Focus on the Right Keywords
The most critical step in having a search engine-friendly Web site
is to choose the key words or phrases that are most relevant and
popular with your target audience.
Stick primarily to two or three word phrases rather than individual
words. Because of the staggering number of web pages that are indexed
by the major search engines, competing for a spot on the first or
second page of search results on a one-word keyword will be a losing
battle. You'll just be one of thousands of web sites vying for that
top position.
Another reason to focus on phrases is that Internet users learn
over time to refine their searches in order to get more relevant
results. Someone searching for "digital camera reviews" instead
of "cameras" will get a fraction of search results, and those results
will be much more useful to them. The good news for you is that
achieving a top ten position for a search phrase such as "digital
camera reviews" is a much more attainable goal, and will yield a
much more qualified prospect.
There are now a number of resources to assist you in identifying
the most popular of relevant keywords. One such tool is provided
by GoTo.com, called the "Search Term Suggestion Tool." This useful
tool tells you how many times a particular key word or phrase was
searched on by users of their search engine during the last month.
Thus, you can determine relative keyword popularities. For example:
- A car manufacturer or dealer will discover that "car" is over
five times more popular than the keyword "auto".
- A fragrance manufacturer will find that "perfume" is over four
times more popular than "fragrance".
- A country inn will learn that "lodging" is over five times more
popular than "accommodation," and nearly thirteen times more popular
than "inn".
- A clothing retailer will find that "clothing" is 30% more popular
than "clothes," and nearly twice as popular as "apparel".
With such information, you can then decide which search keywords
to focus on, and just as importantly, which ones are obscure and
not worth much attention. You can access this tool at http://inventory.goto.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/.
If you have a single keyword in mind, you can use the GoTo tool to
suggest good key phrases to target, ranked in order of popularity.
For example, enter "clothing" and you'll be presented with related
key phrases such as:
- baby clothing
- kids clothing
- maternity clothing
- womens clothing
- childrens clothing
- plus size clothing
- vintage clothing
Note that GoTo combines singular and plural forms and displays the
keywords in their singular form.
Additional keyword brainstorming tools worth investigating include
WordTracker (http://www.wordtracker.com/freetrial.htm)
and Lexical FreeNet (http://www.lexfn.com/).
The latter can suggest keywords that are related in meaning, are
spelled similarly, rhyme, or are even anagrams.
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