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Keyword Research
March 15, 2010 By Webposition SEO Team Comments Off
Keyword Research Methodologies
In this Section:
- What is Keyword Research?
- What are the SEO objectives of my site / page?
- What are the associated keyword categories to pursue?
- What is the list of keywords relevant to these categories?
- What are some additional unique / creative keywords that I could use?
- How should I evaluate keywords and determine which to pursue with SEO?
(keyword popularity x keyword competitiveness)
What is Keyword Research?
Keyword research is the process of identifying and analyzing keywords to target within a web page, with the ultimate goal of driving traffic from search engines. Keyword research is one of the most important components in driving organic & paid search engine traffic. It is an area where SEO overlaps with search engine marketing (SEM), since both require carefully considered lists of target keywords. A single well-crafted keyword list can be used to develop pages for SEO efforts, to design ad-landing pages, and to guide keyword purchases for sponsored search advertisements.
Keywords are a logical starting point for your SEO efforts because search engines are text reading machines. As explained in the first post in this series, search engines constantly crawl across the web, finding sites, analyzing the subject of each page, and building an index of results for each keyword. On the other end, users are continually typing keyword combination’s into search engines. To satisfy users, search engines must make the correct connection between user intent and targeted results.
Search engines evaluate the use of keywords on each page, including the body text content, the URL, the alternate text attached to an image or video, the anchor text on links, and the meta tags.
Not every user is alike though, and that’s where keyword research comes into play. It’s truly fascinating to analyze the different variations of terms we hear on a regular basis – just think about all the geocentric slang in the English language alone.
In this post, we’ll take you through the elements of keyword research, the tools necessary to perform it, and the way you should be thinking about utilizing it to grow your organic traffic.
What are the SEO objectives of your site / webpage?
Before deciding which keywords to target within a page or site, it is helpful to “go broad” and develop a large list of potential keywords. As outlined in the previous post in this series, if you already have a live web page, the first step is to analyze your traffic to identify where people are coming from and what terms they are using to find your site. This analysis tells you what your audience is currently looking for when they visit your site. Those terms can form your baseline set of keywords – in most cases, you will want to build upon the existing traffic that is searching for these keywords.
The next step is to think strategically about the marketing objectives of your entire site and its individual pages. What business or activity are you trying to drive for your site and for individual pages? Brainstorm potential keywords for these objectives, and add them to your list.
There are many different tools and techniques to help you expand this list of keywords. One popular method is to search for your list of terms in the top search engines, and check what keywords your competitors use. For the top competitors, look at the keywords they appear to target, including on their visible page content and in their meta tags. Think creatively. Look for terms related to the theme of your page, especially if you’re not fully optimized for every term tied to what you sell or the services you provide.
In addition to studying your competition to identify keywords, you can rely on keyword services, including WordTracker and the keyword tools provided by the major search engines (see list of services at the end of this post). Enter your potential keywords into these tools, look at their suggestions of related keywords, and select keywords to add to your list of potential terms to target.
The ‘Beautiful Mind’ Approach
Another popular technique for keyword research is the ‘Beautiful Mind’ approach. If you have seen the film, you will see where we’re taking this. Simply browse websites and periodicals tied to your target niche, and look for terms that connect most with your product or services.
Long Tail vs. Short Tail Keywords & Keyword Competition
Once you have a comprehensive list of keywords, you are ready to select terms to pursue. Understanding the competitiveness and popularity of keywords is another vital element in your targeting strategy. When utilizing most keyword tools, you are typically given keyword statistics for a given term in the form of average search volume and overall competition.
Average search volume refers to the average times a term is searched for in a given month, while competition refers to the numbers of total players with listings for a given term. You typically want to look for terms that have high levels of search volume given the competition for the term. Note that competition for a term is not defined only on the number of competitive sites that show in the search results. You also need to consider the strength of the competition. More authoritative and well-known sites will be hard or impossible to displace through your SEO efforts; smaller and lesser-known sites present easier targets. You can assess Google PageRank as a quick metric of your competitors’ strength for a potential term.
Depending on the importance of your terms, you may want to target a highly competitive term. This may not be an overnight task to take out the top players, but it may be the best long term tactic for your business. Long tail terms tend to be less competitive, for example ‘Cars’ vs. ‘Cars with Leather Interior’. Long tail terms typically are two or more words long and are much more targeted to a specific niche. By targeting terms that other top players are not ranking for, you should be able to capitalize on business they have not tailored their SEO strategy to capture. Keep in mind the traffic estimates when choosing long tail terms to target since you will likely need to target more terms in order to drive the magnitude of traffic “popular” terms provide when you are in the higher ranks.
Understanding the lingo of your geographic target region
Another key item that directly affects locally focused website keyword research is the lingo of your target region. In order to truly harness the market, you need to understand how your audience speaks, which in turn will help you to understand how they search for goods and services.
For example, it is common for someone in Northwestern USA to call carbonated soft drinks ‘Pop’, while in California if you go into a grocery store and ask for a pop, you may get a punch (and not the drink) because the local lingo for carbonated soft drinks is ‘Soda’. Imagine the relevance to local online grocers.
If you’re an international soda distributer with a plan to have a large web presence in the future, this is the kind of granular research you will need to perform to succeed across various geographic regions.
Analyzing Keyword Performance
Once you have all your pages set up to target specific key themes, utilize analytics tools to identify bounce rates for those specific terms. If you have a high bounce rate on a term you are specifically expecting to produce sales, then you need to build better content or user experience around this term on the page.
The concept is fairly simple: If people are bouncing from your page for a specific term, the engines will see this as a bad experience to users and start siphoning the traffic to your competitors. It also works the other way around: if people are consistently coming to your site and spending time reading your content, the search engine algorithms capture this data and start directing incrementally more traffic over time to your site for the targeted terms.
Find more about traffic analysis in part 9 of our series
Keyword Research in Action: Tools
There are several great tools in the marketplace to assist you in your keyword research. Below we have outlined recommended tools along with a simple research methodology. Once you become more comfortable with keyword research, you may find other tools, both free and paid, that help you as well.
Online Keyword Tools
Google Adwords External & Internal Keyword Tool
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
Google Insights
http://www.google.com/insights
Google Trends
Wordtracker
Yahoo Buzz (Trends)
Bing xRank (Trends)
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