Here’s something most people get wrong when starting a blog or writing content for their web pages, keyword research. Most of us don’t do it right the first time while it should be the first priority before you start typing anything.
Here’s what I usually hear from people: What’s the point of building something that no one needs. I simply mean that I think whatever it is, will just sit there and be a worthless piece of something.
This article is about teaching you in building something that people need.
Think of it like this, you could be here now reading this post due to typing some keyword related to this article on a search engine. Your search results might have led you to this very post.
A keyword is a word or phrase that a user might deliberately type in a search engine, inquiring the results for which they might want to see. Is very important to know how search engines work when doing your keyword research so you can choose the right keywords.
You have to decide what your page should be about. Knowing what you should write about brings you closer to getting the right keyword.
Keyword research is about finding out which keywords you should choose to use in your content writing on a particular page.
One important piece of advice is that you should not decide to write anything before you find out which keyword(s) to use. Another important factor is understanding what people are constantly searching for could be useful.
Knowing that piece of information is as important as writing and makes it easy to reach your target audience.
Combine what you have found about the keyword and your writing skill to produce your own unique content that will be attractive to your target audience and current readers.
In this keyword research guidelines, here’s what you need to do. I will share some of the most important things you should prioritize before you can start writing any article.
If you have already written some articles then you should see to it that you recheck them and update them to meet your needs so you can improve them to reach your target audience.
Keyword Brainstorming: You should set some time aside to brainstorm a list of keywords that are related to what you wish to write about.
Write down a list of 5 to 10 keywords that come to mind when you think about that topic.
Let’s say you want to write about the keyword “property rental”
You could include other keywords like
House Rental
Apartment Rental
Office Rental
Parking Rental
And others that you can think of, having an idea about other keywords that could be related to what you might be right about gives you a great advantage over your competitors. The aim is to include those keywords in your pages.
There are few tools that could help you with your keyword brainstorming
Keyword Research Tools
There’re several keyword research tools that could help you in your keyword research, they actually help you with a list of related keywords. The good news is that most of them are free and can be accessed over the internet.
You can use the Google Keyword Planner which is one of the best tools to search for keywords.
You get to see the most relevant keywords related to your topic, and you are also given many other keywords like short-tail keywords and long-tail keywords.
The type of keywords that you should look at while doing a keyword research:
Head Keyword – This are one word keyword eg. Shoes. This type of keywords have high search volume, high competition, they are broad by nature
Short-Tail Keywords – This are could be two or three words keyword eg. Womens Shoes. The are also slightly broad and they have medium search volume, high competition but a lower than head keywords, they have more specific purpose, but medium conversion.
Long-Tail Keywords – These are four word plus keywords eg black woman shoes Johannesburg. They have a low search volume, low competition, high specific purpose, but also high conversion.
What’s good about Google Planner Tool, is that it gives you an option to download a spreadsheet of those keywords, you can analyse them and pick your best keywords.
This tool gives you a better view on which keywords have the most competition. If you High next to the keyword then it means a lot of people are competing for that phrase and you might not get to rank high for it.
If you see Medium next to a phrase then it means the search for that keyword is moderate or average if you would like to use that term, meaning you will have a moderate competition for that key phrase.
If you see Low? Now these are the keywords you would like to go for, because there’s low competition for them. If you do your search engine optimization the correct way you will rank high for those keywords. Optimize you pages to rank high and get high organic traffic.
Another big tool is the Google Auto-complete, which suggests you a list of related phrases when you type on Google, those are some of the most searched phrases you can go for.
Go to Wikipedia and look for some of the keywords related to your key phrases.
Use a search engine like Deeper Web, this a great tool, it gives you a cloud of related keywords at the top right corner, that you can select from when doing your keyword research.
User UbersSuggest tool, in some instances Google auto-complete gives you few options to select from so if you use Ubersuggest you will get a longer list of highly searched keywords.
Remember there are free tools and paid tools, free tools might come with few limitations. Which is why I should also suggest some paid tools that are recommended by high profile internet marketers.
While you do your keyword research if there’s one thing that you should not(don not) forget is to check for competition.
Always check for competition of keywords, there are many tools that you can use for free and premium versions.
Some of the most recommended competition keyword tools that you can use include:
- Traffictravis
- SEOMoz(Premium but one of the best)
- SERPIQ Keyword Competition Tool(Also Premium and one of the best)
Another important thing to do is to have a clear view of your competitors, you can spy on them, yep, it will give you a great advantage and it could keep you focused on your goal.
This website will have a full report about your competitors, just type in the URL of your competitors and learn about them to see what where you can improve in your SEO optimization. www.compete.com, www.keywordspy.com and www.spyfu.com
I have found some useful sites that will give you some good info about your competition,
There’s a long list of keyword research tool, some of the big keyword research tools include the following:
- WordTracker
- Google Trends.
- Bing Keyword Tool
- Search Metrics
- WordStream Keywords and many more
One of the most recommended keyword research tools is Long-Tail Pro. Investing in your keyword research would be saving time since you will be getting value for money, and in return you could earn a decent amount from your investment.
What should you do with those keywords after finding them?
Pick the main keyword which is also known as the “focus keyword” and use it to be the number keyword in your page. And also select your supporting keywords.
Where should you use the keywords?
Use you keywords in any place you can think of, whether it be on web content or social media more especially the focus keywords or the main keyword if you’d like to put it like that.
Include the focus keywords in your web pages, when doing email marketing, in forums, directories, in your videos, in your podcasts, webinars and many other places you can think of.
You should also select your best five to ten supporting keywords. Those supporting keywords will also feature in your page, include them in your page as you write. Having supporting keywords emphasizes the relevance of your page content to the search engines and humans.
Where should you place your focus keyword in your page?
Yes there are specific places to place your keywords. This is very important because it plays a good part in search engine ranking, this is part of On-page SEO.
Your focus keyword should be included in this areas of your page:
URL Title – Your URL should also contain the keyword because it is the first to be crawled by search engine spiders. So finding your keyword in that URL will give you an advantage.
Page Title – The page title is just a brief explanation of what your post is about, so including your keyword not only does it help search engine crawlers but humans as well.
Headings – This includes all the headings and subheadings
Meta Tags – Include your keyword in the meta description tag of your page.
Body – This takes us to the keyword density 2-4% rule. Meaning you should keep your main keyword between that 2-4%, this includes everything from the Page Title to the bottom of the page.
Images ALT tag – Most webmasters tend to forget about this but include a short description of the image with your keyword is good practice and good for your keyword research.
Internal Links – You should have a few links that will link to your other pages in your blog. Try to make your links visible and you should not link to another page using the focus keyword.
With a good keyword research you can improve your online advertising techniques and get more traffic to your site.
The Don’ts of Keyword Research in SEO:
- Do not overuse the focus keyword or any other supporting keyword in you content or else the search engines will penalize you. Stick to the keyword density rule and also keep count of the focus keywords.
- Do not hide keywords if you find that you have not put enough keywords on your page. Search engines have ways to trace keywords, should they find that you have not placed them in the readable order you could be toast.
- Don’t overstuff your keyword in the meta tag when describing the page. Have at least one keyword, on the meta tag, one is enough.
- Do not use the same keyword for the two pages or more on one website, use one keyword for each page.
Since you have almost everything you need to start your keyword research it would be good to stick to the basics given here on this post.