charlotte-seo-graphic-33Every successful SEO plan is designed around the keyword phrase(s) that will be targeted for a particular website. Do the right preliminary keyword research, and you’ll likely get the results you are looking for: improved rankings in the SERPs for the term(s) you’ve optimized for and an increase in targeted traffic. Do this wrong, however, and you will have wasted a whole lot of time (and possibly money, too!).

Keyword research is what separates novice SEO’s from true professionals. Anyone can find keywords using a tool like that provided by Google, but few know how to sift through the results to find the right keywords.

It would take all day to detail the intricacies of effective keyword research, but here are some of the main areas of focus:

Search Volume

Behind every individual keyword phrase, there is an associated “search volume.” The search volume is an approximation of how many times the keyword phrase is searched for each month in the search engines. It’s important to know the number of monthly searches for a keyword to decide whether or not it is worth targeting.

Keyword Intentionality

When choosing keywords, it’s important that you try to get inside the mind of the person doing the search. With localized searches, it’s usually pretty obvious (i.e. “dentists in Charlotte NC”).

Sometimes the search results may not exactly be what you would expect, though. If you search in Google for the keyword phrase “how to save a life,” you might expect to see listings about first aid, CPR, the Heimlich Maneuver, etc. Instead, however, you will find information on the song, “How To Save A Life,” by The Fray.

Evaluating the Competition

The sad truth is that if you want to rank on the first page for a particular keyword phrase, you are going to have to kick one of the current listings off!

Because of this, it’s important to know what it is going to take to accomplish this before deciding to optimize for the term, or if you can even realistically expect to rank well for the keyword. In some cases it can be nearly impossible to rank for a desired keyword.

There are literally hundreds of SEO-related factors that come into play when determining your competition. Again, SEO consultants should be experts on evaluating the competition in the SERPs, and further, how the optimization of your website compares to that of the competition. Shoot us a message using our contact form or the form at the bottom of the SEO page for a free evaluation of a keyword or keywords that your website could potentially rank for, and what the competition looks like.

Share and Enjoy:

Related posts:

  1. Some SEO Terms Every Business Owner Should Know

Filed under: SEO