Historical Niche...how to write about history without copying?

1836

1836

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So my site is based on a historical event but its also an actual location. So there is a lot that I can do with this. I own the very best domain in this niche and no one else really has a site dedicated to this specific event. Though there are plenty of broad sites that cover the topic.

To start, I am trying to cover the historical side of this event but there are only so many ways to say "America declared independence on July 4th, 1776." This is not my niche but as you can see, tons of sites already have these kinds of historical events down, especially Wikipedia.

I guess I am just wondering, what can I do to stand out and actually get seen in the SERPs? For one, I plan to write long in-depth pieces but again Wikipedia and a couple of other sites have done the same already. Any thoughts?
 
Visuals and embedded videos will definitely help enhance the written content and can make it stand out from boring-ass Wikipedia and Britannica, maybe visual timelines showing "leading up to" event and "aftermath" of event, something interactive would be next-level, maps (maybe even an interactive map with dates and you can see how aspects of the map change as the dates progress), you can find interesting quotes from historians or pop-historians about the event and have a nice quote format to really make those pop, too.

Wikipedia has to stick to a very formal style with citations and strict guidelines, you have an advantage in that you can make it a lot more interesting/engaging/infuse some opinion or even speculation, if you choose to, whether it's your own of that of others.

If you had a time machine, and you could write about it as it was happening, what would the headlines/clickbait look like, to capture people's attention? Whatever it is that made you so interested in this historical event to a point where you were compelled to own the best domain and to create an entire site about it, try to express that passion to your audience.

A fair chunk of it will be just re-writing stuff since you want to be factually accurate and it's recorded history, so there's only so much you can do there, but as you go through the history books or whatever you use as a source, you can try to make a habit of asking yourself "Who cares about this, why does this matter, what makes this cool," and infuse the content with the answers to that as you go.
 
Make it relevant for me.

Why would I and someone else read history online?

Surely not to pass some history exam. Maybe some other reason:

1. To better understand myself
2. To better understand the time I live in
3. To escape for a while (escapism)
4. To understand a modern political phenomenon
5. To live vicariously through my ancestors
6. To solve an old mystery
etc
etc

The master of escapism and (pseudo)history is Graham Hancock, I don't believe in his theories, but he is very knowledgeable at egyptology and megalithic history, which is his actual material, but he sells with these out there theories.

I like to read history that presents controversial, but plausible theories, but only use real facts to make those theories. It's entertaining, but you also actually learn something. Artistic license.
 
1836 said:
I guess I am just wondering, what can I do to stand out and actually get seen in the SERPs?
Click to expand...

This is what you need for starters. You must match what the best pages are doing, and that's likely Wikipedia. I just broke down in that post exactly how to get that done. It will take serious effort. For those that don't want to click over, it's about Named Entity Recognition & Disambiguation, aka some advanced nuclear level weaponry everyone can use.

I completely agree with what the two gentleman above discussed. You have to match your competitors and then exceed what they're doing. The opportunity is in the:
  • entertainment value
  • the presentation
  • granularity
The data exists. You can spin it in any way that people love. Infographics, interactive charts and graphs, timelines, video clips, lots and lots of imagery, embellished stories, etc.

Also, you can probably break these topics way down too, and interlink heavily. So like... if you have a page on The Battle of the Alamo, you can go hard on it by featuring summaries of other pages you can publish that others aren't writing like:
  • Why Did the Battle of the Alamo Occur?
  • Who Fought in the Battle of the Alamo?
  • Who Were the Commanders and Leaders in the Battle of the Alamo?
  • What Were the Casualties on Both Sides of the Battle of the Alamo?
These are surface level but my point is that you can get VERY granular if your site is about one single historical event. You can go deeper than even the people contributing to Wikipedia are willing to go. And each of these question-based articles will rank highly because they'll be optimized around terms people are only tangentially mentioning in larger articles. And because of that you'll start getting all the links. You wouldn't believe the amount of EDU links you can get from colleges and even more from high schools to posts like these.

Go very deep. Break each event down into as many specific questions and topics as possible, and bust those down even further. Interlink like mad and have great navigation, and you can absolutely dominate. This is only possible because you're tightly focused on one event and location. Basically, be the most in-depth, to a level in which no sane person would dare to venture. You'll become the go-to resource in time and gather some serious links in the process, and soon dominate forever more.
 
Also, if it is a famed location and event, there will be people wanting to visit.

Answer their potential questions about their visit.
 
To add to my previous answer: what is it that you (apart from apparently owning a decent domain) can bring to the topic as opposed to other competing sites?

Do you live locally?
Do you have specific expertise? (Like being a qualified tour guide, for example.)

Looking at all of the questions that people post online about the event and/or location, which of them are not fully covered (especially in non-text media)?
How could you draw parallels between the event/location historically and to controversial topics in the present?
 
Ryuzaki said:
This is what you need for starters. You must match what the best pages are doing, and that's likely Wikipedia. I just broke down in that post exactly how to get that done. It will take serious effort. For those that don't want to click over, it's about Named Entity Recognition & Disambiguation, aka some advanced nuclear level weaponry everyone can use.

I completely agree with what the two gentleman above discussed. You have to match your competitors and then exceed what they're doing. The opportunity is in the:
  • entertainment value
  • the presentation
  • granularity
The data exists. You can spin it in any way that people love. Infographics, interactive charts and graphs, timelines, video clips, lots and lots of imagery, embellished stories, etc.

Also, you can probably break these topics way down too, and interlink heavily. So like... if you have a page on The Battle of the Alamo, you can go hard on it by featuring summaries of other pages you can publish that others aren't writing like:
  • Why Did the Battle of the Alamo Occur?
  • Who Fought in the Battle of the Alamo?
  • Who Were the Commanders and Leaders in the Battle of the Alamo?
  • What Were the Casualties on Both Sides of the Battle of the Alamo?
These are surface level but my point is that you can get VERY granular if your site is about one single historical event. You can go deeper than even the people contributing to Wikipedia are willing to go. And each of these question-based articles will rank highly because they'll be optimized around terms people are only tangentially mentioning in larger articles. And because of that you'll start getting all the links. You wouldn't believe the amount of EDU links you can get from colleges and even more from high schools to posts like these.

Go very deep. Break each event down into as many specific questions and topics as possible, and bust those down even further. Interlink like mad and have great navigation, and you can absolutely dominate. This is only possible because you're tightly focused on one event and location. Basically, be the most in-depth, to a level in which no sane person would dare to venture. You'll become the go-to resource in time and gather some serious links in the process, and soon dominate forever more.
Click to expand...

Very, very interesting and helpful! A couple of questions if you don't mind. In regards to this from your linked post:

"Did you know Paris is the capital of France? It's also the most populated city in the country of France. In fact, it has 2,148,271 people living within its borders as of 2020. It takes up a surface area on the earth of 105 square kilometers, which is 41 square miles. It had a GDP of $808 billion in 2017. The Paris Metro opened in 1900. This subway system serves 5.23 million passengers daily."

Can this kind of info be placed anywhere or would you recommend that this kind of paragraph always be the very first thing people read? Does it even matter, the spot?

I will have to figure out the best way to have great navigation because I definitely agree on that. Nothing more annoying than a site that I can't find what I know is on it.

The other BIG thing to me is if I do decide to break down my content and get very specific, some of these pages would only be able to be 250-500 words apiece. Especially if I am addressing a fairly simple question. Maybe even less than 250 words at times. Would the site not get flagged for thin content? I have read a horror site on that but I may not understand thin content properly.

ToffeeLa said:
To add to my previous answer: what is it that you (apart from apparently owning a decent domain) can bring to the topic as opposed to other competing sites?

Do you live locally?
Do you have specific expertise? (Like being a qualified tour guide, for example.)

Looking at all of the questions that people post online about the event and/or location, which of them are not fully covered (especially in non-text media)?
How could you draw parallels between the event/location historically and to controversial topics in the present?
Click to expand...
Thanks for your reply! I may have understated the domain, its literally THE name, single word. But I completely understand what you are getting at, I need to be offering more than just a decent domain.

To be honest, I've read nearly everything there is on the topic, books, etc...I know the event so well I probably could be a tour guide. I've been to the location, got a thousand or so pictures, and some videos of the location, all with the website in mind and so I can use my own content for it in my articles. Much higher quality than any pictures currently out there. And I can go back for more anytime. I think one of the bigger things I can do for my site is create a YouTube channel for it because there is a lot I could do with it and plenty of room for in-depth videos on the topic, particularly interesting animations. It cannot be the dull high school/college method of history learning.

It's really an overlooked event, but not too overlooked that there aren't any searches on it. My main goal would be drawing attention to it from people who don't even know about it and can use my website to read anything and everything about it. I plan to do this by also writing about some other similar events/locations that are very relevant to this one.

"Looking at all of the questions that people post online about the event and/or location, which of them are not fully covered (especially in non-text media)?"
I like what you've brought up here and will definitely look into these questions and address them.
 
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