After discussing how important it is to set and keep within a budget (Lesson One) and the importance of finding a niche market that you can feel passionate about (Lesson Two), we are now going to embark on a key Internet marketing success strategy:

How to Get the Right Keywords for your Website

There is a lot to discuss, so today’s lesson is jam-packed with detail.

So, let’s dive in!

KEYWORDS = Words that are used in search engine searches to find specific information, products or services.

Keyword Research: “How Do I Choose Good Keywords For My Website?”

Keyword research is the process of determining which keyword phrases best describe your website’s products and/or services. Obviously, that will depend on the niche market you have chosen (see Lesson Two). When you have chosen some keywords, you will need to narrow down your list by doing some further research and asking, “What keywords are people searching for?”

If you have not thought about how to get the right keywords for your website you may not be getting the most suitable visitors and those who do land on your pages may not want to read your information or buy your products.

How to Get the Right Keywords: A 3 Step Process

Keyword research can be broken down into a three step process.

Step 1: Discovery Phase

In this step you want to focus on identifying as many keywords or phrases as possible.

Initially you need to sit down and brainstorm a list of keyword/keyword phrases that address the topic of your web site. Have a dictionary and thesaurus handy. At this point include every word or phrase that you can think of. The point is not to find the best keywords at this stage.

Keyword Research Tools

There are several keyword tools that are available to help you generate a keyword list, but the most popular free tool is Google’s free Adwords Keyword research tool. You can access it here:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

The Google Adwords Keywords Tool is very useful for keyword research, but there is a drawback: everybody else uses it!

Another tool you can use is Google Suggest, or a free tool that uses Google Suggest and other suggestion-based keywords to provide you with an instant list of keyword suggestions.

I use http://ubersuggest.org for this purpose.

Step 2: Analysis Phase

This step involves analyzing the popularity and competition for the keyword phrases.

Using Google’s Adword Tool

You can use Google’s Adword tool to get an idea of the value placed on a keyword (i.e. its competitiveness) by checking the “Estimated Avg. CPC” (Cost Per Click) column after you have entered a keyword and a suggested CPC value. NOTE: The CPC column is hidden by default so you have to turn it on. To do that, log in to Google and click on the “Columns” button on the right and scroll down until you find the CPC option and turn it on.

Add up the total number of searches for your TOP 5-7 keyword phrases to find the total search volume.

Between the 5-7 keyword phrases, the sum of all of them combined, should total at least 75,000 – 100,000 searches per month.

That means at minimum, you should have 5 keyword phrases that get searched 500 times per day. Or 7 keyword phrases that get searched 350 times per day. You get the idea. If you don’t have that much…then the niche is not worth pursuing. Move on to the next one.

(Note, although you want your TOP 5-7 keywords to attract a reasonable number of hits, the rest of your list can also be useful for pulling in extra traffic.)

Step 3: Keyword Selection Phase

From your analysis phase, you should be able to identify a number of high quality keyword phrases that accurately describe the qualities of your website.

Select a dozen keywords and key phrases from your list. This is a very important exercise and you should spend at least a couple of hours, if not more, researching different keywords.

While you are researching your keywords, check your competitors by doing a search in a couple of popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, etc., using those keywords. Keep a record of your competitors’ URLs and other information because you don’t want to waste your time doing the same search again in the near future.

When using search engines to find which sites use the exact keyword phrase, place it between inverted commas, “” to narrow down the search.

In your final selection of keyword phases you need to look for phrases that have a high level of search activity, while the level of competitiveness is relatively low.

To make your final selection of 15-20 of the best keywords and keyword phrases you will want to do a Google search on the keyword phrases and view the top web sites listed for each phrase. Also, check the number of competing sites. Don’t be put off by high numbers, but initially, aim to get your site in the top 1-5 ranking on the first page for keywords that are on no more than 5,000 sites.

Longer keyword phrases (also known as “long tail keywords”) can be used to get one or more of your webpages to the very top of the rankings for some less frequented but highly relevant search terms, so feel free to cheerfully attack phrases with just a few sites to compete against.

Are the top listed sites professionally designed? Can you design a web page that can move up into the top ratings for this keyword phrase? It is not as difficult as you may imagine, especially when you bring article marketing (Lesson 9) and blogging (Lesson 5) into play.

One Keyword Per Page

When starting a new web site it’s highly recommended to target only ONE UNIQUE KEYWORD per page. With your newly researched keyword list you can write your content with a balanced use of unique phrases that will help generate traffic to your web pages.

Keep in mind these simple rules every time you want to launch a website. Learning how to get the right keywords and spending a few days upfront in the preparation of your site will pay off in the long run with better search engine rankings.

Lesson 4: SEO

David Hurley