What is Cornerstone Content?

A cornerstone is a basic element--a foundation.  It's an essential component you build your project on.

Your website needs informational content that can serve as a cornerstone for your online marketing plan.  This content draws people to your website and establishes your authority.  It provides initial value and provokes interest in learning more.

Meritorious Content

Link building expert Eric Ward bases his strategy on a website's meritorious content, which earns backlinks because it has exceptional value.  

He describes his strategy as etiologic content linking, where links are built around the citation potential of the content.  

Meritorious content is the cornerstone of your online marketing efforts because:

• It's optimized for organic search around important keywords and phrases
• It's researched, authoritative, and unique
• It offers direct value to website visitors without a sales agenda
• It provides information that is fundamental in understanding the value of your offerings
• It is the focal point for inbound links 

Researched and Comprehensive Articles

For a business website, written cornerstone content must be approached with high editorial standards. 

Although you have a business site and the content plays a marketing role, the primary purpose of cornerstone writing is to explain a point or answer a question as well as it can be done.  Your page becomes a resource for the specific topic, and has the chance to draw links/citations based on the merits of the information.  

As you develop keyword niches, cornerstone articles can be written that correlate with long-tail search terms.  Links will build, and your cornerstone article becomes an ongoing source of organic traffic for your website.

This type of content takes time and commitment to write.  Ideas and keywords need to be researched, and the information needs to be promoted online in blogs, forums, directories, and social media.

White Paper Web Articles

For informational marketing, cornerstone web content must refrain from trying to sell.  Sales content does not get link citations, and it's difficult to align with long-tail search queries, particularly those in the form of a question. 

Website cornerstone content is written with similar techniques to those used in white papers.  It is researched, informative--and as Eric Ward states:  has integrity, merit, worth, cause, and effect. 

However, for web readability and SEO purposes, it is formatted into a series of shorter articles that can be posted on a website or business blog.

This content draws people into your website, builds links, and introduces the value of what you offer.  This is the basis of SEO content marketing.

You can add a lot of content on your blog that may be of varying quality.  This can be beneficial because it adds fresh content to your site, but cornerstone content is something more.  

Copyblogger suggests you:

• Write an awesome multi-part tutorial
• Create an inspirational manifesto
• Answer a question so much better and comprehensively than the competition that you earn the links

A series of professionally written online articles are the cornerstone of link building, organic SEO, and online informational marketing.