Keywords are words or phrases that people use when they search for something on a search engine like Google. Websites will try and use these keywords on their site in the hopes that Google will display their website when a person searches for a particular keyword – resulting in more traffic to that website.
The process of finding the right keywords is often called keyword research and it is absolutely crucial that every site owner knows how to do it properly. So, we are going to cover what keyword research entails and how you can go about finding keywords for your blog.
What is keyword research?
Not all keywords are built the same. Some keywords have a lot of searches per month, but they also have very high competition (i.e. A lot of other sites are trying to rank on Google for those keywords). Other keywords have very few searches per month, but they also have very little competition. So, in the end, which keywords a person wants to use are heavily dependent on their situation and what they want to accomplish with their site.
Most keyword research is going to be done using the Google AdWords Keyword Planner, which makes it easy to find keywords and see how many searches they get per month and how much competition there is for a particular keyword. The objective of keyword research will be to compile a list of keywords that the person running the site thinks they can rank for.
How to find keywords for your blog or website
First off, start by using a keyword tool (like the one linked above) to start researching keywords that you could potentially use on your site. When you are in the research stage, you can never have too many keywords, so try to take down as many as possible, you can always whittle them down later.
Once you have a solid list of keywords, as well as information about the number of searches and the competition, start thinking about what keywords on your list you can actually rank for. Smaller sites and blogs should not attempt to rank for high competition keywords, it is just too difficult.
Once you have a solid set of keywords picked out, you can start trying to rank for them by writing articles, putting them in descriptions, etc. Of course, this means that the keywords you search for should be highly relevant to your blog’s topic, and the content your audience is interested in reading!
Spot on, Paul! In many instances though, this is one important task that gets sidetracked. Thanks for the reminder. 🙂
Thanks!
So, I use keyword research for my website (and our clients’). Because I want folks to find our firm- so we need to entice themwith the things they find of interest.
Now, my blog? I use keywords there, too- but they are relevant to the matter that I am describing, and want folks to find the topic. But, I don’t “mine” keywords for that0 I use the terms that describe the technology, the business metric, or the thoughts involved.
And since that works for you, Roy, keep it up!