Whether you call it "Panda", "Farmer" or the "Anti-Demand-Media" update, Google is clearly making a push to reward "better" content. So the question becomes, how do you acquire better content?

Buy It

One of the reasons that content farms were started in the first place is because quality writing is expensive. Good writing requires a creative process that isn't easily mimicked by automated solutions. Buying quality content can be very expensive. Hiring an experienced full-time writer can cost several thousand dollars per month. Further, it's not really a volume game. One really good piece of content can be more valuable than thousands of content-light articles (at least that's what this last update is trying to accomplish). Plus, if you're going to buy content, until you have developed some trust with your writer, you're probably going to have to play editor or hire someone to editorially review the content.

I have experimented with several outsourced content solutions. Here are some things to consider if you're going to outsource your content:

1. Get Writing Samples: Any writer worth their salt should be able to show you a lot in terms of prior writing experience. Looking at cross-section of pieces will give you a good idea as to the general quality of the writing.
    
2. Establish and Enforce Editorial Guidelines: Set out your guidelines from the very start. Holding higher editorial guidelines is what saved some of the "content farms" from total disaster (although merely having guidelines, and enforcing them are entirely different propositions).
    
3. Measure Performance: Like other areas of web strategy, when it comes to content, measuring performance is key. While measuring content performance can be a little more tricky that measuring other indicators, conversion rate and time on page are worth considering in terms of content performance metrics.
    
4. SEO Knowledge: Obviously, being an expert author on a subject doesn't mean that the writer has the first clue about SEO. If your writer is SEO unaware, someone will probably have to review and edit the content to make it more "seo-friendly". This may mean adding meta information or optimizing the content for web usability. If you can find an expert author who knows some SEO basics, grab them now. Depending on your subject, they are probably a rarer bird than you might imagine.

Get Your Clients Involved

In my experience, the best content comes from the experts on the subject, the clients. If you work with lawyers, doctors, or accountants, they are likely to be the most knowledgeable on their fields of practice and can generally publish the best content for their sites. Obviously, this isn't always true. Being a great trial lawyer doesn't necessitate that you're a great writer. Bur even if they're not, getting your clients involved in the content development process can go a long way in increasing the quality of your web content. Here are some ways to get your clients involved in content development:

1. Give them Incentive: Find ways to give the client incentive to write. Start a content contest. Make it part of the job. Have the client schedule company-wide writing time.
    
2. Offer Training: Providing some basic writing training can a long way in terms of getting your clients involved in the content development process. It builds confidence, increases the quality of their writing, and decreases the amount of time needed for editing.
    
3. Explain the Benefits: Often times, clients simply don't understand how content strategy fits into the web marketing puzzle. By explaining the importance of frequent quality content publishing, clients are more apt to set down to writing.
    
4. Explain the Savings: Want to get your clients involved in content development? Explain how expensive it is to outsource to quality writers.

In the end, in combination with links, the quality of your sites' content is the currency of the web. If your content is lousy, your web strategy will be largely ineffective (or in the very least, won't reach its potential). While it may be tempting to purchase a large amount of low-quality content to pick up long tail search traffic, the effectiveness of such a strategy has, and will continue, to diminish greatly. While investing in quality writing can be expensive, it is generally worth it. However, I have found the best way to increase the quality of your content is to get the experts involved. Usually, this means finding ways to convince and encourage your clients to get involved in the content development process.