How do I work on keyword research?
So keyword research is simple and complicated sometimes because you need to work on some keywords that don't have a lot of competition.
It is very difficult to rank your pages when a keyword has a lot of competition and there are a lot of content on internet. You can use some tool like google trend or keyword planner that will give you statistic about all keywords you are going to work for.
I will share my strategies of if what I do on keyword research:
Step 1. Check search volume (popularity) and consider related phrases
There are a lot of tools that provide clues into the popularity of a given phrase. Some suggest other phrases, some estimate competition, others show trends over time. Our main goal is to confirm that there is demand for the topic and get a sense for how much.
Google itself is the primary source of keyword data. It offers two free tools: the Google AdWords Keyword Planner and Google Trends. First, weβll compare these and then look deeper at other sources of keyword data.
Google AdWords Keyword Planner
Suggests many phrases and shows estimated ranges for monthly search volume (how many people are searching for the phrase) in the U.S. and around the world.
Google Trends
Shows trending for specific phrases over time. Allows comparison of phrases and also suggests a few phrases.
Google AdWords Keyword Planner
For years, this was the most popular key phrase research tool for SEOs. But it wasnβt really created to help with search optimization. As part of AdWords, itβs designed to help advertisers select phrases to bid on with their pay per click ads, not to help search optimizers target phrases for organic search results.
Youβll need to create an account to use it, but you donβt need to actually set up a campaign or begin advertising using AdWords. Once inside, start by entering your starting phrase into the box labeled βYour product or service.β
If youβre researching a transactional (dollar sign) phrase, you may actually enter a product or service name. But if youβre researching an informational (question mark) phrase, youβll just enter the topic for your article. For our example, weβll use the phrase βrobot parts.β
Now youβll find an estimated range for the average number of monthly searches over the last year for the phrase you entered. This is the βsearch volume.β
But keep in mind that there is always much more demand for the broader topic than that specific phrase. And a page that ranks for that phrase will likely rank for dozens or even hundreds of closely related phrases.
If you are successful, the page will attract many more visitors than this number suggests. Donβt be discouraged by low estimates here!
Below the search volume, youβll find a huge list of other suggested phrases. Scan through and you may quickly find ideas for more specific, more targeted phrases.
Note! This tool is known to leave out some data in the suggested keyphrases, so if you have a good feeling about a phrase, enter it manually if you donβt see it suggested.
The Keyword Planner has a βcompetitionβ column, but this is not competition within the organic Google search results. Itβs the competition among advertisers within Google AdWords.
In many cases, key phrases listed as βLowβ may have little competition in AdWords Pay-Per-Click advertising, but are actually highly competitive and would be difficult to rank for in organic search results.
To narrow your focus on a more specific set of key phrases, click on βKeyword Optionsβ in the left column and then select βOnly show ideas closely related to my search terms.β
Now youβll see a list of phrases that are less popular, but more specific and therefore more likely to attract a more targeted visitor. These more specific phrases tend to be less competitive and easier to rank for.
As you review the wide range of related phrases, youβre looking for two things:
Phrases that relate to your topic more specifically
Completely new phrases that have a similar meaning, especially those with relatively high search volume.
Add these to your original list.
How many searches are enough?
Itβs ideal if the main key phrase for your site has thousands of searches per month. The homepage is usually optimized for the most popular, most competitive phrase. Thatβs because your homepage is your strongest competitor with the most authority and the best chance of ranking.
Interior pages, such as product and service pages, should be optimized for more specific phrases. Those phrases may have hundreds of searches per month. Search volume for a blog postβs target key phrase may be even lower, with fewer than 100 searches per month.
Zero Average Monthly Searches?
If you see a little dash instead of a number, that doesnβt necessarily mean that no one is searching for the phrase. Technically, it means that there are fewer than ten searches per month for that exact phrase on average over the last 12 months.
There may still be people looking for related topics or a small amount of demand for the exact phrase. There are other places to look for evidence that there is demand for the phrase.
What about long key phrases?
For businesses where the value of a potential transaction is high, such as a B2B service company, it may be useful to target very specific phrases with very few searches. Even if very few people search for a phrase each month, those potential visitors may be very targeted and be thrilled to have found your page. Long, very specific search phrases, such as entire questions, are calledβlong tailβ key phrases.
These phrases may have little, if any, competition. If you target a long tail phrase with six or seven words, such as a complete question, itβs possible that youβll have the only page on the internet with that combination of those words together in that order.
You may rank high within days of posting the page, attracting highly targeted visitors. A few hours of content marketing today may lead to a steady trickle of traffic (highly interested traffic) and a handful of qualified leads for years to come.
If you want to compare the relative popularity of several phrases, Google Trends is fast way to check. It shows trending over time, seasonality and geographic preferences.
Hereβs an example: suppose youβre a web design company with a new plan to offer marketing services. Youβre getting ready to launch the service and write a new, search optimized page for your own site. But should you call it web marketing, digital marketing or internet marketing?
Enter those three phrases into Google Trends and hereβs what youβll see:
Yellow line: βinternet marketingβ
Red line: βdigital marketingβ
Blue line: βweb marketingβ
The date range for this report goes back to 2004. You can see that sometime toward the end of 2012, βdigital marketingβ became a more popular phrase. Had you researched these phrases two years earlier just using the Google Keyword Planner, you may have concluded that it was the least popular of the three.
Tip! Watch for seasonal trends for various phrases. Youβll notice that most phrases have some seasonality and that with some phrases, there are huge spikes at certain times of the year. Plan ahead to target key phrases that have strong seasonality.
Google Trends also shows geographic differences, which can be important if youβre targeting a local audience. You can drill down into country, region or even metro area.
It may not be practical or useful to check every phrase in Google Trends. Should you check the trending of every key phrase for every blog post? Maybe not. But check the main key phrases for your homepage, service pages or product pages? Absolutely.
Other ways to confirm demand for a phrase (spoiler alert: Google)
Just because a phrase didnβt appear in either of these tools doesnβt mean there is no demand for it. There are other ways to confirm that someone is interested in this topic. And for the blog posts and articles that target the informational key phrases, we arenβt necessarily looking for huge demand. Any visibility in search can make a big difference in the performance of a post.
Google Search is a great way to check. Just type the phrase youβre considering, then hold off hitting the return key. See the suggestions? If itβs suggested by Google, then people are searching for it. Some of these phrases wonβt show up in the Keyword Tool or Trends, but that doesnβt mean thereβs no demand.
Enter a letter of the alphabet to see more suggested key phrases.
Getting ideas for phrases to target? Rather than type every letter of the alphabet, you can enter your phrase into this Keyword Tool to see hundreds of suggested phrases, as if you typed the next letter of the alphabet 26 times. You can also see the phrases suggested by YouTube, Bing, Amazon and eBay.
This is one of several tools that we use when we research topics for articles. A lot of the tools and tactics for finding topics are also great for picking target phrases.
Step 2. Search for the phrases youβre considering
This is the only way to evaluate the competitive landscape is to search for the phrase. Youβll likely quickly move back and forth between key phrase research tools and the search engine, finding suggested phrases, searching for them, scanning through search results, researching other phrases.
Note: Not all searches are the same
Your results are always slightly personalized for you. Your target audience may not see exactly the same listings with the same rankings. Here are three tips for seeing more βtypicalβ search results:
Use a browser that isnβt logged into any Google products
Use private browsing or incognito mode
Use the Google Ad Preview tool, by searching from Google Adwords.
In each of these cases, there will still be implicit search signals, specific to you and your computer that will affect your search results, so we donβt recommend spending a lot of time trying to see perfectly neutral results. I recommend these approaches only if you suspect that what youβre seeing is highly personalized.
As you browse through search results, youβre looking for clues, asking yourself questions.
Am I in the right neighborhood?
If a member of your target audience who is looking for your topic landed on these same search results, what would they do? Would they immediately try again and search for something else? In other words, are the high ranking pages relevant to you, your brand and your content? If not, youβre in the wrong neighborhood. Go back and consider different phrases.
Every key phrase indicates intent. Search results are a powerful clue into the intent and desires of those potential visitors.
Are there a lot of SERP features pushing down the organic rankings?
Some search results pages are crowded with ads, images, answer boxes and other features. These push down the high ranking pages, reducing the likelihood that a searcher will click on your page even if you do rank.
Those features reduce click through rates for organic search rankings. If you see a lot of them, keep in mind that Google itself is your competitor and the size of the prize is smaller.
Does this look like a very competitive phrase?
In a moment, weβll go into the science of evaluating competition for a given phrase, but a quick glance at a search results page can often tell you if you have any chance of ranking.
Are all of the high ranking pages on famous websites? National brands or big media companies? If so, it may be difficult or impossible to rank for this phrase unless you are a famous brand yourself.
Are there other, more specific phrases suggested here?
Google search results are another source of related phrases. Look at the βSearches related toβ¦β links at the bottom of the page. Look for question and answer boxes. Getting any ideas?
See a map? A quick note about local SEO
If you a search for a phrase and see a map with a list of businesses below it (usually in a group of three), you may need to focus on βlocal SEOβ to compete for this phrase. Local SEO is very different from organic SEO. Those arenβt websites that rank under the map, they are local listings.
Your local listing in Google is your βGoogle My Businessβ page. To improve the ranking of this listing in the local search results, make sure that your business information is up to date in Google My Business, within all of the Internet Yellow Pages websites (IYPs) and anywhere else where your business name, address and phone number (NAP) appears. An instance of your NAP is called a βcitation.β
When a business has many citations with few inconsistencies, Google has more evidence that there is a relevant business is in that location. Therefore, Google is more likely to show that business listing when visitors in that area search for a related phrase. To quickly improve the number and consistency of your citations and improve your local SEO, consider using a service such as Yext, BrightLocal or Moz Local.
They are called βblendedβ or βuniversalβ search results.
Note! Google often shows search results for general meanings, rather than specific words and phrases. When you search for a phrase in Google, youβll see the keyword bolded in the search results. Look closely and you may find words you didnβt search for bolded in those same search results. For example, a search for βHVAC repairβ returns search listings with phrases such as βheatingβ and βair conditioning.β
Step 3. Estimate the competition
In my experience, this is one of the more difficult web marketing skills. Itβs a tricky inexact science. But it starts with common sense. Take a look at the search engine results page for the phrase youβre considering. The phrase is likely competitive if:
There are four pay-per-click ads at the top of the page and three at the bottom. This means others have already determined the keyphrase is valuable.
The top-ranking sites are popular, well-known sites. Unless you invent a time machine, youβre not going to outrank Wikipedia or Amazon. If the top three or five sites are trusted, reputable websites, theyβll have loads of link popularity and therefore powerful domains. Youβre not likely to compete without focusing serious time and resources.
The top-ranking sites have the target keyphrase at the beginning of the link. This means those sites have the keyphrase at the beginning of their page titles, which indicates the owners of these sites know a bit about SEO. This means it will likely be more difficult, but not necessarily impossible.
There are tens of millions of results. This means there are many pages on the web that are relevant for this phrase.
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