If you watch any news shows, political shows, or propaganda posing as political shows, you’ve no doubt seen hosts ask at least one or two questions of all their guests. Regardless of which party is currently in power, anytime a politician gets caught doing something they shouldn’t, or there’s a scandal involving one of their family members, everyone wants to know what all the other politicians and political pundits have to say about it. They all want to know about their guest’s “hot take” on the hot topic.
The same is true of any industry. There’s almost always something happening in your world that everyone wants to know about it.
Last year, Google announced their Helpful Content Update, so for a while that was all SEO and content marketing professionals could talk about.
Then OpenAI released ChatGPT and now that’s the only thing anyone can talk about. It seems like every conversation I have — from podcast interviews to networking meetings — has to include at least one question about AI and whether or not my job as I know it is over. If you’re wondering what my answer is, I covered it in this post.
The point is that providing your “hot take” on the Topic of the Day is a great way to position yourself as a thought leader in your industry. Here’s how it works.
Table of Contents
- Use Your Hot Take to Boost Your SEO
- Position Yourself as a Thought Leader
- Use Your Hot Take to Defeat the Robots
- Show Your Work
Use Your Hot Take to Boost Your SEO
If everyone is asking you about the latest hot topic in your industry, chances are good they’re also asking Google about it. As always, the key to getting on Google’s good side is to regularly create high-quality content that answers the questions people are asking.
Now, people have been talking about AI for months. I actually wrote a blog post about AI writing software about a year ago. I don’t normally cover the same topic in less than a year, but ChatGPT changed the conversation so much (and made it so much bigger) that I had to write another blog post covering the topic less than twelve months later. What that means is there is still SEO value in both blog posts I wrote, but that’s not always the case with trending topics.
Take most Google algorithm updates as a good example. Google tends to have a major update to the core of their search algorithm every 3-4 months. That means, by the time I have a chance to analyze the data from their last algorithm update, write and publish a blog post about it, promote and get some traffic to that blog post, it’s time to start talking about the next algorithm update. Now that last blog post is outdated and provides no SEO value whatsoever because no one is looking for information on that algorithm update anymore.
That’s not to say there’s no value in talking about topics that are trending right now, even if everyone will have forgotten about it in a month or two. I always recommend maintaining a blog that’s a mix of timely and evergreen topics. Timely topics can be a great way to position yourself as a thought leader in the moment, but from an SEO perspective, the evergreen topics give you a lot more bang for your buck.
Use Your Hot Take to Position Yourself as a Thought Leader
One of the biggest benefits of blogging is positioning you as a thought leader in your industry. SEO certainly plays a role in this.
Let’s say I’m interested in a topic or industry and I keep going online to look for information on that topic or industry. If one website keeps showing up every time I ask a question, I’m going to start thinking of that website (or, rather, the person/people behind the website) as a thought leader in their industry. Eventually, it will reach a point where, every time I have a new question about that industry/topic, their website will be my first stop because I want to know what they have to say about it. That’s thought leadership.
Achieving that status requires consistently creating high-quality content that answers your audience’s questions. It also requires having a unique take on every topic you cover. It’s not enough just to regurgitate what everyone else has already said on the topic. AI can now do that for you, which brings me to my next point.
Use Your Hot Take to Defeat the Robots
OK, you don’t actually want to defeat the robots — at least I don’t think you should want to defeat them, but that’s a topic for another blog post.
AI can be super useful when it comes to creating content, but you should not use it to create content for you and then just copy and paste that content onto your website.
At the very least you should edit whatever content the robot gives you to check for accuracy, brand voice, etc.
Even then the problem you’ll run into is that a robot cannot give you a “hot take” — i.e. a new perspective on a topic. It can only tell you what most people are already saying about that topic. If everyone else is already saying it, what value is there in saying the same thing on your website? To do so means you’re just shouting into the void and creating more white noise.
The ability to bring a new perspective to an old topic requires you to be an expert on the topic and to know enough about it to go against the grain. That means you are the only one who can give your “hot take” on the latest trending topic in your industry. Not your writing software. Not your assistant. You.
Show Your Work
This is not to say you should be contrary for the sake of being contrary. If you agree with what others are saying on a topic, by all means, write a blog post about why you agree with them.
If you write a blog post (or even just a social media post) claiming they have it wrong, be sure to have good explanations to back up your reasoning. Why do you think they’re wrong? What do you think is the right position to take on this topic? Why?
Think back to when you were in school and you were always made to show your work. You couldn’t just give the answer. The teacher needed to see that you understand the problem and that you’re not just good at guessing, so you had to show them how to arrived at your answer.
The same goes for your marketing content. Showing your work means showing you have a thorough understanding of the topic. That’s what makes a thought leader.
This is not to say you need to be the only one creating your content. A lot of experts have great reasoning for their hot take, but have a hard time explaining it in terms that mean anything to the average reader. That’s where we come in.
We work with our clients to help them create content that answers the questions everyone wants to know.
We can also do the research to tell you what questions people are asking about your industry. We then work with you to understand the topic as thoroughly as you do so we can create content that positions you as a thought leader while making Google your friend so you can show up when people are looking for you.
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