How to Find New Topic Ideas and Create SEO-Friendly Content

If you want to rank well on Google, then you have to create meaningful content that resonates with your audience.  In theory, that shouldn’t be too difficult, right? Sure, if you’re a content-generating machine that A) always knows the right keywords to target and B) never runs out of ideas!  Also, SEO is fiercely competitive across all industries, so there are bound to be umpteen other websites covering the same topics you do.  So, even if you do choose picture-perfect topics to cover, you can still get outdone by other websites, catapulting your content to the dreaded no-man’s-land of page two of the search results (which no one ever visits).   The solution? You need a specialized tool like Semrush’s Content Marketing Platform.  Why? Because it will transform you into the aforementioned content-generating machine that never runs out of ideas!  In this article, we’ll break down how you can use the Content Marketing Platform’s features to consistently create SEO-friendly content while outsmarting your competitors every step of the way, so stick around! 

What’s the Content Marketing Platform?

The Content Marketing Platform comes with any Guru or Business-level subscription to Semrush, and it’s designed to make creating SEO-friendly content that ranks a breeze.  With it, you can quickly find trending topics, put together helpful content briefs, and perfect your copy and tone of voice with an AI writing assistant.  Unlike other SEO content marketing tools, this platform provides real-time competitor data to ensure that your content is 100% original and unlike any other article on Google.  This is HUGE because it’ll help you avoid creating carbon copies of existing articles online.  Google values E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness) in its content, and its algorithm prefers content that contains first-hand experiences and unique insights.  If you prefer drafting your content in programs like Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or WordPress, that’s no problem, as you can add the Content Marketing Platform as a plugin. That way, you can centralize your SEO content in one spot without having to keep track of multiple applications.  The Content Marketing Platform consists of the following features:

1. The Topic Research Tool 
2. SEO Content Template 
3. SEO Writing Assistant 

Each feature contains multiple ways to improve your SEO content, so let’s take a closer look at each one. 

Uncovering trending topics for your target audience 

First, let’s look at the Topic Research Tool, which will provide you with thousands of relevant topic ideas that you can use to form valuable, meaningful content for your audience.  Simply enter a topic and hit Get content ideas to get started. As an example, here’s what happens when we enter ‘digital marketing’ as a topic: As you can see, we’re currently on the Cards view, meaning the tool presents us with topic cards that tell us:

• The topic’s search volume 
• Several headline ideas 

You can click on Show more to get a more detailed view of each topic. Let’s click on the Show more carrot for Google Ads: Now, we’ve got a far more detailed overview of the topic. At the top of the card, there are metrics for:

1. Subtopic volume 
2. Difficulty (how hard it will be to rank content for that topic) 
3. Topic efficiency (this refers to how rewarding it will be to try and rank for a topic) 

These metrics will help you quickly approximate whether a topic is worth pursuing or not. Underneath that, there are Headline suggestions and Questions that will help spark content ideas.  In addition to the Cards view, there’s also the Explorer view, which will let you preview existing articles published on the same topics: If you’re a more visual learner, there’s also a Mind Map view: Clicking on one of these terms will bring up the headline suggestions and questions for each one. 

Creating helpful content briefs to stay focused and outdo competitors 

Next, let’s explore what the SEO Content Template has to offer.  It’s your ticket to outlining your topic ideas and outdoing your competitors to ensure optimal ranking power.  Writing content is always easier with a brief or outline, and it’s a great way to keep all your writers on the same page.  Here, we’ll stick with the same example of ‘digital marketing.’  At the top of the page, you’ll get to see your Top 10 Google rivals, so you should study them to find ways to outdo them.  For example, let’s visit the Investopedia article since it’s our #1 competitor for this topic.  It’s an article that defines digital marketing and gives a few examples of some common digital marketing channels.  While it’s a fantastic beginner’s article, it lacks real-world examples and advanced techniques. These are two components you can add to your article to make it stand out from the crowd.  Going back to the Content Template tool, another section shows you how your competitors are using related keywords in their content: At the bottom of the page, there’s an outline template that’s ready to rock: It contains candid suggestions for title length, keyword usage, and meta description length, all of which are integral for SEO-friendly content. 

Cleaning up your writing with an AI-powered assistant 

Lastly, let’s see how you can use the SEO Writing Assistant to ensure your content is 100% readable, SEO-friendly, and pertinent to your audience.  Here, you can add drafts of your articles and video scripts for proofreading and deeper analysis.  Also, there are options to download plugins for Google Docs, MS Word, and WordPress.  If you haven’t written anything yet, you’re free to use the text editor included in the Writing Assistant: Your writing receives a score based on readability, SEO-friendliness, originality, and tone of voice, which is extremely helpful for producing top-tier content that ranks.  Also, the AI-powered smart writer can rephrase sentences, compose new text, and answer any questions you may have! 

Start Producing SEO-Friendly Content That Dominates the Search Results 

Here’s a brief recap of what we’ve covered so far:

1. The Content Marketing Platform is the #1 way to consistently produce SEO-friendly content for trending topics. 
2. The Topic Research Tool quickly uncovers untapped keywords and trending topics. 
3. The Content Template creates unique outlines and content briefs. 
4. The SEO Writing Assistant ensures your content is original, readable, SEO-friendly, and contains the right tone. 

In other words, you need to start using the Content Marketing Platform to enhance your SEO while saving time and money.  The good news? You can try out a Guru subscription to Semrush (that includes the Content Marketing Platform) for a free 7-day trial right now by following this link, so don’t wait to give it a go today!