Keyword Research and Keyword Selection for Search Engine Rankings
The goal of keyword research is to:
- Generate a calendar of keyword phrases; some keywords are more popular at different times of the year.
- Discover new keyword opportunities.
- Fix missed keyword opportunities.
- Increase the number of clicks from landing pages to the site.
- Increase the relevance of landing pages from natural SEO, PPC advertising campaigns, press releases, or offline marketing efforts.
By collecting and analyzing keyword data, website owners gain valuable insight into user behavior and are able to devise ways to create more user-friendly site that converts visitors into buyers.
For instance, when site owners find that visitors are searching for a specific keyword phrase on Google and then arriving at a specific page on their site. They then discover that same keyword phrase is a heavily searched term on his site search engine. This data indicates that visitors might not be arriving at the most appropriate landing page. Hence, increasing optimization for other site pages may be necessary. If the Web search engines indicate a keyword phrase is popular, and the site search engine shows visitors have a genuine interest in a keyword phrase, you can create new information around a topic.
Nowadays, many search engine marketers offer keyword research services. Keyword research and analysis is not as simple as using the tools available at Overture and Google. Web site owners should look beyond these tools and see the bigger picture.
Essentially, keyword analysis can be performed on three levels. Data-mining all three levels provides website owners with the full perspective of how target audiences find the information on their Web sites. These are:
- Keyword research tools
- Web analytics software
- Site search engines
Most of you are probably familiar with keyword research tools available at Overture, Google, and Wordtracker. These are powerful tools that provide great data for keyword research. Most SEO companies collect their data from these three. In addition, however, they review related search results on Yahoo, Business.com, and Teoma. By researching all of these resources, instead of just one, they are able to determine which specific keyword phrases are the most popular on all these Web search engines and zero in on the common denominator. There are also subtle differences among the different engines. Some searches are more popular on one engine than on another.
For many sites, creating a keyword phrase calendar is a good strategy. By creating a calendar based on keyword research over years, website owners know what pages to create for timely "natural" Search Engine Optimization (SEO) campaigns and what ads to create for Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaigns.
SEO companies use special Web analytics software to review keyword phrases. For an SEO campaign to be successful, the Web analytics software has to reflect that success in the following key areas:
- Top search phrases
- Top search keywords
- Top referring URLs
- Top referring sites
- Top search engines
Additionally, Web analytics software reveal whether website visitors access the most appropriate pages or just a few sections on the site. Further, this software also puts on view untapped keyword phrases. Our experience with dozens of websites has proved that one of the most frequently visited pages is that with the most commonly used keywords employed optimally. Knowing that your target audience seeks knowledge about that topic, we are able to create web pages on those topics that will provide additional entry points to your site for optimization of campaigns. They also provide additional opportunities for link development campaigns.
Helpful information to review on a site search engine, includes:
- Number of words entered in the search query
- Average number of words entered in the search query
- Average number of characters entered in the search query
- Search terms that yield results but no clicks
- Search terms that yield no results
Another item overlooked in site search is those search terms that yield results but no clicks. This is useless because, in many of the search engines, we use meta-tag descriptions and title-tag content for the search results. If we find a specific keyword phrase consistently yields the appropriate URLs in the search results, then we know the calls to action in the title tag, meta-tag description, or both might not be effective. We then rewrite that specific content and measure the results.
Keyword is the #1 tool to boost your search engine rankings
The goal of all this is to optimize pages for better site search engine conversions. In the bargain, Web search engine visibility increases, as well. Remember, keyword research and analysis is an ongoing process.
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