Choose Your Keywords Wisely
Are you looking in the right places for keywords that deliver relevant traffic to your pages? Chances are your overlooking positioning opportunities that if coupled properly with a bit of off page promotion, could yield hordes of long tail traffic.
Competitive keywords may be great at the end of the day, but why settle for one competitive term, when you could have dozens of long tail keywords that deliver a steady stream of traffic to your pages.
What is the long tail?
For those unfamiliar with the concept, instead of conducting a search in search engines for a term “buy a car” which is broad and general, they might use “buy a new Ferrari F50 in
There is nothing wrong with reaping the rewards of long-tail traffic. People typically employing long tail search terms are looking for more than just information they are closer to the purchasing cycle as a result of them seeking more relevant results. Long tail searches are statistically higher up the conversion chain as action-based queries have eager surfers attached with card in hand and are ready to make a move.
Similarly, each time a search is conducted, it is by the use of the determined keywords that search engine sort, eliminate and prioritize websites with the highest relevancy for those terms.
The role of an optimization specialist is to “raise the bar” for each of the associated keywords that a prospect might use (while conducting a search) to create a correlation between the wide range of potential terms and the optimized site in question. Naturally everyone wants to rank in the top 10 for a series of keywords, but in order to accomplish this feat, you must appease search engines and their stringent on and off page criteria.
Search Engine Positioning breaks down to a few noteworthy factors.
Content and composition
Categorization and Orderliness of related data
Link
Feedback, Traffic and Popularity
First up.
Content and Composition:
Search engines catalog and index millions of pages and websites each day, there are specific guidelines that they use in order to separate the garbage (poorly written, off topic or grammatically challenged jibber jabber) with materials that are notably authority resources (well written, informative, concise information).
Keep your writing style on topic, use references when applicable and always try to focus the information on the page to a maximum of 3 unique distinctive topics in order to maintain consistency for your marketing message.
If you wanted to write a long winded thesis for example instead of an informative article, breaking it into sub categories and pages would create a higher relevance for each of the respective areas (if ranking in search engines was a concern).
Composition:
Once the writing style is addressed and your pages are air tight, there are two things to consider here, who you link to and who links to your pages. You can link to your own pages to create relevance through internal linking or you can uplink to other sites that are more established to slingshot your pages up the food chain to catapult past your competition.
Well written content reinforced by up-linking to the appropriate pages. Link to authority sites (or sites that rank higher than your own for the subject) can create continuity for the topic in question. This way, if someone does not find all of the pertinent information on your pages they can always find out more about the topic.
This also can elevate trust in search engines which will then reward your site (by association) with such indicative authority sites you link to. Many webmasters use .edu’s, Wiki’s, .gov and trade/ industry / news related websites in order to uplink their pages.
Oftentimes this will result in elevating your relevance as a resource site and others will link to you on the merit of your pages contribution to the topic. This can also present additional opportunities to ask for a backlinks later down the road from the authority sites you link to that take notice.
One of the main factors for achieving high rankings (for multiple terms) is to include pertinent facts that reinforce a themed relevance for your pages. If you have one page about a topic and several other pages that are off-topic it makes it difficult for search engines to decipher the true purpose of your pages. Themed pages rank higher by default because they all reference the other pages in some way shape of form. This is called keyword density and applies more to your site as a whole (like a book that contains a table of contents or an index).
Categorization and Orderliness of Related Data
In the past, many webmasters would create a series of unique domains (with keyword rich domain names, tags and titles) to focus relevance for each mini site and then up link them to one main site to escalate their money maker into the spotlight.
This practice is now frowned upon by search engines and can present a morally challenging dilemma as it is a gray / black hat (search engine manipulation) tactic, so if you feel your site has more than one focus, you can essentially separate it into sub-domains (refined-topic.yourdomainname.com) to accomplish the same themed relevance without getting the penalty for excessive over-linking or restructure your pages internal links to accommodate the Siloing of topical information.
So now that you have your pages created, your internal links are intact and referencing the others with the most appropriate anchor text, your site structure is impeccable now what?
It’s time to build some links. With so many methods for building links, it is not about any one particular format, but rather a required which are all dependant on the competition, the industry and just how high the allinanchor ceiling is for the related keywords your site is built around.
For example, we were hired to optimize a website in the promotion industry, the first thing we might do is.
1) Perform keyword Research - Start researching the top ranking keywords for the site. Depending on the domain age and site structure, if it is decent, then we may have to make some on-page changes to beef up the relevance for the keywords, but assuming that all is in order, then a minor update to the content, tags and titles (to match the links we will be building) would be in order.
2) Create a keyword cloud by taking the top 10 keyword combinations using a tool link Wordze for example and then create content that uses the keywords in a logical and relevant fashion. After we integrate the keywords, those would serve as homing signals for the off page SEO to synchronize the backlinks with the internal links (a key factor in SEO).
3) Find the existing keyword allinanchor relevance / ceiling of the site in it’s existing form. This means we would find one of the highest ranking phrases it currently receives traffic from, wrap that term in “quotes” and conduct a search in Google to get the exact match form of the keyword competitive ceiling. From there, we can determine how competitive the term is and based on the number of results returned “in quotes” (located in the blue bar under the search term) we could gauge, just how much juice the pages currently wield. If the pages non domain related keywords (as keywords in the domain rank easier) are above 50,000 results, then we know that we have leeway up to 100,000 results as an aspiring target for our efforts. In order to ensure that we have created an appropriate profile, we may use several keywords to assess the sites strength.
4) Next we would create a series of articles and submit them to various ezines (and link back to the pages using links with the keywords we wanted to optimize for each respective page. This would produce a nice rounded mixture of IP diversity for the first batch of link building and later assist in getting a nice mix of links. Aside from that, you have key directories, guest blogging, viral marketing, social media and getting links from authority sites to bolster your rise to the top. Link building is the key to long term SEO defense and can stop others from pushing your pages aside in the rankings. Not to mention, if done correctly they can elevate your pages to the top of search engines for multiple terms. Essentially I would refer back to the keyword cloud (list of 10-20 keywords) and find places where I could link back to the site, using a wide variety of overlapping key phrases. This would raise the allinanchor relevance of the site up each time someone used them combined in a search which would essentially blanket the entire market (one batch at a time) whenever someone used those keywords. Staring with vague 4 word terms, then moving to three word phrases, two words, and then one word terms can eventually be acquired through this method.
Feedback, Traffic and Popularity
Traffic and popularity is another way to hasten authority for your keywords. If you promote your pages well through using any of the methods outlined in #4, then search engines will begin to notice the increased traffic and response to your content.
If your site is getting thousands of visitors per month and your competitors is only getting 100 visits per month, for a related topic, who do you think will wind up moving up the relevance ladder and who will have to step down? Wordpress blogs are great for this as they are already categorized and themed and siloed in nature, the manage links well and spread the link juice evenly to each page.
Now, all you need to do is create link bait, either break the larger pages into compelling posts, reference the longer in-depth pages in the links of the link bait posts or pages, use social media to drive traffic (like stumbleupon) and sit back as the pages age with a steady flow of backlinks, internal links, traffic and uplinks to top off the equation. Do this until each of your pages has 20-40 links per page providing support to it’s content, the reevaluate the need for tweaks and revisions to the pages, or modification of the pages (301 redirects, no follow tags, etc) to leverage the most link juice to the pages that have the best chance of ranking the highest.
One method use Google and use the following link command site:yourdomain.com keyword then the pages returned are the ones with the highest allinanchor relevance. The page at the top is the most suited for building links to that page with THOSE keywords. If you see one further down the list, them you can build that on up as well to create a well rounded allinanchor profile for your pages.
Are you looking in the right places for keywords that deliver relevant traffic to your pages? Are the keywords you target <strong>overly competitive</strong> or <strong>moderately competitive?</strong> What is your goal a few high ranking positions (which could takes months to a year) or several less competitive keywords that can yield a steady flow of traffic immediately, or is it a combination of both methods that your targeting with your optimization methods?
Chances are your overlooking positioning opportunities that if coupled properly with a bit of off page promotion, could yield hordes of long tail traffic.
Competitive keywords may be great at the end of the day, but why settle for one competitive term, when you could have dozens of long tail keywords that deliver a steady stream of traffic to your pages.
<h3>What is the Long Tail? of Search</h3>
For those unfamiliar with the concept, instead of conducting a search in search engines for a term “buy a car” which is broad and general, they might use “buy a new Ferrari F50 in
There is nothing wrong with reaping the rewards of long-tail traffic. People typically employing long tail search terms are looking for more than just information they are closer to the purchasing cycle as a result of them seeking more relevant results. Long tail searches are statistically higher up the conversion chain as action-based queries have eager surfers attached with card in hand and are ready to make a move.
Similarly, each time a search is conducted, it is by the use of the determined keywords that search engine sort, eliminate and prioritize websites with the highest relevancy for those terms.
The role of an optimization specialist is to “raise the bar” for each of the associated keywords that a prospect might use (while conducting a search) to create a correlation between the wide range of potential terms and the optimized site in question. Naturally everyone wants to rank in the top 10 for a series of keywords, but in order to accomplish this feat, you must appease search engines and their stringent on and off page criteria.
<h3>Search Engine Positioning Breaks Down to a Few Noteworthy Factors.</h3>
Content and composition
Categorization and Orderliness of related data
Feedback, Traffic and Popularity
First up.
<h3>Content and Composition:</h3>
<strong>Content: </strong> Search engines catalog and index millions of pages and websites each day, there are specific guidelines that they use in order to separate the garbage (poorly written, off topic or grammatically challenged jibber-jabber) with materials that are notably authority resources (well written, informative, concise information).
Keep your writing style on topic, use references when applicable and always try to focus the information on the page to a maximum of 3 unique distinctive topics in order to maintain consistency for your marketing message.
If you wanted to write a long winded thesis for example instead of an informative article, breaking it into sub categories and pages would create a higher relevance for each of the respective areas (if ranking in search engines was a concern).
<h3>Composition</h3>
<strong>Composition:</strong> Once the writing style is addressed and your pages are air tight, there are two things to consider here, who you link to and who links to your pages. You can link to your own pages to create relevance through internal linking or you can up-link to other sites that are more established to slingshot your pages up the food chain to catapult past your competition.
Well written content reinforced by up-linking to the appropriate pages. Link to authority sites (or sites that rank higher than your own for the subject) can create continuity for the topic in question. This way, if someone does not find all of the pertinent information on your pages they can always find out more about the topic.
This also can elevate trust in search engines which will then reward your site (by association) with such indicative authority sites you link to. Many webmasters use .edu’s, Wiki’s, .gov and trade/ industry / news related websites in order to up-link their pages.
Oftentimes this will result in elevating your relevance as a resource site and others will link to you on the merit of your pages contribution to the topic. This can also present additional opportunities to ask for a backlinks later down the road from the authority sites you link to that take notice.
One of the main factors for achieving high rankings (for multiple terms) is to include pertinent facts that reinforce a themed relevance for your pages. If you have one page about a topic and several other pages that are off-topic it makes it difficult for search engines to decipher the true purpose of your pages. Themed pages rank higher by default because they all reference the other pages in some way shape of form. This is called keyword density and applies more to your site as a whole (like a book that contains a table of contents or an index).
<h3>Categorization and Orderliness of Related Data</h3>
In the past, many webmasters would create a series of unique domains (with keyword rich domain names, tags and titles) to focus relevance for each mini site and then up link them to one main site to escalate their money maker into the spotlight.
This practice is now frowned upon by search engines and can present a morally challenging dilemma as it is a gray / black hat (search engine manipulation) tactic, so if you feel your site has more than one focus, you can essentially separate it into sub-domains (refined-topic.yourdomainname.com) to accomplish the same themed relevance without getting the penalty for excessive over-linking or restructure your pages internal links to accommodate the Siloing of topical information.
<h3>
Now that you have your pages created, your internal links are intact and referencing the others with the most appropriate anchor text, your site structure is impeccable now what?
It’s time to build some links. With so many methods for building links, it is not about any one particular format, but rather a required which are all dependent on the competition, the industry and just how high the <strong>allinanchor ceiling</strong> is for the related keywords your site is built around.
For example, we were hired to optimize a website in the promotion industry, the first thing we might do is.
1)<strong>Perform keyword Research</strong> - Start researching the top ranking keywords for the site. Depending on the domain age and site structure, if it is decent, then we may have to make some on-page changes to beef up the relevance for the keywords, but assuming that all is in order, then a minor update to the content, tags and titles (to match the links we will be building) would be in order.
2)<strong>Create a keyword Cloud / List </strong>- by taking the top 10 keyword combinations using a tool link Wordze[dot] come for example and then <strong>create content that uses those keywords in a logical and relevant fashion</strong>.
After we integrate the keywords, those would serve as homing signals for the off page SEO to synchronize the backlinks with the internal links (a key factor in SEO).
3) <strong>Find the existing keyword allinanchor relevance / ceiling</strong> - of the site in it’s existing form. This means we would find one of the highest ranking phrases it currently receives traffic from, wrap that term in “quotes” and conduct a search in Google to get the exact match form of the keyword competitive ceiling.
From there, we can determine how competitive the term is and based on the number of results returned “in quotes” (located in the blue bar under the search term) we could gauge, just how much juice the pages currently wield. If the pages non domain related keywords (as keywords in the domain rank easier) are above 50,000 results, then we know that we have leeway up to 100,000 results as an aspiring target for our efforts. In order to ensure that we have created an appropriate profile, we may use several keywords to assess the sites strength.
4) <strong>Promote them with links</strong> - Next we would create a series of articles and submit them to various ezines (and link back to the pages using links with the keywords we wanted to optimize for each respective page. This would produce a nice rounded mixture of IP diversity for the first batch of link building and later assist in getting a nice mix of links.
Aside from that, you have key directories, guest blogging, viral marketing, social media and getting links from authority sites to bolster your rise to the top. Link building is the key to long term SEO defense and can stop others from pushing your pages aside in the rankings.
Not to mention, if done correctly they can elevate your pages to the top of search engines for multiple terms. Essentially I would refer back to the keyword cloud (list of 10-20 keywords) and find places where I could link back to the site, using a wide variety of overlapping key phrases.
This would raise the allinanchor relevance of the site up each time someone used them combined in a search which would essentially blanket the entire market (one batch at a time) whenever someone used those keywords. Staring with vague 4 word terms, then moving to three word phrases, two words, and then one word terms can eventually be acquired through this method.
<h3>Feedback, Traffic and Popularity</h3>
<strong>Traffic and Website popularity</strong> is another way to hasten authority for your keywords. If you promote your pages well through using any of the methods outlined in #4, then search engines will begin to notice the increased traffic and response to your content and move you up the index accordingly.
If your site is getting thousands of visitors per month and your competitors is only getting 100 visits per month, for a related topic, who do you think will wind up moving up the relevance ladder and who will have to step down? Wordpress blogs are great for this as they are already categorized and themed and siloed in nature, the manage links well and spread the link juice evenly to each page.
Now, all you need to do is create link bait, either break the larger pages into compelling posts, reference the longer in-depth pages in the links of the link bait posts or pages, use social media to drive traffic (like stumbleupon) and sit back as the pages age with a steady flow of backlinks, internal links, traffic and uplinks to top off the equation.
Do this until each of your pages has 20-40 links per page providing support to it’s content, the reevaluate the need for tweaks and revisions to the pages, or modification of the pages (301 redirects, no follow tags, etc) to leverage the most link juice to the pages that have the best chance of ranking the highest.
One method use Google and use the following link command site:yourdomain[dot]com keyword then the pages returned are the ones with the highest allinanchor relevance. The page at the top is the most suited for building links to that page with THOSE keywords. If you see one further down the list, them you can build that on up as well to create a well rounded allinanchor profile for your pages.
Once you achieve a saturation for the allinanchor relevance (links pointing at your pages from other sites using keyword in the text) your website will begin to rise up the search results for numerous related searches where any one of the keywords you have optimized in involved. Depending on the industry and the competition, it is not difficult to see just how effective this can be to blanket an entire industry for multiple terms through following the fundamentals discussed above.
Article from the SEO Design Solutions blog
