Keyword Strategy
There is no “one thing” that will guarantee high placement on a search engines result page (SERP). In fact, when it comes to improving a website’s search ranking there is no such thing as a guarantee period. Unlike real estate which can be boiled down to three things, location, location and location, an effective SEO strategy is all about lots of little things done in conjunction. But one of those “little things” is very important and it should be the starting point for a comprehensive SEO initiative – keywords.
Keywords are words and/or phrases that describe what your website, or individual pages on your website, are about. They are the words users will type into the search field of Google, Bing or Yahoo to find a business that does what you do. Simple enough. Or is it? Before you select the words that will describe what your website is about, you have to know what it’s about. This should be painfully obvious but in our experience it’s surprising how many businesses can’t tell you what they are about in any succinct, focused way. So your first job is to clearly define your site’s main themes. Once done, Kaneworks will use its diverse set of tools to create a list of relevant keywords.
We’ll help you discover:
- how popular a keyword or keyword phrase is – how many searches are done for your main keywords per month
- how competitive is the phrase
- what’s the relative value of the keywords in your list
- are the keywords you think are the most relevant really what people are searching for
In general, here are a few things to remember when choosing keywords:
- Clarity – make sure your keywords are clear and concise
- Relevance – remember, Google’s job is to return search results that it believes are the most relevant to the searcher’s query. Make sure your keywords really describe what you’re offering on your website
- Appropriateness – make sure your keywords are appropriate to your audience. If you’re targeting Harley Davidson enthusiasts, the keywords you use, in fact the tone of your content as a whole, should be very different than the keywords and tone you would use for a website offering babysitting services
The important thing to remember is that the best keywords to use to attract customers to your website may not be the words you think they are. That’s where our experience and expertise comes in. SEO is an imperfect science. Google is constantly changing its algorithms. You need a partner that stays on top of the changes when they occur.
How Does Google Define Keywords?
Knowing how Google identifies words and phrases as keywords will give you a distinct advantage when choosing your keywords. So what does Google look for?
- Pages that contain the exact phrase a user entered into the search field
- Pages that contain derivations of the words like auto instead of automobile
- Pages where the words have been specially formatted by using them in header tags
- Pages that contain all the words in a key phrase but not necessarily all together
- Pages that have links pointing to them where the link text contains the words
- Pages that have all the words in a phrase close to each other
- External web pages that link to the site from a page Google considers to be about the same keyword
Clearly there is a lot to know when it comes to choosing the most effective keywords for bringing traffic to your website. Unless you have way too much time on your hands and enjoy cramming a ton of knowledge into your head that has nothing to do with your core business, let Kaneworks do the hard work for you so you can focus on what you do best.