Keyword Research is Vital. Search engines like Google and Bing have been the way for most people on the planet to search out information for over two decades. With the advent of smartphones, laptops, tablets along with the old standby, the PC, there are a plethora of ways people can access search engines. With more people than ever before using search engines is why keyword research matters. Your company’s goal should be to rank at or near the top of the search engine results page (SERP). Why? Multiple studies show a majority of organic clicks go to the top 3 search returns. With that in mind here are some tips on how to improve your SERP rankings through keyword research.
There is no SEO Without Keyword Research.
Keywords are the fuel that drives search engine optimization (SEO) results. With that level of importance, they need to be carefully researched. It’s a simple enough process creating a strategy for your SEO campaign, which should always start with keyword research. Once you have found keywords that will be helpful to your results, the next step is to build content around those keywords. Then you will need to upgrade content revolving around the main keyword. There are free and premium keyword research tools available across the web. Perhaps the most popular free keyword research tool is Google Keyword Planner due to its connection to its namesake.
Once you have researched keywords, you will be able to put together relevant keyword phrases related to your business that will get targeted results. Using relevant keywords is crucial since Google now looks at content as a whole, not just keywords. Be sure your content is specific as well. Let’s say you are the owner of a classic car dealership. Using the keywords “Classic Cars” is too broad a term, and you won’t rank very high in any search engine results. Cast a narrower net with a specific term like “1950 Red Ford Pickups” would yield narrower results, which are more likely to get clicks from a paying customer.
Organic is Good for Content Too
Free is always trumps paid in the world of search engine results. If you are a start-up or have a minimal budget, a pay per click campaign can become expensive fast and bring minimal results. If people arrive at your content organically, it is because they are engaged with it. This fact is why it is vital to generate organic traffic. When your content is achieving its full potential over blog posts, landing pages, and other content; it will bring higher rankings with Google and Bing regularly.
It is vital to make sure your content is of high quality and not too spammy. Search engines devalue content that uses too many keywords(keyword packing) and that are too much alike in meaning. Google and Bing eschew content that reads like a spam ad. Spammy content will not be among their top search results. With that in mind, be careful not to overuse keywords.
Bad Keyword Research and Practice = Bad Results
You can quickly get bad leads when you use keywords that aren’t specific to your company’s goods or services—using our classic car dealership example from before this time with the phrase “classic model cars”. Using that phrase could bring people to your site looking Packards, not 1950 Red Ford pickups. Even if weak keywords actually do bring an increase in traffic to your website, it would be bad traffic and would be unlikely to bring about any conversions. Guests who find they are at a site that does not have what they are looking for will bounce quickly.
When creating keywords, research the well, or your site may end up being shipwrecked, on an island alone among an ocean of other search results. If your keywords aren’t relevant to what your company does, nobody will know you exist. Be sure your content is not using overly generalized terms or terms that are spammy. If that is the case, your website may as well not be live.
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