SEO isn’t a real complicated game. Aside from your creative use of keyword phrases in the title and content, SEO really boils down to a popularity contest. Not just between you and Google, but your readers as well. And how do you win? Easy – good content, and lots of it.

I can hear the groans just reading that statement. A few of them from myself, even. That thing you’ve been told all along – create unique content- actually has some merit. Even Google says it’s true, so it must be. All those “automated content creators” and “free article directories” really aren’t going to help you out here. If you want it done right, you have to do it yourself.

Here’s the two main reasons why it’s an absolute MUST to have unique content if you want to get anywhere with SEO:

1. Expands Ranked Search Terms
Unique content, with keyword phrases weaved NATURALLY into your content, brings in the visitors. Not just a short 100 article, but 500-1,000 words on your page topic. The shorter the content, the less terms your going to pop up in the search engines for. Plus if you have a copy that’s just pure crap and includes lines such as “[keyword phrase] is important. You’ll need a lot of [keyword phrase].” you aren’t going to rank for anything but [keyword phrase]. If your lucky even.

2. Links back
If your content is pure junk and an obviously your just trying to get a handful of visitors in to click on the Adsense links, no one will want to link back. No links back and you’ve lost the popularity contest with Google. Simple as that, really. Even if we don’t like it, Google puts a lot of emphasis on how many people are linking to your pages and site as a whole. What’s more, you can’t force that, and NEED to rely on others linking to your content or site. The only way to do that is with unique content.

Now of course, there’s more reasons why you need good content, some of them specific to why your writing in the first place (example – gain subscribers, gain credibility, accurately describe products, etc). But since I’m talking from an SEO perspective, those are the two most important. It’s also proof that us little guys working hard behind the scenes are always going to beat out the big boys with the automated systems.