Commercial or Informational Content? What's the Difference?

So, what is the difference between commercial and informational content?

And what percentage should you have of each?

Let's break down the definitions and the numbers.

Commercial content may be thought of as your "money" posts, from which you hope to make an income.

They will typically have titles that include "best" or "review" or "top 5", and will have affiliate links to allow your reader to click and purchase.

You would likely be using keywords with buying intent.

On the other hand, informational content is the exact opposite.

The keywords will relate to answering questions and solving problems and will have no affiliate links.

They will not be product-based.

They are helpful and educational, with titles including how, which, when, why, etc.

So, how many of each type should you have?

A recent study has analyzed the content of top-performing sites, and come up with the following percentages:

Average informational content - 67%

Average commercial content - 29%

(Some posts were not included such as about me pages, contact pages, disclosures, policies, etc, hence why it doesn't add up to 100%).

Rounding this up, it equates to a 70/30 split.

(Which is similar to what Jay recommends in his webinars).

Looking at this another way, for every 10 posts you write, 7 should be informational and 3 can be commercial.

In other words, only 3 out of 10 posts should contain affiliate links.

Interestingly, if you have a site that falls in the Your Money or Your Life (YMYL) categories such as Health, Financial, Medical, or Legal, it is recommended to have less commercial content.

YMYL niches have a greater need to establish their authority and trust, and therefore should be even less about selling and more about helping.

And those of you who have spoken to me previously will also know that I disagree with the training when it suggests you start adding affiliates in level 3, as you will have very few informational posts at this point.

You need to build up trust and authority with Google to have your posts ranked high enough to be seen.

Adding affiliate links too soon hinders your trust-building efforts.

It's my opinion you should have at least 25 informational posts before adding commercial content.

Obviously, you will see a variety of different views from everybody here, so please make use of all the available information to make an informed decision.