Is it for a genuine business reason? Or do you fancy a slice of the extra organic traffic pie? If anything, know this: it will be difficult. But that doesn’t mean it will be impossible – someone has to be in the top spot, so how do you give yourself a winning chance? Read on to find out:

Make it relevant

Relevant content is one of the most preached tenets of Search Engine Optimisation, and rightly so - content needs to be relevant to the search term or what’s the point? But for highly competitive or time-sensitive keywords, it is extremely important that you ensure your content is relevant to the user’s search term. You will be competing with a lot of other websites who will be trying to achieve the same goal so make your content stand out.

The number of searches for 'FIFA World Cup' since January 2004.

Make it engaging

Engagement is a broad spectrum and you need to cover all of it. First, make sure your content looks good. This is especially important as layout, images, colours and fonts all contribute to how engaging a piece of content is. Theme your colours and images around the World Cup to try and catch the reader’s eye - It should look attractive, but not too busy and remember to tag your image’s alt text.

If a user reads your content, there’s a good chance they will share it, so make sure all your Open Graph content is up-to-date and correct. If you don’t know already, Open Graph content is what appears to accompany your link when it is shared on Social Media - usually an image, a title and a description – so ensure that all of these are something that will grab a user’s attention.

Finally, when your content has been shared, you should engage with it on the social platforms. Don’t chime into other people’s conversations but to encourage discussion both through your content and sharing on your own social media profiles.

An example of how Open Graph data is shown on Facebook

Make it the best

Now, whilst every bit of content you write should always be the best, it might not be the case. If you want to score by getting your content on the right SERPs then it will need to be the best piece of content you have ever written. Below are a few tips for writing great optimised content:

• Don’t write for the sake of writing – make sure that what you’re saying needs to be said
• Know what you’re talking about – if you’re unsure, get an expert
• Make it provoking – not necessarily in a controversial way, just enough to promote discussion

Promote It

To give your content the best chance of getting noticed, you will have to promote your content in some form, whether that’s paid or not depends on both the content and audience but be prepared to spend to get results – it’s going to be competitive.

Make sure you narrow your audience appropriately, so your content gets shown to the right people, and make sure you schedule your ads, so they get shown at the right time. For example, if you’re writing about a specific team, look at their fixtures and schedule appropriately.