SEO 101.1 Keyword Research

I love cookies.

Don’t worry, I’m not turning into Brick Tamland over there. It’s just I don’t know how to introduce something as incredibly dry and just as equally dull as keyword research. In fact you’re probably going to learn more interesting things by actually watching Anchorman. Things like San Diego is German for…

OK I won’t go there

Back to cookies. They have no relevance what-so-ever to keyword research. I can’t think of any witty metaphor or clever analogy that would make the process of learning about keyword research interesting in any way. Still, it does give us something tastier to talk about in the comments!

So you can switch off now, take a nap. It’s ok, I won’t hold it against you. Those of you not using your textbooks as a pillow, turn to page 2:

The Importance of Keyword Research

It’s the cornerstone of all your Search Engine Marketing, the foundation upon which everything else will be built. Get it right and you’ll build a towering skyscraper that will weather any storm. Get it wrong and you’ll build a house of cards that will come crashing down with the slightest of breezes.

(See, that’s a clever analogy, why oh why did I pick cookies?)

Easier said than done? Not really.

3 Fatal Mistakes You Must Avoid

When it comes to keyword research there are a few traps that people fall into. Traps which are downright fatal to their Search Engine Marketing efforts. They are:

1. No Keyword Research. How do you know how competitive your keywords are? Put another way; how do you know which keywords have a low competition but a high volume of search? (The ones you really want to target)
2. Guessing. No. Just no. It’s tantamount to fatal mistake number 1.
3. One Time Only. Just like every other aspect of SEO, keyword research is an ongoing process. It’s organic, requiring regular attention. New words need to be added, non-functional ones removed. How can you possibly do that without continuous research?

There are a few other mistakes such as ignoring keywords for domain names, but for the most part they can all be avoided by following one simple rule.

If you’re serious about SEO – be it organic listings or PPC advertising – keyword research absolutely must come first.

Keyword Research Demystified

There are a few other terms you need to be aware of, before you can get the most out of your keyword research. They are:

Seed word: This is the word that you use to seed your list. It is the word that will be used to generate every other keyword you will focus on. Though it will appear in your keyword-rich articles, very rarely will it be by itself. This is because seed words are extremely competitive.

Examples of a seed word are: golf, fishing, ghostwriting, dentist.

Longtail keywords: This term comes up a lot. Essentially it’s the term used to describe a series of two or more keywords. In fact, longtail keywords can easily top 5, 6 or even 7 words.

Why is the longtail important? Let me illustrate with an example.

Let’s say you have a website that ranks number one for the keyword “dentist”. Along comes Joe User, he has terrible toothache and is in need of an emergency dentist. So he goes to Google, types in dentist and like all good users clicks on the first site he sees, namely yours. Good news right?

No.

The problem is Joe User’s click won’t convert; i.e.  you won’t receive any business from Joe. Why? Because Joe lives in Longbeach, California and your practice is in Glasgow, Scotland.

Joe would realise his mistake and go back to Google whereupon he will type in “dentist Longbeach California”. That is what we call a longtail keyword.

Sure, your practice in Glasgow won’t come up in the search results but who cares, you wouldn’t have received any business anyway. The search term “dentist glasgow scotland” on the other hand is something you’d want to look into.

So to sum it up, longtail keywords are:

1. highly targeted / low competition (there are many dentists in the world but not many are located in Longbeach, California!) which result in

2. higher conversion rates (someone searching for a dentist in Longbeach, California is (highly likely) prepared to do business)

When entering a new market go for the longtail keywords in order to establish your authority.

Other examples of longtail keywords are; “trout fishing lure” and “ladies golf baskets”

Singular Vs. Plural: Do you optimise for the keyword “concert ticket” or “concert tickets”? Too easy? How about “allergy” or “allergies”.

Which gets typed into Google more often? Which has the lowest competition? Do you see now why you can’t just guess?

Word stemming: What are the variations on your keywords? Are they worth going after?

E.g. Fishing and fisher, ghostwriting and ghostwriter

Misspellings: Everyone makes mistakes when typing on a keyboard, but when you factor in all the possible mistakes is it worth bothering to research them all?

The answer is no. Unless your brand name is your keyword, in which case you should research the common misspellings and target those.

Conclusion

There ends the not so brief overview of keyword research. I am truly sorry it’s such a dry and boring topic but it’s important to get all the theory stuff out of the way. For on Thursday, I’ll show you a step by step way of using Google’s own tools to conduct your very own keyword research, with particular emphasis on finding those low-competition, high-traffic, golden nugget longtails.

In the meantime, don’t forget to subscribe if you haven’t done so already and fire away with any questions you may have. (My favourite cookies are the chocolate chip kind!)

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