website keyword research. the techniques
Website last updated: Saturday April 27, 2019
The importance of keyword research
If you want your website to rank high in the search engine results it is essential that you undertake extensive keyword research before a word is written! There are basically two types of keyword and in each case they are not "words" but complete phrases. If I were researching the correct keyword for "alsatian dogs" that could be described as a normal keyword search. I just typed that keyword into Google and got 450,000 results. Typing "German Shepherd" into Google returned 14,600,000!
It's quite clear from this that the second phrase is the most common. The question is, which one to use? If you use the former it's almost certain that you won't get many people searching for that keyword(s) because 450,000 results is low in internet terms. On the other hand using "German Shepherd" would ensure that people were actually searching for your keyword but unfortunately it also indicates the huge amount of competition there is for that phrase.
It can be seen from the above that keyword research is not so straightforward. Fortunately there is an alternative type of keyword and these are known as long tail keywords. Generally speaking any keyword phrase that uses three or more words can be classed as a long tail keyword.
Long tail keywords don't have as much competition when it comes to ranking in search engines so it seems like a good idea to use them along with the "normal" keywords. An example of a long tail keyword would be, "german Shepherd puppies for sale". Obviously I've just invented that but you get the idea.
Deciding on keywordsOnce you have decided roughly what keywords might apply to your web site it's time to do some proper keyword research. Some ways of doing this are listed below.
Google's keyword tool works well and is free. You need a Google account to use it but that's easy enough and if you have a Gmail account you can simply log in with that. Note that this planner is actually designed for people who are using Google Adwords, i.e. who are placing advertisement on web pages like the ones on this site but that doesn't stop us using it. If you don't fancy using Google's tool just search the web for keyword research. I just typed that into Google and got 6,710,000 results! Some of these are free and some charge so be careful.
To use Google's keyword tool look at the left hand side once you are signed in. There are three options and the one you want is the top one, "search for new keywords using a phrase, website or category". Enter your keywords in the box that opens. You can fill in some of the other boxes if you wish but that isn't necessary at this stage. Now scroll down a little to get to "get ideas button" and click that. You will get a graph showing information about the keywords you typed but scroll down and you will see many other suggestions as shown on the next page.