Keyword Research Tools and Tips

Writing content for your website starts with keyword research. If you're new to writing website content, you may be asking yourself where to start. The easiest method would be to think like the visitor. Ask yourself, what would a website visitor type in to a search engine that should bring up your website? Lets say for example "designer". "Designer" is a pretty generic search term so you'll next want to identify what type of designer or add a location. This is referred to as a long trail keyword.

Identify Long Tail Keywords

A long tail keyword is a phrase composed of several keywords that are more specific in describing the keyword you are going after. Long tail keywords give me information into a search to narrow down results which intern means less competition and better rankings. This means that visitors are more likely to find your website when compared with a more generic search term.

For example, lets start with the a generic keyword "designer". Now lets identify what kind of designer. Are you a interior designer, landscape designer, or designer handbags. There are so many different Combinations of keywords that can be paired onto this one keyword. Lets say for example "web designer". We can narrow it down even further by going after "custom web designer" and even add a location such as "custom web designer seattle". This long tail keyword now tells us what kind of designer and the location.

Here is how it looks in terms of search volume:

  • "Designer" has over 600,000,000 results (way too many).
  • "Web Designer" has about 596,000,000 results (still too many).
  • "Custom Web Designer" has about 208,000,000 results (a bit more manageable).
  • "Custom Web Designer Seattle" has about 17,000,000 results (much easier to rank in).

The Keyword Suggestion tool within Live Imagination and Affinity Tracker will assist you in coming up with long tail keywords (pictured to the right).

Geo-Search Keywords

Google and many other search engines strive to produce the best more relevant searches for users. If a user enters a keyword that might be location based, lets say "plumber" then the search engine is going to use the user's IP address to determine local results. If you've included a location on your keyword, the search engine is usually able to determine what you mean based on the location entered. This means the results for a "plumber" for a user searching from a Seattle location will receive plumbers in Seattle first in their results.

Related Keywords and Keyword Combinations

Use different keywords that mean the same thing in your content and throughout your website. This allows you to cover a wider variety of search terms without straying too far from the overall text of your website. Some search engines (e.g.. Google) are able to distinguished the meanings of words and pair them with searches even if it doesn't match the visitors search query. You can also try keyword combinations of the same long tail keyword. Use the keyword research tool within Live Imagination and Affinity Tracker to find high search volume keywords that are related and different combinations to your targeted keyword.

In summary, write for people and not the robots (search engines). Don't stuff your page content with keywords to the point it is obvious. Some search engines have algorithms in place to identify this type or activity. Read your article when you're done and if it sounds like your stuffing it with keywords you probably are.