SEO Keyword Research 2019
Have you ever wondered about the importance of search engine positions? Your target audience uses certain keywords and phrases to look for the products or services you offer online. Targeting these keywords in your SEO campaign will help your website rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs), and will increase overall website visibility.
Your digital marketing campaign’s success relies heavily on the keywords.. Creating a list of viable keywords is just the first step in building a successful marketing campaign; the real challenge lies in selecting keywords with high search volume, low competition, and high buyer intent. It’s also important to understand just how easy it is to build a team and outsource digital marketing services.
Different Types of Keywords For SEO
Keywords can be divided into two groups based on length and search volume:
Short-tail keywords are usually one or two words long and have the highest search volume. This often makes them difficult to rank for because there are usually a lot of competitors going for the same keywords. “Shoes” or “women’s shoes” are good examples of short-tail keywords with high competition.
Long-tail keywords are longer, more specific versions of short-tail keywords. Fewer people search for these terms and there is less competition for them. “Affordable women’s shoes online” is a long-tail version of “women’s shoes”.
These types of keywords can be further divided based on the intent of the searcher.
Navigational keywords help searchers find a specific web page. For example, someone might search for “EZJ Online” to find the our website.
Informational keywords help searchers find information on a topic. Someone looking for information on search engine optimization might search for “SEO tutorials” or simply “SEO”.
Transactional keywords are used by searchers looking to buy something online. “Search Engine Optimization services” and “SEO agencies” are examples of these types of keywords that have what’s called buyers intent. Being familiar with these keyword types can help you determine which ones are priority to go for to use on your website.
What Defines A Good Keyword?
Just because we’re running a digital marketing agency website doesn’t mean '“SEO” makes a great keyword for our online marketing campaign. We always keep four major factors in mind when deciding which keywords to use in our website content and online ads:
Keyword Relevance
Choose keywords that are relevant to your products, services, and content. Your keywords need to describe your business accurately or your website visitors will simply skim over your website and bounce in an instant just because it doesn’t look like what they’re looking for.
Buyers Intent & Conversion
Many of the keywords you find through keyword research can generate a lot of traffic for your website, but that doesn’t guarantee you’ll see an increase in sales or conversions as well. Choose keywords that appeal to visitors who are most likely going to buy your products or services.
Keyword Search Volume & Competition
Choose relevant keywords that you know you can compete for in the market. It can be tempting to focus solely on keywords with the highest amount of searches, but you should also remember that these are the keywords everyone else is trying to rank for.
By definition, a good keyword is one that is relevant, targeted, and has a combination of low competition and high search volume. Newer sites will benefit from choosing what digital marketers often refer to as “low-hanging fruit” (or targeted, long-tail keywords with lower competition and search volume) because they’re easier to rank for. You can always add more competitive phrases as your site continues to climb the rankings.
Keywords To Avoid
When going through your keyword research phase, you should know which keywords to avoid using in your campaigns. This quick list can help you identify which keywords to eliminate from your campaigns:
Poorly Targeted Keywords
Failing to choose general keywords based on your target audience can increase your website’s non-targeted traffic. This means more people will visit your site, but your chances of converting those website visitors into leads and then customers is very low.
Keywords with Little To No Search Volume
Choosing keywords that nobody searches for often means you won’t get any traffic, and not having any traffic means you won’t get any sales.
Irrelevant Keywords
You should naturally avoid using keywords that have absolutely nothing to do with your business, but those aren’t the only keywords you should consider “irrelevant”. Do not misrepresent yourself by using related keywords that don’t accurately describe what you offer. For example, don’t use the word “discount” in your keywords if you’re not actually offering products at discounted prices.
Broad Keywords
Keywords that are too broad will require an incredible amount of time and resources to rank for, and even then, achieving top rankings is nearly possible in a feasible time frame
Grouping Your Keywords For SEO
Keyword selection doesn’t stop with choosing the best ones based on the four major factors listed above. Creating groups of related keywords allows you to increase your website’s relevance for those keywords, improve your click-through rates (CTR), and improve your Quality Score if you’re running pay-per-click (PPC) ads on Google.
Start creating groups by choosing your main keywords. The main keyword is the highest priority and most competitive keyword in a group. It serves as the “root” for the other keywords its group includes.
For Example
The website you’re choosing keywords for features an Albuquerque-based hair barber that specializes in affordable mens haircuts. Your main keywords might be “mens haircut in abq”.
Once you have chosen your main keywords, choose your supporting keywords. These are usually long-tail keywords.
For Example
The client with “mens haircut in abq” as a main keyword can include “affordable mens haircut in abq”, “cheap mens haircut in abq”, and “low cost mens haircut in abq”.
SEO Keyword Research Process
Create a list of relevant topics
We use your products and services to start the process and then branch out further into your industry in general to create SEO topic ideas.
Identify keywords for each topic
Each topic will get its own list of keywords derived from the SEO topic idea.
Find related keywords or phrases
We use tools to generate keyword variables to add to our SEO topic idea list.
Group Keywords
This keyword research phase helps us optimize our campaigns by identifying and grouping main keywords and supporting keywords with similar buyers intention. This way we can create prolific amounts of content for each group one at a time.
Analyze competition and reduce list
We establish the relationship of demand to competition in any given market which is the estimated global search impressions of that keyword divided by the total number of exact match search results.
Conclusion
An effective keyword research strategy can elevate the success of all your online marketing efforts. In many cases, the success of an campaign totally relies on the keyword strategy. It’s an important element in any digital marketing solution that should be given the correct amount of investment in time and effort. Without the proper systems and processes in place, it will be difficult to understand white-label reputation management.