SEO Essentials for Evergreen Content Success

Content can be split into two categories: the sizzling content, that captures fleeting opportunities (such as a 2-day flash sale or a special event…) with a limited duration, and timeless content, also known as evergreen content. These are articles that remain relevant for an extended period of time and continually engage with the audience. Evergreen content does not have to be tied to any particular season or event but rather addresses timeless needs or interests (for example, ‘the best mattresses for a good night’s sleep’ or ‘the best denim brands of 2023’).

A commerce content article is considered evergreen by Skimlinks when it continues to generate commissions week after week after 90 days. So think of evergreen content as a gift that keeps on giving!

Evergreen content is the secret sauce of commerce content growth. 

Just like cooking, one ingredient can elevate your dish from good to great and here that is SEO.

To consistently generate revenue, your evergreen content relies on search to drive traffic and this is where SEO becomes vital.

You can consider content in a tryptic: Create x Upcycle x Optimize (the order can vary), like we do at Skimlinks. This approach applies to Evergreen content too.

Create and optimize evergreen content

Let’s begin with content ideation before even starting creating content.

The concept of evergreen content is straightforward once you’ve identified your niche.

It’s important to ensure your content resonates with your audience, creates value to them and aligns well with your identity. If your publication is not legitimate in a field, your audience is less likely to engage with this content and link to it, and search engines won’t drive an audience to it.  You’d hardly expect to find an article on the “10 Best Camping Tents” in a Beauty publication. Google Trends can help you estimate the potential of your ideas. Similarly, Google Ads platform is another valuable free tool that allows you to view the search volume associated with a keyword in the keyword planner (you can access the data without running an ad campaign).

Next you will need to find your SEO niche to create your own opportunities. It can be very tempting to aim for the number one ranking in a highly competitive search category. It’s achievable with time, effort and investment but the more competitive, the more challenging. That’s why we encourage you to take a step aside and identify your sweet spot. Target less-crowded categories to have a better chance of ranking number one more quickly. Go beyond high-traffic terms, target long-tail keywords or specific categories, and create your own playground.

A category such as “luxury handbags brands” can be very crowded with well-established brands or publishers investing to stay on top of the search page. For instance, Harper’s Bazaar is currently ranked number one in this category with their evergreen content piece  “35 designer handbags that will stand the test of time”. However if you’re new to the game or lower down in the rankings, you should consider alternatives where you may have a chance to shine by investing in long tail keywords or more specific terms such as “vintage luxury handbags brands” or “vintage luxury handbags brands under $500”.

With this approach in mind, you can start writing your content accordingly while meeting the classic SEO-friendly standards for your title, description, links (inbound and outbound), to ultimately establish yourself as an authority. Remember that longer blog posts (at least 300 words) have Google’s preference and visitors tend to spend more time on the page. When writing your content, aim to create unique descriptions instead of copying product descriptions that your competitors have access to. This can also influence your ranking as Google algorithm is now favoring or

iginal content, including original images. Additionally you can check out our article: Our Top 10 SEO Tips For Bloggers to improve SEO and grow their audience for more information!

In the Skimlinks Publisher Hub, we provide you with tools to help boost your content’s success. The Trending Products Report helps you understand what products consumers are buying in the Skimlinks network that you haven’t talked about yet. Additionally, the Product Bought Report shows you which products your audience acquired after clicking on links on your pages. The Publisher Hub also informs you about exclusive rates available to you to help you select the best merchants. With the Editor Toolbar, you can identify affiliated merchants and available rates directly from a Google search page. You can even A/B test your articles to determine the best performing version of your content piece to maximize conversions ((link) here).

In a nutshell, when it comes to content creation, you can embrace the craftsmanship method: Plant a seed. Watch it grow. Harvest. Repeat.

Once you have established the foundations by creating your evergreen content and generating revenue from it, the upcycling phase begins.

Upcycle: Maintain your evergreen content

Content is considered evergreen if it continues to generate commissions after 90 days. This naturally leads to the challenge of maintaining fresh and relevant content. Refreshing content with new links is also an SEO best practice because Google prefers old content that remains relevant over content that simply grows old. This is what we refer to as upcycling, or making sure your existing articles remain relevant, with the appropriate content (links, products…) so they continue to generate revenue for publishers and support sustainable growth.

Not sure which of your articles are evergreen? We have you covered! The Evergreen Report is available to you in the Publisher Hub as part of our set of advanced reports. This report will identify the articles within your domains that are still generating revenue after the first quarter of publication. It will display the first-click date of your evergreen articles and the revenue generated by each of them over the past 7 days, compared to the average weekly revenue they have generated over the past 12 months. This data will help you identify which content to upcycle and optimize so they continue to drive commissions.

Make sure all your links are working properly, showcased products are updated to the latest versions or releases (our Product Key can help with this), and best-performing products are positioned at the top of your article. Use the Revenue Source Report to track sales performance and see where your commissions are coming from.

Last year, for the fifth edition of the Commerce Awards for Publishers (CAPs) organized by Skimlinks, the New York Post won the CAPs award in the best Evergreen article category for their article “We tried 21 meal delivery kits — here are the best of 2022”. 

The URL is very much evergreen (“article/the-best-meal-delivery-kits/”) as it doesn’t mention a specific year and the content was updated just last month with fresh information (and food!) to reflect the best options of 2023.

Ultimately, the effort you put into maintaining relevant content and keeping it up-to-date will benefit both your audience and your SEO, contributing to your commerce content growth. It’s a worthwhile investment. Within the Skimlinks network, evergreen articles continue to generate 20% of their first-quarter revenue every quarter.

Optimise: Make evergreen content relevant for Black Friday

You may think that Evergreen content is not compatible with peak shopping seasons such as Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Single’s day, and so on… 

However, there are two ways to consider this: 

• Leverage your evergreen content for Black Friday:
  In fact, as we approach the season, you can update your content to promote special deals for the occasion, adapt the narrative and later revert back to your content as it originally was.
• Turn some existing Black Friday content to Evergreen:
  Start by making your content timeless: avoid referring to Black Friday as the ‘2022 edition’ so it remains relevant in 2023.

Additionally the long-tail keyword approach can be applied to Black Friday: identify less-competitive categories to explore (and differentiate). If it’s not for this year, you can start investing for next year’s Black Friday. If you want to learn more tips on how to optimize SEO for Black Friday, check out the advice the SEO specialist, Brian Dean, shared with us here!

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“Evergreen” is the keyword to unlock sustainable commissions in your search for commerce content growth. Like any content, SEO is intertwined with your overall content strategy, striking a balance between the level of difficulty and expected outcomes. 

This effort pays off as you will watch your revenue flourish.