17: Content lessons from travel adapters

One of my biggest travel annoyances is trying to figure out if I need a travel adapter for my electronic devices or not.

Thankfully, there’s a website that constantly comes to my rescue—aptly named Power Plugs & Sockets of the World. It’s surprisingly clean to navigate and understands search intent super well.

And it’s optimized for a super mundane question - power plug adapters.

The site is optimized to answer an informational search intent, and it does it excellently. It respects your time by answering your questions and search intent upfront.

Without having to scroll, I get the answer to my search queries:

• Do I need a power plug adapter for the country I’m traveling to?

• Do my current power plugs fit or not? 

They’ve got a handy visual of how all these plug sockets look, so anyone who’s more visually inclined can still get the answers they need. I don’t even pay much attention to the more technical information about voltages, frequencies, and whatnot.

Another pleasant touch is the use of visuals to show the different plugs and sockets for the more visually inclined. It’s also easier to identify the right plug when you don’t know the terminology to search properly.

As a result, this power plug site performs well on Google for “(Country) plug” queries.

Analyzing the website using Similarweb, the website got the most of its traffic without paid advertising, including:

• 387,853 visits per month over the last quarter.

• 86% of it’s traffic via organic search

Some core content marketing lessons I took away from this resource

• People use the Internet to find answers to everything: Yes, even things as mundane as power plugs. It’s such a basic, but important question. Who has had the unfortunate travel experience of going to a new country and realizing a bit too late that you didn’t bring the right travel adapter or wrongly assumed your devices worked? This website is an invaluable resource for travelers around the world.

• Be an authority on an evergreen topic: There will always be people traveling (unless something like COVID-19 happens again). As such, this nifty little power plug website for travelers doesn’t need to worry about becoming irrelevant 

• Content design and user experience -really- matters: You’ll expect a high-traffic site like this to be laden with ads and have horrible UX. (There’s so many offenders like Fandom, Forbes, etc)  But besides a few clearly marked ads to Amazon and AliExpress to refer people to buy travel adapters, the site experience is clean and easy to navigate. Design and user experience made their content useful and easy to consume. I would have a different opinion of this site if it had ads splashed over every centimeter. I’m glad whoever operates this site chose (at least for now) to prioritize the user.

• Quality content understands the person they’re trying to reach: This site is geared towards travelers packing for a trip, and does it well. They’ve structured their headers in a way that’s relatable to travelers, e.g., “Do your power plugs fit in Thailand” or “Voltage converter needed in Thailand? There’s even a link to a traveler’s packing checklist to help the person check if they’ve packed everything.

It reminds me of the foundational principles of content marketing

I use this power plug/travel adapter resource as a reminder to myself (and everyone else in any form of content marketing) that regardless of whatever AI tool or algorithm change comes our way, these are the foundational principles of quality content:

• Has a clear audience in mind

• Understand what the audience is trying to accomplish

• Helps them get there with a mixture of informative examples, visuals, and other formats, where relevant 

• Written both for humans while satisfying SEO needs to help discoverability

I admit, there’s so much noise in marketing.

But keeping to these core principles keeps you a bit more grounded. It gives your content a higher chance of weathering ever-changing search engine algorithms or the ebb and flow of AI tools. (I’m not the only one getting tired hearing about AI tools, am I?)

Other things I’ve enjoyed lately

Soft skills are anything but soft: I’ve heard this adage over and over in well-meaning business speak, but it’s the first-person, personal storytelling in this essay to illustrate the point that does it for me here.

How to talk about your work in public: I came across this lovely essay by Katherine May (author of Wintering, one of my favourite books about rest and seasons of life). This is more for the creators and solopreneurs who’s felt unwilling to do any form of ’self-promotion’ . It doesn’t need to be work-work related, it can be a side hobby you’re working on, or a business you’ve started. I think we’ve all felt this way before at some point. Lots of practical tips here, all written with a healthy dose of empathy and kindness. And goodness knows we need more of that today.

And of course, Luna (my dog) has been the goodest girl living her best life

Thank you for being here and reading! See you soon!

Joshua

I have one client opening for July 2024!

Here’s how we can work together.

⭐ B2B SaaS product-led content: People look for solutions and information online. Why not position your product to illustrate a point and show why your product is the best at solving a problem? It attracts visitors and educates your customers while motivating and guiding them to use your product. Talk about a win-win!

⭐ Customer case studies: Highlight how you’ve worked with a customer and celebrate their success! Case studies build trust with potential customers and show how your work has solved their issues. Attract customers like your ideal clients who want to solve a similar issue.

⭐ Whitepapers, research reports and e-books: Nurture valuable leads for a marketing campaign with an in-depth, persuasive long-form piece highlighting an issue and articulating your brand’s expertise. They help start sales conversations and showcase industry authority with original data. Besides interviewing stakeholders and research, I'll assist your team from outline to design to publication.

 ⭐  Content repurposing: Don’t let the content you worked so hard to put together collect digital dust after publishing. Repurpose your existing content to reach a new audience. For example, I’ve worked with clients to repurpose speaker recordings into blog posts and turned internal sales slides into e-books.

DM me, and let’s schedule a call to discuss your content! Let’s determine what types of content best suit your customers and craft a path forward together.