Topical Authority is the 'Wave' Forward

I've been telling more and more people the best strategy moving forward is Topical Authority.

From Glenn Gabe's review of the overlapping updates, he said something about a site that was hit, recovered, hit, recovered, and hit again:

"Google is clearly having major issues understanding the type of site and whether it should rank well."

Everything leads back to topical authority, but how do you establish it?

If you're in the gardening niche, do you just write a bunch of articles about gardening and gain authority?

If only it were that easy! (Well...it used to be)

Search engine algorithms change and the tricks that were used in the past don't work anymore or have less effect. The algos close those holes.

At one time, SEOs and others were pushing Web 2.0 links, PBNs, keyword stuffing, 100% target anchors, and of course - Just Write.

Google updates the last few years have all led to benefiting sites with topical authority. Working on your topical authority is the best way to be update-proof.

How do you build topical authority? Here are the broad strokes:

1. Keyword Research based on Topics
2. Structure your site based on Topics
3. Write Content driven by completing Topic Clusters
4. Internal Linking Strategy that's based on your Topic Clusters
5. Always Keep E-A-T-ing

Yea, yea, I know. Sounds like I'm pushing topical maps doesn't it? That's right!

A good topical map that shows you how to effectively structure your site and internal links is your greatest weapon.

Whether you get one at topicalmap.com or elsewhere, be sure that you're also getting topic structure and not just a list of topic clusters from a clustering tool. Or if you do just get a list of clusters, hopefully you can organize the clusters yourself and plan out your internal linking strategy.

I'll be coming out with a topical map sample and guide soon, so I'll show you more how a topical map will up your SEO game!

Yoyao