Jan 12
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Search engines are the vehicles that drive potential customers to sites all over the web. If you want visitors to reach their proper destination (i.e., your website) you will need to provide them with a specific and effective roadmap that will direct them to your site. The way that you do this is by creating carefully chosen keywords.
Think of the right keywords as the key that opens the door to your Internet store. If you pick the correct words or phrases, traffic will be pulling up to your front door. But if your keywords are too general and vague the possibility of visitors actually making it all the way to your site will decrease dramatically.
Your keywords serve as the foundation of your marketing strategy. You must have the proper keywords in order to get the right people to your website. You probably think you already know EXACTLY the right words for your search phrases.
Unfortunately, if you haven’t followed some specific steps, you are probably WRONG.
It’s hard to be objective when you are so passionate about your own site and your own work. However, you need to be able to think like your potential customers. Since you are the business owner and not the customer, your best bet is to go directly to the source.
The customer is an invaluable resource. You will likely find out that your understanding of your business and your customers’ understanding is significantly different. You will find the words you accumulate from your customers are words and phrases you probably never would have considered yourself.
Only after you have gathered as many words and phrases from outside resources as you can should you add your own keywords to the list. Now that you have your list of keywords built it is time to evaluate the keywords and settle on the ones that will work the best.
The goal here is to narrow down your list to a small number of words and phrases that will direct the highest number of quality visitors to your website. By “quality visitors” I mean those consumers who are most likely to make a purchase instead of just cruising around your site and taking off for greener pastures.
So, as you go about the process of evaluation all of your keywords, keep in mind the following three characteristics: popularity, specificity, and motivation.
Popularity is the easiest to evaluate because it is an objective quality. The more popular your keyword is, the more likely the chances are that it will be typed into a search engine which will then bring up your URL. The only problem here is, the more popular the keyword is, the greater the search engine position you will need to obtain for someone to make it to your site. If you are down at the bottom of the search results, the prospective customer will probably never scroll down far enough to find you.
Therefore, popularity alone does not make a keyword a good choice. You must move on to the next criteria, which is specificity. The more specific your keyword is, the greater the likelihood that the customer who is ready to purchase your goods or services will find you.
Let’s look at a hypothetical example. Imagine that you have obtained popularity rankings for the keyword “home repairs.” However, your company specializes in painting only. The keyword “painting contractor” would rank lower on the popularity scale than “home repairs,” but it would nevertheless serve you much better. Instead of getting a bunch of people interested in everything from building a new deck to plumbing needs, you will get only those consumers that need painting work performed.
In other words, consumers ready to buy your services are the ones who will immediately find you. Not only that, but the greater the specificity of your keyword is, the less competition you will face.
The third factor is consumer motivation. Let’s look at another example, such as a consumer who is searching for a job as a sales manager in a new city. If you have to choose between “Dallas job listings” and “Dallas sales recruiters” which do you think will benefit the consumer more? If you were looking for this type of specific job, which keyword would you type in? The second one, of course! Using the second keyword targets people who have decided on their career, have the necessary experience, and are ready to enlist you as their
recruiter.
You want to find the people who are ready to act or make a purchase.
Once you have chosen your keywords you should continually evaluate performance across a variety of search engines. Remember, visitor numbers alone do not make a good keyword; profits per visitor do.
You need to find keywords that direct consumers to your site who actually buy your product, fill out your forms, or download your product. This is the most important factor in evaluating the productivity of a keyword or phrase. Ongoing analysis of tested keywords is the formula for search engine success.
This may sound like a lot of work but the amount of informed effort you put into your keyword campaign is what will ultimately drive your business success.
