Keyword search and research is required to identify attractive target keywords for your pages.
When you search on Google, millions of results appear from the database in less than a second. These results are sorted, starting with the best match at the top, and less relevant as you go down.
Google ranks websites according to the analysis of major two factors:
- On-Page SEO – What your web page says its about
- Off-Page SEO – What other pages on the web say that your page is about
Setting Goals of Keyword Search
1.High Relevance
When you put a Search Term into the search box, Google looks in it’s database for the most RELEVANT pages that match your enquiry. Google always places the most RELEVANT result at the top of the search engine results page, and the results are deemed to be increasingly less relevant as you go down the page.
On the most basic level, if your page mentions the keyword or phrase that someone has typed in the search box, then it puts your page ‘in the ball park’, however, if you want to be on the first page for a particular search term, you have to do substantially more to rank above your competition. For example, a page that has thorough and in-depth content around that keyword or phrase, will always rank higher than a page that only vaguely mentions the keyword. Why?
When searchers get high quality relevant information in answer to their search, they are more likely to stay on your site, and more likely to become a customer.
2.High Traffic
On one hand, it’s quite easy to think of a search term that gets you to the top of Google, but it won’t necessarily generate any traffic, if NO ONE is searching using that term. In fact, its possible to be ranked number one on Google, for a certain term, and still not get any traffic to your website, because no one uses that term.
So, you have to do the research that allows you to discover the keywords that your target market is using. And, these can change over time, changing from season to season. In other words, you need to meet the changeable needs of your target audience, and ensure you get found by the people who want what you have.
Once you have found a search term relevant to your page and target market, you next have to consider how much competition there is for that term, from other websites. The greater the competition for a particular search term, the less chance your page will rank high for that term. So, the skill is to find a great search term that has low competition.
Summing Up Keyword Search
Keyword search has moved on from just using the obvious or ‘general’ search term. These days, people are more specific in their searches, and have a better idea how to quickly find what they want. So you have to be prepared to think ‘outside the box’, to find relevant terms with high traffic and low competition.