7 Min SEO Tip – Keyword Research
There is no question that SEO is a complex topic. URLs, 404s, 301s, Google, Caffeine Updates, Yahoo is now Bing, Mobile strategy, local search, more acronyms that you can shake a stick at… and the list goes on and on.
So where do you start with SEO?
With keywords. Keywords are really at the core of everything that search engines do. So what is a keyword? According to Wikipedia, a keyword is:
a term that captures the essence of the topic of a document
Straightforward? Every document (read: page) on your webpage should have a keyword that captures the essence of its being. Perhaps that is a little grandiose… but you get the idea. One keyword per page. That keyword tells us what the page is about.
So, how do you pick the keywords for your webpage? SEO professionals will use many different tools. But the best free place to start is with Google’s Keyword Tool
Imaginary Case Study: Pepe’s Organic Bakery for Dogs
Pepe Jones has started a bakery for pooches in Vancouver’s notoriously dog friendly Kitsilano neighborhood. The storefront is open, the dog biscuits are baked and ready to go, there is only one problem, Pepe needs customers!
Pepe decides that in addition to working on his word of mouth and direct marketing campaigns, he is also going to invest in some time, energy and money in search engine optimization for his newly launched website.
But how are people going to find Pepe’s Castle of Dog Goodies? Will they search ‘dog biscuits’, ‘dog treats’ or ‘dog cookies’? Or none of the above?
Here is how we find out:
1. Lets head over to Google’s Keyword Tool
*make sure you click “advanced options” and click “Canada” (or where ever you are) as a location. Also change “Show results for” to “Ideas containing my search terms”
2. Now we are just going to do a couple of refinements of the data to make sure that we are getting the right information
a) Just below the header that says “Keyword Ideas” then all the way over on the right of the page is a button called “columns”. Click that button. This will bring in a pop-up. Here click “Estimated Avg. CPC”, (CPC means Cost Per Click), unclick “Global Monthly Searches” hit save and the page should reload with the new data. This will include all of the PPC bids for the keywords and just the data from Canada. Before you say “But we are not doing PPC, we are doing SEO and my market is the world!”… just give me a sec… we will get to that!
b) In the left hand-column most of the way down the page there is a box that is titled “Match Type”. Uncheck “broad” and check ”exact”. The page should auto-reload the data.
Phrase match (signified with “keyword”) is a search query that contains the phrase exactly, but can also contain other words before or after. This is like a revolver, good from middle distance, but you are still taking your chances as the user could be looking to “buy”, “compare” or “review” your product. You are still guessing their intent.
Broad match is anything that Google deems relevant to the search query. This is the shotgun of keywords, spraying buckshot on the side of a barn. Broad can be useful to gauge and industry, but is imprecise for what we are looking at.</aside>
3. So now we have our exact match keywords and our average CPC data. What do we do with it?
First things first, click the “Estimated Avg. CPC” link at the top of the keyword ideas. You may need to click it twice, but what you want to happen is have the most expensive keyword at the top and all other keywords fall below.
What can we infer from this? The higher the CPC bid, the more value that click ads to the business because the advertisers are willing to pay more for it. For example, look at the following three keywords:
- ‘buy cars’ –> CPC $2.53
- ‘compare cars –> CPC $1.65
- ‘review cars’ –> CPC $0.81
Advertisers have determined that the phrase “buy cars” has more commercial value and hence can be bid higher. The assumption is that whoever is searching that term and clicking an ad, is further along in the buying cycle than someone who is searching for “compare cars” or “review cars”. The “buy cars” keyword has a higher commerciality. </aside>
4. Pick those keywords
Here is the fun part. With the keywords sorted by CPC from high to low, scan across at the other columns. The second place to look is competition. The more white the better. Solid green means that there is going to be stiff competition for those search terms. You should follow the Blue Ocean Business Strategy and head the other direction!
Finally, and most importantly, you are looking for search volume. Local monthly searches. There is no number that it too low here (besides zero) or too high. It all depends on your market.
In relative terms, you are looking for keywords that have:
- High CPC
- Low Competition
- High Local Monthly Searches
And those are your keywords. Back to Pepe, a quick scan of the results reveals there may be opportunities in the following keywords: (keyword, CPC, local monthly searches, competition)
- Natural Dog Treats $3.26 46 3/4
- Discount Dog Treats $2.53 210 4/5
- Organic Dog Treats $2.30 46 1/2
- Cheap Dog Treats $1.50 140 5/6
- Healthy Dog Treats $1.48 46 3/4
- Iams dog biscuits $1.15 91 3/4
- dog treats $1.13 320 3/4
- jerky dog treats $0.98 170 3/4
- homemade dog treats $0.93 480 1/4
- dog biscuits $0.89 110 2/3
- all natural dog biscuits $0.84 170 3/4
- making dog biscuits $0.75 91 1/3
So where you do see the best value in that list of keywords? Go ahead and pick your top three. I’ll wait…
Ready? Got yours? Now pick your bottom three!
Here are my top three and why:
1. Homemade dog treats. It is the biggest volume of search, still has high commerciality and I love that low competition. It might not be a perfect fit for the business, but I could see a page with a couple of recipes set up on it, as well as some of Pepe’s Classic Versions that you could pick up in store only.
2. Organic Dog Treats. Ok, the search volume is low here, but so is the competition. And this fits perfectly with Pepe’s product offering. Pepe just needs to be sure that the page he creates for this keyword has… Organic Dog Biscuits all over it!
3. Discount Dog Treats. Competition is a little high here, and the search volume is ok, but the commerciality is what steers this keyword into the top three for me. It is a chance for Pepe to offer a new product line. Maybe market all his day-old doggie biscuits at a ‘discount’
Here are my bottom three and why
1. Iams Dog Biscuits. If someone is searching a brand name and you do not offer that brand, do yourself a favor and just get out of the way. Or start to offer that brand. But don’t stick your nose in where it doesn’t belong.
2. Making dog biscuits. There is an opportunity here for Pepe to educate potential customers on the art of the biscuit. But the commerciality is relatively low. This is more of a long term growth opportunity than anything else and I would avoid it for the first interjection of keywords
3. Jerky Dog Treats. This is a gut feeling one. Knowing what I know about the good people of Kitsilano (They like Sushi, Yoga and Organics) I am not sure that Jerky is at the top of their minds.
So what were your top three? Do you disagree with any of mine? Let me know in the comments below!
Great Advice Jesse. Thank you.
I agree with your choices but would also inclued all natural dog biscuits because of it’s low price and number of searches.
Don,
I thought I commented here weeks ago. The concern I have with that keyword choice _is_ the low price. You want high commerciality when you are thinking only SEO.
Talk soon
Jesse
reffering to this article again, cause I am finally getting a blog strategy together. great post jesse.