Spotlight Sessions: Mieke Kyra Founder of Lekker Creative
This month on the blog we’re interviewing Mieke, the co-founder of London-based content collective, Lekker. She’s giving us her insider secrets on SEO, why good copy is important, and what ‘Lekker’ actually means…
Hi Mieke, tell us a bit about what you do?
So I’m the Creative Partner at Lekker Creative - a content collective that helps businesses find and tell better brand stories. We essentially offer a mashup of brand marketing and editorial writing.
Working with a range of different sized companies, from startups to global megabrands, my day to day can vary quite a bit. For our smaller clients, most of the time I’m working on crafting meaningful brand identities, identifying target audiences and offering consultation services to show business owners how they can tell engaging stories across social media, newsletters and blogs.
For bigger clients, who tend to have their brand identities locked down, Lekker brings new storytelling ideas to the mix - whether that’s launching a printed magazine, starting a new podcast or combining SEO, editorial writing and consumer trends to create an online blog that people actually want to read.
What inspired you to start Lekker Creative?
I guess I’d say my business partner Liz played a huge role in inspiring Lekker Creative. We met ten years ago at our first job working in live music PR where we’d be promoting campaigns for the likes of BBC6, iTunes and NME. Liz went on to become a features writer for titles such as Elle, GQ, Metro and The Independent, whereas I went brand side, producing content for companies like MAC Cosmetics, Rimmel London, Ballantines’ Whisky and GSK.
“We could see how a lot of really cool businesses were just adding to a culture of throwaway content that was often super salesy in its nature. So in May of this year, we decided to use my brand insights and Liz’s editorial experience and set up Lekker to offer companies a solution to bad branded content.”
Being a big fan of Liz’s work (she’s one of the best writers I know) and also having written my own pieces for Evening Standard, MTV and Huffington Post, I saw a big gap between the content some brands were producing and what people actually wanted to read. It was a frustration that always came up when Liz and I would meet. We could see how a lot of really cool businesses were just adding to a culture of throwaway content that was often super salesy in its nature. So in May of this year, we decided to use my brand insights and Liz’s editorial experience and set up Lekker to offer companies a solution to bad branded content.
What does Lekker actually mean?
Lekker means good/slightly intoxicating/yummy in Dutch. I’m half Dutch and I really like how the word Lekker works with the idea of content being just that - good, slightly intoxicating and yummy. Plus, it’s one of our goals to eventually open another office in Amsterdam, so it’s sort of a nod to our bigger ambitions.
Why is good copy important for your website?
Good copy helps someone who lands on your site connect with your company; with the words and phrases you use having the ability to attract or put off a potential customer.
It also plays a fundamental role in forming your brand identity. Think about Innocent Smoothies’ playful, cheeky language or Nike’s ‘Just Do It’ tone of voice. What brands say can have a huge impact on how people view your business.
You’ve also got the big issue of SEO. Good copy isn’t just engaging it’s hard-working. It gets your company on that first page of a search engine. If you think about your own online behaviours, it’s unlikely you’ll go beyond the first page of a Google search - your target audience are no different. It’s all about combining SEO with topics that really hook your target audience so your site gets high-quality search traffic and repeat visits.
“SEO is extremely valuable but it’s also not a quick fix. ”
Why is SEO important?
Adding to what I just mentioned about SEO, here are some stats for you - 67k searches are performed on Google every second, 39% of all global e-commerce traffic comes from search, 93% of all online experiences begin with a search engine and nearly 80% of users ignore paid ads in search results.
Put simply, if you want more people to find your business online, you need to have an SEO strategy in place.
Does social media help SEO?
There’s quite a lot of debate around the impact of social media on SEO activity. In 2014, Google released a video saying that social metrics such as Facebook Likes or Twitter followers do not affect search rankings. However studies such as Hootsuit’s 2018 report have claimed that’s not quite the case. Testing the SEO results of its own articles, Hootsuite found those promoted via social performed 22% better in terms of SEO than those that weren’t.
Despite contradictions between Google and leading marketing companies, the way we see it is that SEO relies on three main factors - keywords, backlinks and quality traffic. So sharing these articles on your social channels and having ‘social sharing’ icons at the bottom of your pages encourages more website traffic to that page and can act as a credible backlink. It’s win-win.
It’s also worthwhile remembering that social media profiles can rank in Google. If your Instagram or Twitter page is ranking higher than your website, promoting articles on your social channels helps encourage traffic to your main site, converting followers to site visitors.
If you could give one piece of advice to start-ups or small businesses to boost their SEO, what would you say?
SEO is extremely valuable but it’s also not a quick fix. Depending on how competitive your market is, you won’t be seeing results for at least 3-6 months, so it’s really important to manage expectations around SEO activity.
While this might be frustrating, it’s important to remember that SEO isn’t just about bumping you up Google’s search engine. SEO provides engaging newsletter content and more meaningful social posts and develops your brand’s unique tone of voice, phrases and keywords that help set you apart from your competitors and boosts your brand value. You need to take a more holistic view of the content you produce rather than looking for easy wins.
What’s one thing that a small business could do today to improve their search engine ranking?
Start a blog and fill it with key-word optimised articles that you know your target audience will want to read. The average first-page result on Google contains 1,890 words so in 2019 long form content (aka posts over 1000 words) is king.
What SEO services would you recommend to small businesses?
The keywords you use and how you use them is so important. For example, unlike a decade ago, Google punishes pages that are cramming loads of the same keywords into one page. If you don’t have the time or resources to learn how to write SEO copy for your own business, either outsource it or work with an SEO consultant to check-in and make sure you’re doing it right.
Any final words of wisdom?
Check out Answer The Public for article inspiration, it’s free and a really great tool for combating a bad case of writer’s block.
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You can keep up to date with Lekker creative on their website here.
