 Optimize Your Site For the Most Effective Keywords
by Matthew Coers
If someone wanted to buy the products or services you sell, what words would he type into a search engine? The truth is that many business owners cannot answer this question confidently. Implementing a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) program successfully requires knowing what terms people actually search for, how often those terms are searched, and how much competition exists for each of those terms. This information is available online, but you need to know how to access it.
Don’t be too General
One of the biggest mistakes webmasters make over and over is trying to optimize on terms that are too general for their business. To illustrate this point, let’s take as an example a hypothetical website called Joe’s Gift Baskets.
You can imagine that there are a lot of people who search for the term "gift baskets". In fact there are about 25,000 people searching for the term "gift baskets" every month. This is a pretty good business to start online, and there are many successful entrepreneurs who get started on the Internet this way.
A quick search on Google, however shows that poor Joe is not alone. In fact, there are almost 35 MILLION webpages that show up for the term, "gift baskets" on Google. The numbers don’t look so good anymore do they? After all, there are around 1,400 web pages about gift baskets for every person searching for that term.
Long Tail Phrases
Long tail phrases are search phrases with three or more words. They are also much more valuable to a Webmaster who is optimizing his site for keywords because long tail terms are much more accessible, and they generally bring in more qualified traffic.
Let’s take another look at Joe’s Gift Basket Company because Joe has observed that a very large percentage of his orders come from businesses – not consumers. He does some research on the Internet and discovers that the term "Corporate Gift Baskets" gets almost as many searches per month as "Gift Baskets", but it only has 2% the competition.
Furthermore, because the term is so specific to a niche that performs well, Joe feels that it’s a good bet that people who search for "corporate gift baskets" are much more likely to buy something than the tire kickers who come around once a year looking for a cheap gift to send to Aunt Edna. What’s even better, it appears that corporate gift basket buyers tend to buy year-round, not just in the middle of December.
As he does additional research, Joe finds even more "long tail" terms that he can optimize on: "Cheese Gift Basket", "Chocolate Gift Basket", and "Fruit Basket". The more he looks around, the more potential phrases he finds. All these terms get thousands of searches per month, and have far less competition than the generic "Gift Baskets" phrase does.
Joe did a good job of finding some great phrases to focus his SEO efforts on. So, how do you find long tail phrases for your market?
WordTracker
One of the best tools for identifying search phrases for SEO or Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns is WordTracker. I personally use this tool almost every day, and find that it is one of the most valuable arrows in my quiver. In fact, I’m not sure what I would do without it.
WordTracker is great for helping you to do synonym research and helps to identify long tail phrases you would never think of otherwise. It gives you an idea of how often terms are searched so you can better judge which terms to optimize for, and it helps you to understand how competitive each term is.
WordTracker has a free trial that you can use as much as you like, but honestly, the paid version is only about $25 for a week (they bill in English pounds, so the exact cost fluctuates for those of us living outside the U.K.). I’ve found that the advanced functionality of the paid version is definitely worth the few bucks it costs because you can generate hundreds of terms to load into your favorite PPC program very quickly. I would encourage you to take the free trial for a test drive. When you are ready to sit down and do some real keyword research, pay them the $25 – it will save you hours.
You can sign up for the free trial here: www.profitchoice.com/af/wordtracker.
Yahoo Search Marketing
Another place to get some good information is Yahoo Search Marketing. The program offers the ability to get information on keywords, how often they are searched, and how much your competitors are willing to pay for the sponsored search ads you see on Yahoo. The reports you get from Yahoo Search Marketing are not as useful or comprehensive as those that you can get from WordTracker, but they are free, and you can easily use the information from your searches to purchase Yahoo Sponsored Search ads and start bringing some traffic to your website.
There are two tools on Yahoo that you might be interested in. The first is the Keyword Selector Tool, which can give you suggestions on which terms to optimize for. The other is the Bids Tool, which tells you how much your competitors are paying to advertise on any given keyword. By combining the information from these two tools, you can get an idea of what you should focus your efforts on. Both tools can be accessed here: www.profitchoice.com/af/yahoo
Google Trends
Another interesting tool that has recently come out is Google Trends. This tool allows you to compare up to five terms and shows relative search volume for each term. As is typical for Google, you can’t get hard numbers out of this tool, so you won’t know precisely how many searches were made in August for the term "Gift Baskets", but you can see the relative performance of the term over time.
So, by doing a comparison for "Gift Basket", you can see that (predictably) volume for this terms spikes 300% around the middle of December. The tool also gives you some geographic information about your terms just in case you were considering some local search sponsorships.
You can access the Google Trends functionality here: http://www.google.com/trends
Take The Blindfold Off
Attempting to do effective search engine optimization or pay-per-click advertising without the right data is really like throwing darts with a blindfold on. Occasionally you’ll get a bull’s-eye, but more often than not you’ll waste time and effort on terms that are either too competitive or not searched often enough.
By using a few free and low-cost tools available on the Internet, you can make much more informed decisions about what terms you are focusing on, and how you approach your market.
About the Author
Matthew Coers is an Internet marketing consultant. His website, ProfitChoice.com contains everything an entreprenuer needs to build a website and make money online. Visit ProfitChoice.com to access his FREE online course, "7 Days to Website Success".
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