing approach.

So, can you tell me where to put my dollar – SEO or content marketing?

Well, no. That is, we can’t give a sweeping, general answer as to which is more important and beneficial. It’s all on a case by case basis, but we can give you an answer after looking into your story. We can give you one definitive answer – if you want to delegate the optimization to pros, you’d do best if you teamed up with a group of seasoned SEO experts who can have you covered on-page and off-page. We won’t be falsely modest here. If you want to rock SEO for dispensaries, SEO 1 Click is your band.

Want to have a transcending experience with San Diego SEO for dispensaries? Give us a call!

Reach out to us if you are ready to get to top results in Google for your targeted keywords. SEO 1 Click offers you experience-honed expertise, data-powered results, and a team of enthusiastic professionals who love helping businesses reach new high!

It’s been almost a year since dispensaries started sprouting everywhere and the way they communicated with their customers went from face-to-face communication, niche directories and word-of-mouth recommendation to websites and Facebook pages and the whole SEO shebang. Many dispensary managers are wondering what’s more prudent for their digital marketing efforts – investing in SEO for dispensaries or content marketing? What will set them apart from the rest and bring in more customers? Before we get to that, let’s see how SEO and content marketing differ, if at all.

OK, so what’s SEO?

SEO includes a variety of actions you take to improve the search rankings of a given website. The spectrum of SEO runs from the website code, over website structure, to content and backlinks. Many people split this range into on-page optimization (keywords, page titles, meta descriptions, load optimization, etc.) and off-page efforts (backlinks).

The technical side of SEO ensures that a website can easily be crawled by Google. However, a website doesn’t report only to Google. Actually, Google will take into account how Internet users react to your website. The treatment you get from users (your website visitors) is directly related to the user experience you provide. What you want, what Google will take as a plus for you, is if visitors spend time to explore your content, if they interact with your website and if they share your content on social media, among other things. To achieve that, your website has to load fast, to have responsive design, to adapt the design and content to the delivery platform and have a structure that makes it easy to navigate. How do you take your website there? With a lean code free from plugin bloat and lossless lightweight images.

Put simply, SEO is the full scope of measures you take to improve the website’s ranking for specific keywords. Content marketing is an inherent part of it, but when people want to contrast SEO and content marketing, this is what comes out as most salient about SEO:

  • Tweaking the code to make the pages easily crawlable
  • Reducing the number of website plugins to ensure the website loads as fast as possible
  • Optimizing images so that they don’t slow down load speed, but ensuring they retain the quality
  • Building a network of backlinks from high-authority websites
  • Streamlining website structure and architecture to ensure it’s interpreted correctly by Google (including pruning and enhancing URLs)

And what’s content marketing about?

The catchphrase “content is king” has become completely dulled and blunted from overuse, but it’s still undoubtedly true. Content will never fall by the wayside, because content wins battles on two fields:

You need content to rank for keywords. (Content tells the search engines who you are and what you do.)

Content allows you to tell your story to your customers and consumers. (It also speaks to the people.)

You can’t really separate content marketing from SEO. They blend and support each other on many levels. For example, website structure is the number of pages and their topics, as well as the way they connect to each other. Website structure rests on two pillars: knowing what pages you need and what interlinking scheme and meta data so that search engines understand what you’re telling them, but also knowing what you need to tell your visitors so that they turn into customers. The first is knowing the technical side of SEO and the latter is developing a content strategy grounded in thorough keyword research. Mind you, content is not only words. Visuals are a vital part of any up-to-date content marketing approach.

So, can you tell me where to put my dollar – SEO or content marketing?

Well, no. That is, we can’t give a sweeping, general answer as to which is more important and beneficial. It’s all on a case by case basis, but we can give you an answer after looking into your story. We can give you one definitive answer – if you want to delegate the optimization to pros, you’d do best if you teamed up with a group of seasoned SEO experts who can have you covered on-page and off-page. We won’t be falsely modest here. If you want to rock SEO for dispensaries, SEO 1 Click is your band.

Want to have a transcending experience with San Diego SEO for dispensaries? Give us a call!

Reach out to us if you are ready to get to top results in Google for your targeted keywords. SEO 1 Click offers you experience-honed expertise, data-powered results, and a team of enthusiastic professionals who love helping businesses reach new high!

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