Recently, we’ve discovered that up to 40% of the Dr.Explain website’s organic (non-paid) traffic that comes from search engines do actually land on pages of our on-line manual. This proves that on-line documentation is not only a helpful tool for existing customers and users. It’s a good marketing and sales tool as well.
If you already have published your product documentation on your website then check if it’s properly optimized from search engines’ points of view. Don’t try to over-optimize your on-line manual. Just follow the simple rules to make your help pages to display higher on a search engine results page (SERP) for relevant search strings:
Use appropriate words and terminology in content.
This must be the same terminology that your target audience uses daily. They will likely use the same words and terms in search requests.
Use unique and keyword-based titles for your pages.
“Topic 2330: Transparency” is a too general title. “Transparency Settings - Cover Designer Advanced Customization” is a better title.
Use topical keywords in file names of your help pages.
Again, “topic2330.htm” is a bad name. “cover-designer-advanced-settings-transparency.htm” is a much better name.
Use header tags for titles.
Wrap your headings and subheadings in H1, H2, H3, and so on tags to make them more meaningful for search engine ranging algorithms.
Mark specific terms and phrases with bold.
Write specific terms and targeted keywords in bold (strong) font to highlight their importance and relevance.
Cross-link your help pages.
Insert links to certain help pages in content of other pages. Use keywords for link text. For instance, “To read more about boxshot rendering click here” is a wrong way. “Read more about boxshot rendering” is a SEO-friendlier approach.
Create or solicit external links to your help pages.
A big number of external links that point to your help pages means a bigger page rank and higher position on SERP. Put links to your on-line manual wherever it’s possible on your product and company websites, partner websites, support forum, and so on. If some topics of your documentation can be considered as a standalone articles with useful content (trouble shooting, glossary, reviews, problem overview, etc.) then try to gently solicit links from third-party websites: topical forums, article directories, industry blogs, and resource collections.
User manual is a huge bunch of words, highly targeted words, which are specific to your product’s market. People use these words in their queries when they are looking for specific solutions on Google, Yahoo, Bing, or other search engines. On-line manual will increase your web site rank in relevant search results and will bring highly targeted traffic to your web site. Let the manual work not only for your users, but for your business as well.
You still have not made an on-line manual for your product?
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Dr.Explain - help authoring and documentation writing tool.
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