The problem of attracting the attention of a site, in an ocean of websites available on the Internet, is a challenging task. It is found that 90% of websites are getting no single organic hit from Google, which is a major issue encountered by most webmasters and content generators. However,SEO keyword research assists content writers in the creation of content targeted for specific intentions of use while at the same time promoting the content.
What is Keyword Research?
Keyword research is not only the identification of significant words and phrases, but it also undertakes the search into the customer’s minds. With knowledge of specific terms used by your prospective consumers in search engine marketing like Google, it is more comprehensive to position your marketing content to match these needs in order to attract a long stream of quality visitors. Effective keywrod research is a significant part of an SEO consultant.
Here you have an article that explains from scratch the tip of how to do keyword research with all essential tools and steps.
Types of Keywords
Not all keywords are the same; there is a difference, and it lies in the type of keywords that surround content strategy directly.
Matching Terms vs. Related Terms
There are several types of keywords that you are likely to come across the moment you type your seed keyword into the keyword tool:
- Matching Terms: Contains your seed words in any order or combination with the use of Boolean operators and proximity operators as well (e.g. “coffee machine” will return “best coffee machine”).
- Synonyms: These are keywords that are somehow connected to your seed keyword but do not necessarily contain it (for example, a keyword “brewing coffee” or “coffee recipes”).
Keyword Clusters
Keyword clusters include a grouping of keyword aspects of a common theme to act as a guide in providing content creation. For instance, both ‘whipped coffee recipe’ and ‘how to make whipped coffee’ may fall under a cluster of whipped coffee and it means you can answer both questions on a single webpage.
How to Understand Keyword Intent?
Keywords are categorized by intent:
Commercial Intent: In this case, it is a group of probable keywords people search before they are willing to purchase something (e.g., “best coffee maker”).
Informational Purpose: Search Request [Knowledge purpose] where the user is in need of information to gain knowledge (For instance how to brew coffee).
Local intent: It involves searches that are aimed at finding particular websites or places (e.g., “coffee shop close to me”). It is applied in local SEO optimization.
Thus, defining intent is very useful when it comes to creating content good for users and raising the chances of conversions.
Keyword SEO Metrics Explained
With such a large number of possible keywords, it is important to determine which keywords warrant further investigation. The reply can be found in the look of diverse SEO metrics.
Keyword Search Volume
This means the number of searches for each of the keywords has been averaged out to represent the monthly search average. But as it exceeds the quantity, be careful it might include multiple searches of the same user. However, this should go hand in hand with a high number of searches and it is very important to remember the competition degree coming with these keywords.
Traffic Potential
It is important to be able to estimate how much traffic a page can receive should it rank. To find out the nature of the overall organic traffic, an analysis of the ranking pages, and a list of keywords giving more light on the reach of the overall ranking can be used. In Keywords Explorer, Ahrefs will empower you to see activity potential as well as the volume of searches.
Keyword Difficulty (KD)
This is a measure of the difficulty of ranking for a given keyword, most of which depends on the number of backlinks on the leading pages. Most importantly, a high KD score should not be a cause for alarm; rather, it should be embraced as a signal for other topics that are likely to attract links given properly tackled.
Cost Per Click (CPC)
Specifically a tool for advertisement, CPC is used to determine how much the advertiser is willing to pay for each click on the advertisement concerning the keywords. This is interesting especially because URLs that contain high CPC are likely to have a hint of commercial value to them; meaning, they are likely to be profitable.
Growth
Volumes can change over time, hence, employing the “Growth” metric will let you know keywords rising in trend. To visualize these trends in time one might use websites such as Google Trends.
Business Potential
Last but not least determine how much it may benefit your business to rank for certain keywords. The business potential on a scale of 0 to 3 shows how relevant the given keyword is to your business. One should target keywords that have a high score on this scale if one wants the advertising to generate the right kind of conversions.
How to Get Started with Keyword Research?
Understand Your Audience
The first and principal rule of keyword research is that you ought to put your customer’s hat on. One must reflect on what they are looking for and how they phrase it or word it in the form of a question or issue. This we consider as the basis for identifying the keywords required for data analysis.
Utilize Keyword Research Tools
After becoming familiar with your audience’s language, the next step is to use the keyword research tools, for instance, the ‘Keyword Explorer’ from Ahrefs. You begin by entering what could be termed a “seed keyword,” a term that relates directly to your business or products. For example, if your topic is coffee equipment, then key phrases can be seeds like:
– Coffee
– Espresso machine
– Coffee grinder
– French press
The fact is that such seed keywords will bring you to a vast set of other related keywords.
Generate Comprehensive Keyword Ideas
Using the above-mentioned tools, it would be possible to compile a list of words that would be relevant to your field of specialization. For instance, for the Ahrefs tool, the outcome can be thousands of keywords that do not stress, as you will filter them down in the next step.
Analyze Existing Rankings
In case you already have a website, use Google Search Console to find keywords for which your website is currently optimized. This makes it easier to identify areas that necessitate optimization of the activities relating to the given pages. But you should know that there are no SEO analytics offered by Google Search Console so it would be quite difficult to identify the value of each keyword.
Engage with Your Niche Community
Forums, Q & A are the treasures containing your keyword treasures for your industry-relevant niche. Noticing the words that are being embraced by the audience, the questions they may be asking, and the topics that are popular are important. If you think that you are a coffee lover, for instance, it is suggested to participate in the conversation on Reddit or some materials linked to a specific industry might help to use keywords.
How to Do Keyword Research Using Free Tools?
However, there are some tools that can be used free of charge at the very beginning of the keyword research process:
- Ahrefs Keyword Suggestions: Input the seed keywords to get 20 related keywords as well as 20 questions related to these keywords together with a keyword difficulty rating and its monthly search volume.
- Google Keyword Planner: While it was created for advertising purposes, the tool provides keywords and their monthly searches and may exclude key data if you do not have an advertising account.
- Google Trends: This tool allows the user to search for specific keywords and trends in the market but it is not very specific.
How to Prioritize Keywords
However, it is the last and perhaps the most challenging step to identify which of the key terms gets to be targeted first. It depends on the following factors:
– Is your site newly established or well-established?
– Are you working solo or as part of a bigger group?
– Are you focused on generating leads or conversions?
Sometimes, the need is for traffic to come right away, and therefore high traffic, combined with low difficulty could be useful. However, if the aim is to generate leads, then one should concentrate on the high business type of keywords.
Setting Keyword Objectives
To help in the process of identifying keywords, set up goals for the short-term, middle, and long-term horizons. Although building up such positions will allow getting to the top for day-one search results related to high-value keywords, it is important not to focus too deeply on short-term goals.
Final Thoughts About Keyword Research
Keyword research is at the core of any SEO strategy and defines your chance to provide clients with useful content promptly. By creating an approach that involves identifying the audience and the right tools to use, as well as sorting the keywords based on intent, and tracking important values you will be able to create a solid foundation for the content to be effective when reaching out to the audience. The best approach is that the intended content is not only search-engine optimized but also capable of turning the visitors into buyers, to achieve the goals that search-engine optimization aims at.