"If you build it, they will come."  Although those words were originally used to convince Kevin Costner to build a baseball field, I'm willing to bet they've been used numerous times since as motivating words to thousands of people in hundreds of industries.  In fact, I'd be shocked if someone out there hasn't used the phrase in reference to building a successful online business.  Just in case they haven't, I'm going to go ahead and use them now:

If you build it… they will come.

By "it" I'm referring to the content of your website.  When we start trying to optimize and market our website for the search engines, we sometimes forget that the best keywords in the world and the highest rank in the search engine won't sell our products if the content on the page is garbage.  To that affect, ClickZ Expert PJ Fusco has written a great article on the difference between "good" content and "great content".

In "Resolve to Produce Great Content", Fusco defines the difference between good and content this way: 

Good content informs and inspirers readers. It entertains and amuses its intended audience. It's passed from user to user and cited by others as having worth. Great content, however, encourages end users one step further: to click that button. 

She goes on to say that great content leaves the reader no choice but to take some action.  And I don't think she means in the "Help!  I'm trapped at this website!" kind of way.  She's talking about the kind of content that is so convincing, so inspiring, or so motivating that you can't help but go one step further and make a purchase, subscribe to a newsletter, or sign up for a service.  And I agree.  That's great content.  Great content can help your SEO aspirations in a couple of ways, too.  For one, you can use the content on your website to highlight keywords and phrases that you'd like the search engines to rank you for.  But that great content also encourages other websites to link to your site and that, in turn, will also help your search ranking.

I'd like to take the idea of great content one step further.

THE CHALLENGE

It's one thing to talk about producing content and the things that make it great.  But that won't help a lot of people gauge the caliber of their content.  For one, a lot of website owners don't think there's anything wrong with their content.  And maybe there's not "anything wrong" with it, per say.  Maybe you do pretty good with your search ranking and land somewhere in the top few spots.  Does a high search engine ranking automatically equate to more sales or conversions?  No… not at all.

Case in point:  I did a Google search for the words "DVD burner" and then went down the list of results on the first page looking for sites that were selling something.  Of the 10 sites on the first page, four of them were commercial sites with something to sell.  One of them looked like your run of the mill mass e-reseller website.  One looked like a blog.  And the other two looked like sites from the early 90s built by home programmers trying to sell downloadable versions of software made in their bedrooms.

Now there's nothing wrong with any of those types of sites.  I've bought software from home programmers before.  I've never bought anything from a blog, but I'm sure it'll happen some day.  I do typically avoid mass reseller websites just because I'd rather go direct to the source.  That being said, I wouldn't buy anything from any of the sites I looked at.  My decision wasn't made based on the look of the websites, although I'm sure the look would probably turn more than a few of your average web users away.  What turned me off was the content that was trying to convince me to make a purchase.

A few examples:

• "Today, users trust NEC's high-performance OEM DVD Multi Writer for perfect speed, precision and comfort."
• "NEC’s proven quality. Our incomparable pricing and customer service. Hurry, while supplies last! These internal drives are hot sellers."
• "Burn Video DVD's, Dual Layer DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, CD-RW, and CD-R disc's. Burn Bootable CD/DVD's, ISO Files, and Audio CD's from MP3, MP2, WMA, WAV, AVI and OGG files."
• "With this software you can burn CD-R, CD-RW DVD+R/RW DVD-R/RW discs. All features in detail you can read on the features page."
• "[Product name] is powerful and easy CD burners software and DVD burners / [Product name] is CD / DVD burner that burn any data to CD / DVD in high speed / [Product name] build and burn ISO Image to CDs and DVDs"

Keep in mind that these are all sales pitches found on the sites that are currently ranking in the top 10 results for "DVD burner".  They must be doing something right, wouldn't you say?  I'd love to find out a little about their conversion rates, though.  Because I'm willing to bet that once users find their way to these sites, they're not buying anything.  And here's a couple of reasons why:

REAL WEBSITE #1

BAD

"Today, users trust NEC's high-performance OEM DVD Multi Writer for perfect speed, precision and comfort."

First off, don't use technical jargon when you're trying to sell to the masses.  Do you think most people know what OEM means?  Chances are, they don't.  Second of all, the sentence makes no sense.  For one, speed can never be perfect and precision can never be perfect.  Plus, I'm strill trying to figure out how NEC's DVD writers are providing users with trusted "comfort".  The three benefits listed here aren't what most people searching for DVD burners are most likely to search for.

GOOD

"Today, users trust NEC's high-performance DVD Multi Writer to archive their family memories, burn home movies to DVD, and create original works of art."

You've got the company name, the product name, and several reasons that people might be looking for a DVD burner:  archiving, burning movies to DVD, and creating original media.

BAD

"NEC’s proven quality. Our incomparable pricing and customer service. Hurry, while supplies last! These internal drives are hot sellers."

What about NEC's proven quality?  Fragmented sentences.  Make little.  Sense.  Do I want to set up an account with a online store that has a problem keeping their supply up with demand?  What makes them hot sellers?  Even if you ignore than the obvious lack of grammatical correctness, this one-liner says absolutely nothing concrete about the product.  In fact, you don't even know what kind of internal drive they're trying to sell from the description.  It could be an internal CD player… or a CD burner… or a DVD player… a hard drive… a Zip Drive… you just don't know.

GOOD

"The [insert product name] exemplified NEC's proven quality with fast writing speeds and flawless movie burning.  Never waste another DVD because of burn errors with this rock-solid and affordable internral DVD burner direct from [insert company name].

The main idea from the original wording is carried over:  these drives have a proven quality and they're cheap.  It also lets you know what kind of product you're buying, who makes it, who's selling it, and one of the reasons it's considered reliable (no more wasted DVDs).

REAL WEBSITE #2

BAD 

Burn Video DVD's, Dual Layer DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD-R, DVD-RAM, CD-RW, and CD-R disc's. Burn Bootable CD/DVD's, ISO Files, and Audio CD's from MP3, MP2, WMA, WAV, AVI and OGG files."

To start with, you have to either pay attention to the title bar of your browser (which most average users don't do) or read the whole sales pitch to find out if this product is hardware or software.  This blurb is all you know about the product from the landing page.  To find out more about the product, you have to go to another "features" page which, in turn, has no link back to the landing page and no link to make a purchase from.  That's not good website design.  But I digress.  Keeping the majority of internet users in mind, how many are going to 1) care and 2) understand that long list of disc formats?  Coupled with the fact that they haven't yet discovered that this is a piece of software and not a DVD burning drive, this is just really poor content.

GOOD

[Product name] is the last piece of DVD Burning software you'll ever need to buy!  With support for nearly ever type of DVD and most major file formats, [product name] allows you to use your DVD burner to its full potential.

In this example, the words "type of DVD" and "major file formats" would be linked to pages or pop-up windows with the full list of supported discs and formats on it.  Plus, we know that the product is software and that you'll need an existing DVD burner to use it.

REAL WEBSITE #3

BAD 

With this software you can burn CD-R, CD-RW DVD+R/RW DVD-R/RW discs. All features in detail you can read on the features page. 

Again, the grammar is the first thing I noticed about this.  If you're trying to sell to customers in a language that is not your first language (which I assume is the case here), have someone who speaks the language proofread your copy.  A lot of people will question the validity of poorly worded copy.  The good news is this description does say that the product is software and not an actual DVD burner.  The problem, however, is that the name of the product isn't even mentioned and the features that are likely to sell the product are tucked away on another page.

GOOD

With [Product name] and your DVD burner, you can not only burn to a multitude of disc formats, but also [insert feature], [insert feature], and [insert feature].  [Product name] boasts a multitude of other features that make burning DVDs fast, easy, and fun!

In this example, "other features" links to the original features page and "multitude of disc formats" links to page or pop-up of disc formats.  We've got the product name, several features, some keywords people might search for.  And while it doesn't specifically say "software", you can quite easily gather what the product is because it requires "your DVD burner".

REAL WEBSITE #4

BAD

• [Product name] is powerful and easy CD burners software and DVD burners
• [Product name] is CD / DVD burner that burn any data to CD / DVD in high speed
• [Product name] build and burn ISO Image to CDs and DVDs

Again, I don't think English is this person's primary language, which is just fine.  The author should, however, have someone who does speak English proof his or her work prior to publishing it.  I had to change the formatting of the pitch to make it work well in the post.  These were originally the first three items on a bulleted list of features next to very poor screenshot of the product.  The problem is, they pretty much all say the same thing.

GOOD

• [Product name] is the powerful, but easy to use, software solution to all your high-speed CD & DVD burning needs
• [Product name] can build and burn ISO images, [another format], [another format], and many more

Re-writing this copy to read more along these lines would eliminate half of the bullets already on the page and allow the author to highlight more features or benefits of the product.  Some of those bullets could be used to highlight possible keyword phrases like "burn movies to DVD" or "back up a hard drive".  As in the other examples, "many more" links to a list of formats.

CONCLUSIONS

Are the examples of content that I gave perfect?  Probably not.  Someone else might be able to squeeze even more bang for the buck out of them.  Keep in mind that I tried to minimize the change in message.  I didn't want to change what the author was trying to say… only how they said it.  Hopefully these examples will illustrate the difference that a few words can make in the way your product is presented.

And the difference between bad content and good content can make a $1000 day into a $10,000 day.