How to choose Keywords?

[alexp3]

So how do you go about choosing keywords for SEO?

I have been using adwords for a while so have a bit of data on my clickthrough rates & average ppc for various keywords. Also I have used the keywords tools from google and have found about 25 possibilities.

With a limited budget is it worth ruling out the high competition keywords and concentrate on the medium keywords? On the main the medium keywords have a lot fewer monthly searches than the high keywords so I guess this is a negative.

Also how many should I be targeting? I have a smallish budget for SEO but have some time to put towards it.

 

[cts1975]

I sometimes use the high cost keywords in long tail phrases.
So for us an example would be :

"manchester airport taxi" 42p
"manchester airport taxi quote" 14p

Do a search on google for keyword spy - that should bring up a tool that allows you to look at other companies/competitors keywords.

 

[mariacntg]

Keep an eye on the competition, see who your main competition is (the best in your niche) and what keywords they use.

 

[Jonathan Senior]

How are people currently finding you ? If you are getting traffic, can you optimise what you already have?

If you have a small budget - 24 is too high I reckon. Can you whittle it down to 5 ?

 

[alexp3]

How are people currently finding you ? If you are getting traffic, can you optimise what you already have?

If you have a small budget - 24 is too high I reckon. Can you whittle it down to 5 ?

Just adwords currently although I am just starting to rank (lowly) for some keywords. Until a month ago I was ranking for nothing.

I think I can get down to 5 keywords but not sure whether to be ambitious and go for the high traffic/high competition keywords or something less competitive.

 

[Jonathan Senior]

I think I can get down to 5 keywords but not sure whether to be ambitious and go for the high traffic/high competition keywords or something less competitive.

Best off waiting for an adwords person to come along for this but for sure - your budget will go further if you got 5 keywords instead of 25...

 

[VictorTurner]

Keywords Selection Are The Basic Step For Online Business Promotion. Choosing The Right Keywords Are Necessary To Get Good Results. The Google Adwords Keywords Tool Is One Of The Best Service For Keywords Selection.

 

[NileLars]

I suggest you to target keywords which have low competition and high searches. With this practice you will have low low competition and high traffic.

 

[karths.info]

Hi i want a know the techniques and how to choose the correct keyword for my marketing company new website, within the tools used for getting keyword suggestion ..

 

[flx89]

Google keyword tool is the best resource. You can also try to type your first words from your keywords, and check what google instant suggests

 

[DanielMckay]

Start small. There is no point going after your main keyword straight away if you haven't done any SEO or your website is new, you need to build authority by going for the "low hanging fruit" which are long tail keywords (keywords of 2 words or above) with relatively low search volume but which you would rank for quite easily.

Once you have gained authority, built a natural link profile and are offering engaging content you can start to target more of the "juicier" keywords

Personally I go for the low hanging fruit first (these keywords seem to have the higher conversion rate anyway)

 

[Richard1992]

The best option for choosing keywords for your new website is to opt for more precise, low competition, ‘long tail’ terms. This will allow you rank quickly, increase traffic and increase sales.This is a very basic treatment of keyword selection for new website owners.
Best Regards,

 

[cscscard]

It’s easy to identify which keywords are relevant to your website because Google shares that information with anyone who wants it through the Google Keyword Tool.

 

[WebProfitsConsulting]

Alex,

Do you know which of the keywords from your adwords campaign result in some sort of meaningful conversion? If you know this then you have everything you need to put together a powerful keyword strategy. I would always suggest finding out using some paid advertising what the actual search volume and conversion is for a keyword as opposed to that shown on various keyword tools. Google's keyword tools will tend to inflate the number of searches, resulting in businesses chasing keywords that don't have the volumes behind them.

Use your adwords data to determine search volume and most importantly what is converting.

Once you've identified these then you need to do some competitive research to ascertain your prospects of ranking in the top 10 ideally top 3 of a search term query. There's a loads of paid tools out there to do this. You can do it manually but it will take you an age to do.

Once you've done the above and identified 5 or so target keywords drop me a PM and I'll run them through some analysis tools which will give you some idea of how competitive they are.

Hope that helps.

 

[Sammy86]

When selecting keywords for an SEO campaign, I always divide the website into different categories & do a complete research of different keywords along with variations. I not only look at the Search Volumes & Competition but also the relevancy. In case of a huge list of keywords, I try to choose the keywords with high Search Volumes & low Competition. Your final list of keywords does not have a fixed number of keywords but you should include only the once that is relevant.

 

[abclassifieds]

you need to simply have it so the competition is lower than either the global or monthly searches, generally i would use global as monthly can be very irratic for some reason.

but dont get too keyword bound, its great to use a keyword tool, but some of my best traffic pages have been ones where i just added a keyword phrase from adwords, but made up the others and they generate more traffic than the adwords keyword, but in adwords they show up as having no traffic.

 

[mouli]

I think the google keyword tool in the adwords account is the best source as the tool itself generates relavent popular keywords.

 

[abclassifieds]

Google keyword Tool and google adword is the best option to chose the best keyword.

 

[flackoknutson7]

I think one of the best ways is to look at the Google nudge (start typing in the keywords you are looking at and see what Google suggests). Google is constantly changing these suggestions (in an attempt to inflate keyword prices on Adwords I presume). A lot of webmasters neglect this for some reason and I have found it to be invaluable.

 

[Anastasiya]

The best keywords are 2- to 4-word phrases that accurately describe what you offer using everyday language that searchers are likely to type in, and which aren't so competitive that you have no chance of getting on the front page. The main rule is to avoid single-word terms, terms that are not focused to what you offer, unpopular terms and highly-competitive terms. Here is how to choose the good SEO keywords http://www.ehow.com/how_2189968_choose-seo-keywords.html

 

[NitroSEO]

The highest traffic keywords are not always the best to target, especially where seo is concerned. For example, "weight loss" gets 18,100 exact match searches according to Google, where as "hypnotherapy for weight loss" gets only 1600 exact match searches within the UK. The lower volume keyword is more targeted to an actual product, where as the main keyword is extremely broad. My point is, target specific "buying keywords" as you will get better results in the end.

 

[Lucas Shrek]

Keyword analysis is necessary as they are the one which improves the ranking of the web page. Keep an eye on competitor and see from where you are getting more clicks and plan according to it.

 

[middleastravel12]

1. You choose the keyword low competition and searches high.
2. keyword select use keyword phrase.

 

[eventdomain]

You need to go after what people are typing in - to try and guess all manner of combinations is just crazy, as most wouldnt type a bunch of rubbish in anyway - there's got to be some accuracy to a search or you'd struggle to get the right searches come up.

You have 2 choices:

You either design a seperate website to assign keyword ownership to.. which means you'd have to take up that new job. Or, you stay content on the deeper pages and hope to scrape clients that way.

I agree with the above posters - you got to find the most accurate keywords for what your website does. Remember - search engines and tools like accuracy and searchers want an easy life while wading through the SERPS, so make it easy and be accurate.

 

[FIZIX Agency]

I would select low competition keywords that are relevant to certain niche's within your market that are high value.

It's more about looking at your business, market and audience and finding the best keywords to achieve a specific goal; rather than looking directly at competitor keywords or what keywords are leading to traffic now.

Of course if you have keywords that generate traffic and lead to conversion then optimise it.

One thing I've found is that you can ignore or put a lower priority on an aggressive phrase and find yourself performing well for that phrase. We've been surprised by that.

 

[Astrogy]

I suggest also using google keywords tool (you enter adwords site and find in in Tools). It's also best to sort keywords according to the number of searches. Ideally, you want to choose the ones mos t searched but with medium or low competition. Of course, you should include high competition terms if they suit you best, but don't concentrate only on these.

 

[Amanda Dawson]

Keyword should be one with higher searched vol. and lower competition

 

[Baz Watkins]

Keyword strategy can be fairly simple, you just need to put yourself in the mind of the searcher, who will more often than not look for a mixture of term + location or term + location + value i.e. web design cardiff and cheap web design cardiff.

So with that in mind you build a small list of phrase, exact and possibly negative keywords that utilise that term in both long and short tail variants.

Big keywords lists are ok, but I prefer to build a campaign around one keyword with 20 or so variations and with 2 to 4 ads for testing. I then build a new campaign for each new keyword, and point it to the relevant landing page with a cta that matches the ad.

As for costs etc, underbid on high cost terms and own the low cost ones if you can, and don't forget that Google quotes keyword cost as an ideal (for them), usually they are cheaper except when we are talking about keywords likely to be used by major industry players i.e. insurance.

A small company can build a successfull series of low cost campaigns this way, but they have to plan and prepare well and drill down and manage the campaigns at a micro level.

What tends to happen however is that they just get a few hundred keywords all in one campaign wth maybe 3 ads and priced at a cost that Google quotes, and they then get depressed at the lack of return.

So in relation to your original question choose your keywords how the searcher would and build a new campaign per keyword, whilst paying an optimal value for each.

PS don't forget to turn off ads when people are aslepp, its just wasted money.

 

[directmarketingadvice]

So how do you go about choosing keywords for SEO?

I have been using adwords for a while so have a bit of data on my clickthrough rates & average ppc for various keywords.

Hopefully, you've also been collecting data on conversions, so you know which search terms are bringing people who find what they want on your site.

No point in SEOing for non-buying terms. (Or 'non-buying from you'.)

Also I have used the keywords tools from google and have found about 25 possibilities.

With a limited budget is it worth ruling out the high competition keywords and concentrate on the medium keywords?

I'd suspect there are just too many factors for a general rule of thumb.

For example, I'd imagine it really depends on the skill of the person doing the SEO. If they don't have the ability to get you p1 rankings for the high competition terms, then there's no sense in having them SEO for those terms.

If they do have the skill to get such rankings, then they should also be able to give you a rough cost-benefit comparison between the different strategies (short tail v long tail) that makes sense for your budget.

Hope this helps,

Steve

 

[abclassifieds]

Google's Adwords Site is one of the best I have tried. You will also be able to learn many other web masters tool from Google.

a2bclassifieds.com

 

[Ninja Commerce]

Hi Alex.

Firstly, if your budget is limited, then yes it might make sense to go for less competitive phrases. This is for a couple of reasons:

As has been mentioned, longer tail phrases often convert better anyway, so whilst the search volumes are lower, you can make more sales - and you will get rankings faster as a bonus. Basically, the ROI is better.

But even if you think that you might get a better ROI on a more competitive term, if you are going to run out of money before you see that return, the point is moot.

---

Anyway, to answer your actual question. I used to use a lot of data when picking keywords, now-a-days I still look at data, but I try not to let it guide me so much...

Firstly, highlight the terms that you think you can be most competitive on. If you see a search term and think to yourself "I can solve that person's problem" then that is a good start. Try not to target terms which are not totally relevant.

Hopefully, that will help narrow down your options. Now Google each phrase and have a look at who is ranking, ask yourself whether your site is a better match than these sites that are ranking. How can you make yourself better.

Any time you spot a phrase where the sites currently ranking aren't a great fit, or could be improved upon, you have an opportunity to position yourself.

The one thing I would avoid, is the temptation to go after keywords that are not 100% relevant just because they seem to be low competition.

 

[WebMeUp]

Choosing keywords is a complex activity, and you can expand or cut it depending on your project, or keyword number, or competition in the industry. The more competitive is the environment, the more accurate and deep you analysis should be.


First you have to think of all the words that can be associated with your business, products or services. As you have the list, try to combine the word into phrases to get even more variants. Search for synonyms and professional terms. Then it’s time to use some help from Google Keyword Search or any software that provides the same functionality. The more results you combine, the better.


After that you need to look through your competitors’ keywords. Look through their meta information and texts, look through the SERP and discover where they are now.



Now you have a bunch of keywords, but it’s obvious that you have to choose from them. Not all of them can be good for your business. First of all, think whether the keywords are going to sell anything (or serve your purpose anyway). For example, if you own a cafe in Manchester, this is useless to choose ‘cafes in London’. Also pay attention to the SERP on these keywords. If the SERP is commercial (meaning that most of the sites are selling something), it’s okay for you are a business or product seller. But say you sell shoes, then you don’t have to choose ‘medieval shoes history’ keyword for optimization. It’s good when you have time to look at the SERPs for all the keywords and analyze them properly.


The next step is to count KEI, competition and number of searches and displays for each keyword. Now delete those which do not correspond to your resources (most competitive keywords are expensive, let’s be honest), your SEO strategy (high, mid or low frequency keywords – it depends). Here your activities can vary a lot. For example, if your project is very specific, that low frequency keywords are the best for you.

 

[Mary S.]

I use Google keyword tool. But also it is useful to to Google adwords learning center and study about keywords. They have also some good review slideshow into learning materials.

 

[fontenot]

Hi all,
Keyword having less competition and high searches sholud be choosed..You can use Adwords or to get Organic keywords you can check with google directly to know the position of the keyword and no.of competitors before you..

 

[Sir Charles Dawson]

The key is finding "low-costing" keywords. Keywords relating
to the topic or business your advertising for should also have
a little big of competition. Those types of keywords are usually more
profitable.

Try playing around with the "Google Keyword Tool" its free.

 

[piyushaegis]

Yes, definitely google adward is good option for selecting keyword.

 

[imran7777]

these line will help you to choose the best key words ,be creative but be choosey,try not to target that pharhase that are too competitive,if there is unusual words associated your content that you think people might search for,or miss speling, include them sparingly.

 

[rbsmith]

Firstly i would like to suggest you make sure what types of services your business provides and find relevant keyword through the name of service by Google ad-words keyword tools. If you business service is insurance related then your keyword may be life insurance, health insurance, car insurance and so on.

 

[pinterestmarketing]

IMO, I would choose at least 5 keywords with medium and low competition with at least 500 hits. In choosing your keywords, I always go with personal judgement. From the 25 possibilities, I would think myself which of the keywords relate the most to my site.