Creating and curating a successful content resource hub can be tricky for most businesses. When done well, it should be a key point of engagement for visitors to your website. It should also be a key point for the business’s own internal team.
But often, these hubs are not well planned and organized. As such, it’s not easy for users to engage with them so they remain unused or rarely used.
However, when you do take the time to create a well-organized content resource hub with pertinent content, you’ll find that it might just be a place where many of your customers or clients spend their time, keeping them on your site longer and making them more likely to take action. You’ll need a thoughtful strategy for promoting and distributing your content. Then you can make sure it’s read rather than just sitting there taking up space on your website.
What is a content resource hub?
A content resource hub or resource center is a place on your website where you can organize and publish all your content. This includes whitepapers, eBooks, guides, recorded webinars, infographics, third-party content, and more. This hub organizes it in a way where visitors to your site can easily find it and also easily share it with others. Blogs, news posts, books for sale, and other such valuable resources can also be placed in a centralized resource hub. This provides a kind of one-stop shop for those who visit your website in search of something in particular.
Content resource hubs can be used by businesses of any size but can be especially valuable for non-profits, associations, and research organizations. These all are often expected to provide thought-provoking and educational ideas and information to their target users.
Structuring your content
Experts like our team at Watershed9 understand that a well-crafted content resource hub marries content strategy with content architecture. Not only should they be full of superb content but these resource centers should be easily accessible, well-positioned, and diverse.
Furthermore, they should be structured according to how the site’s users generally behave. This could vary greatly depending on what kind of products or services a business offers.
For example, visitors to a plumber’s website could search by location, i.e. “looking for a good plumber in Langley”. Or they may search more often by stating a particular issue, i.e. “the best way to fix a leaky faucet”. By conducting user surveys and gathering such information, you can learn how your users generally behave. You’ll learn what the best practices would be to optimize a resource hub’s search experience.
You’ll also need to know what kind of content your target audience is most interested in finding. Are they a group that likes to read detailed whitepapers or do they tend to be visual learners? Visual learners would lean towards infographics that provide what they need with far fewer words. Again, you might need to conduct some user surveys in order to gather this sort of information for your resource hub.
Website design experts can make sure that the design and development of your resource hub cater to the mobile user as well. With more and more individuals searching for information and making purchases from their handheld devices, it’s essential for those people to be able to easily engage with every aspect of your website, including that all-important resource page.
Tools to build your content resource hub
You’ll no doubt want your resource center to be streamlined and easy to use. Usually, it’s best to use some sort of in-site search solution to reach your goal of creating a useful, easy-to-navigate hub. Of course, which solution you use will depend on what platform you’re using. WordPress, our favorite, has options to integrate platform-specific features as well as search tools. Other resource-related tools can be employed as well, such as filters or checkboxes. Again, what tools are employed will be largely determined by the habits of your users.
To recap, it’s important to remember that a really successful resource hub demands not only great content but also insightful information about your users. It also requires quality tools that are admin-friendly and right for your size and type of business.
We can help you turn your website into a content resource hub or add an effective resource center to your existing website. Contact us via this website or give us a call at 614-337-1449. We provide no-obligation consultations about your options.