Many years ago, when I worked at a particular association, we noticed that Google began ranking a lot of sites that would simply answer basic questions that our audience wanted to know. Certainly, at the time, that wasn’t a huge revelation. But, seeing this, we took the hint and created robust content pages aimed with the purpose of simply answering those questions: “What is [instructional design]?” or whatever keyword people wanted to know more about. And lo and behold, those pages soon ranked no. 1 for many of the terms (and still do today).

While there are many factors that certainly contributed to that ranking result, including that the organization I worked for had a built-in audience and authority on the topic, the fact remains that when you answer audience questions, Google will often reward you.[1]

What kinds of questions should you try to answer? Here are 5 question types that are worth either making the focus of any landing page or a large part of one (whether in FAQ form or long-form) – activities that can boost your search engine optimization (SEO).

No. 1: Definitional Questions

We provided an example of this above. “What Is_____?” It’s such a common question, especially when it comes to terms that may not be so familiar to the average person or someone who is particularly interested in a product or service and wants to know more. Why are such definitional questions important?

A lot of small to midsize businesses we know actually overestimate how much their current and potential customers actually know about their industry – and they often assume (wrongly) that customers immediately get all the “inside-baseball” terms because they live it every day. That’s hardly the case. To give you an example, think about the following we’ve run into recently with just our clients alone:  

• • Immigration Law: “What is a K-1 visa?”
  • Electrical: “What is a GFCI breaker?”
  • Health & Fitness: “What is a barre class?”
  • Health & Fitness: “What is an Epley maneuver?”
  • Plumbing & Water Treatment: “What is reverse osmosis?”
  • Finance & Investing: “What is net zero investing?”

Now, not all of these are going to be important to define for customers in every business (especially some local businesses who may not care so much about ranking nationally for such queries). However, think of it this way: If customers come to your website and discover your expertise in this way, they are much more likely to view you as an authority. And with enough of those “customer touches” you’ll certainly be more top-of-mind than others. Plus, relevant traffic will help get more traffic. And if you rank for answering these definitional questions on a particular topic, you know an area that your customers might be interested in learning more about – especially how you might solve this for them.

No. 2: Pricing and Cost Questions

Have you ever Googled the cost or price of something? Of course you have! Well, your customers are likely doing the same thing when it comes to understanding what to buy in your industry. That’s where having a pricing table that answers such questions can be valuable. Or, if you can’t do that, some way to acknowledge this query by talking about how you set pricing or what pricing could be based on if it’s a variable service of some kind. If you’re a local business, help them understand what pricing may look like for your industry sector in your area.

No. 3: Questions About Challenges They Face

Regardless of the industry, your potential and current customers are often Googling about “how to [overcome a particular challenge they face?] For example:

• • “How do you remove grass stains from jeans?”
  • “How do you make Beef Wellington?
  • “How do you do you change an electrical outlet?”
  • “How do you change an HVAC filter?”
  • “How do you start with SEO?” (Well, this article is a great way to start).

And so on. Similar to definitional questions, the better you as a business can answer these, the more your audience (and Google) will come to view you as an authority. The bigger your authority becomes, the higher you rank and the more likely your audiences will buy from you.

No. 4: Comparison Questions (You Vs. the Competition)

One of the things that customers do as they investigate options is to comparison-shop. Sometimes, they want to hear what others or experts might think, but companies can also play that game, especially with key searches that might involve one brand versus another. And it can be really high-stakes in that companies can also use such landing pages for ads (to improve their quality score) for branded competitor’s keywords. Here’s an example we often use – from the project management industry. The two big rivals in the space are Asana and Basecamp.

So, what did Asana do? It knew people were searching for “Asana vs. Basecamp” so it created a page just about that: https://asana.com/compare/asana-vs-basecamp. It shows up no. 1 for this query right now. That’s just good marketing and getting ahead of what customers are looking for.

No. 5: Who Else Uses You/Buys Your Product?

Regardless of the landing page or even if you have a separate testimonials page, it’s critical to include what’s known as social proof. Social proof can come in the form of reviews, ratings, and testimonials from your customers. The reason they’re all important is that people want some comfort that others have used a product or service and found it helpful or good before they take the plunge and make a purchase.

For example, how many of you, base a decision on whether to go to a particular restaurant on the reviews? Probably all of you! It’s a really important indicator if you haven’t tried a place before. (That’s one reason restaurants spend a lot of time with marketing on collecting good reviews.) 

Putting this kind of social proof on your page(s) particularly helps at that critical decision phase when a potential customer is thinking about purchasing or not. A good review or rating can often be the difference in purchase so make sure to at least carve out a section for this on your landing pages. The reason it’s good for SEO is that people will ask how well a brand has been reviewed (“What are the reviews of X company”) and having these on your website can help you attract people who may be ready to buy and just checking your references as it were.

Conclusion

As always, we hope articles like this help you excel in digital marketing. If you need help, don’t hesitate to contact us for a free consultation. We can support your efforts in SEO or any other area of digital marketing. 

[1] Indeed, even when it comes to ad landing pages (pages that aren’t necessarily looking to be indexed), it’s also a best practice to answer audience questions.