How do you balance writing for search engines vs. writing for humans?

Basic SEO advice, such as using keywords in headings and URLs, has been a part of my blog writing. However, I need to work on honing my skills in making blogs human-friendly. You need enough SEO elements to rank well, but too much optimization can make your content feel robotic and unnatural. I am learning how to create blogs that are both user-friendly and search engine optimized. I would appreciate it if you could offer me some advice and recommendations.

Write only for humans, as over-optimization kills your search visibility.

BillSmith said:
Write only for humans, as over-optimization kills your search visibility.

If I write only for humans, how can I get my site on search engines?

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Bruno said:
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The goal is to create content that search engines will love and that your human readers will find genuinely useful. It takes some practice to strike that balance, but it’s worth the effort. I will take the advice you gave me and work to get better. Thank you!

Bruno said:

Come on with this percentage stuff. Geez.

I have turned my back on search engines. You’re one update away from being invisible no matter how good your blog is. I write people first, and use other strategies to try and get traffic.

Focus on creating valuable, engaging content that flows naturally while still using keywords in strategic spots like headings and throughout the text. Avoid keyword stuffing and aim for readability with short paragraphs and a conversational tone. Tools like Yoast SEO can guide you without sacrificing your voice. If your content is helpful and engaging, both people and search engines will appreciate it. Keep your audience in mind and write for them first.

Write for people and don’t overthink it.

Don’t balance…write for your readers.

Honestly, I tried both ways, and writing for humans is getting me more impressions/clicks. Of course, I did some basics like meta description, tags, and title. But I didn’t do keyword research and stuff.

I think the user experience is something people don’t take into account. When I Google something, I usually end up with a couple of cringy affiliate marketing pages that I leave right away, and then the genuine one is the one that I spend more time on, i.e., longer session.

Writing high-quality content that answers readers’ questions or provides value in some other way should always be step one. Once you have a post that meets those requirements, you can check to see if there are any aspects that need improvement. Things like keyphrase density don’t matter that much anymore but you should still have a decent amount of mentions of the keyphrase throughout your post. I really like Yoast SEO for this kind of stuff. It’s a free plugin you can use for WordPress sites and it gives really great insights for both readability and SEO!

I use Surfer SEO, and it provides you the list of keywords on the topic alongside the text editor. Here is where my quest begins. I fit words into the text like puzzle pieces, and quite often these puzzle pieces go well, but not in the expected way.

E.g., recently when working on my most searched post, Surfer SEO said that it should include information about white rhinos. My topic is “no longer extinct animals,” and white rhinos are from the “no longer endangered animals” topic. Google just confuses them. Some more in-depth investigation showed that, indeed, white rhinos could be on my list as well. They were thought extinct in 1892–1893.

Great question! Balancing SEO and human-friendly content can definitely be tricky. One thing that helped me was using Undetectable AI Tools to ensure the writing sounds natural, while still maintaining good SEO. For example, I found some AI tools that help with fine-tuning the tone and flow of the content while keeping key SEO elements intact. It’s all about striking that balance between readability and optimization. I’ve had good results experimenting with those, but of course, the human touch is still the most important! Have you tried any tools to help with that yet?

People first. SEs second. Add some keywords where you need them. Title tag, H tags, etc., but people first. Google doesn’t click your ads or buy your stuff; people do.

Use a natural tone within your content and make it as helpful as possible by adding EEAT aspects as appropriate.

Write for humans, focus on SMO (Social Media Optimization). Use social media to drive traffic to your website.

winsteizsty said:
Write for humans, focus on SMO (Social Media Optimization). Use social media to drive traffic to your website.

Why only SMO?

Brianna said:

winsteizsty said:
Write for humans, focus on SMO (Social Media Optimization). Use social media to drive traffic to your website.

Why only SMO?

Not only that, but my impression is that way more people search for content through different social media platforms.