Five
Steps to SEO Keyword Planning
1. Identify Your Customer and the World They Actually Live In
a. Because
your customer spends most of their time NOT searching for your product/service,
you have to find out their other areas of interest.
b. Doing
wider contextual research on your ideal customer, will provide hundreds of opportunities
to get in front of them in other ways.
c. Visit
forums and online communities where your ideal customer hangs out, and see what
your target customer searches for when he's not searching for your stuff.
d. Then use keywords
from those other areas of interest and create content, headings, and ads that tie-in
or bridge to your stuff.
e. Your
target customer will begin seeing your site or brand showing up in all of their
other contextual searches. And, when they're ready to buy, you will be at top
of mind!
f. Action
Step: answer this question:
My customer is ______________
If you're a wedding photographer, you might answer:
"My customer is a bride getting ready for her upcoming wedding."
2. Find Topics Your Customer Cares About
a. Go to
where your customer hangs out online, and look for topics they tend to discuss.
b. Look at Pinterest,
YouTube, Reddit, Blogs, Forums, etc.
c. Take
notice of the most popular topics, ideas, concerns, questions that your
customers spend time on.
d. Keep
digging until you find five (5) topics that your customer talk about in online
communities.
e. You may
want to create a spreadsheet to track your research (Description of target
customer, Topics, Where topics are found, Keywords, etc.)
3.
Find
Untapped Keywords
a. Use Google Suggests
i. First: Type
topic into google search bar and observe the list of longtail keywords that
google suggests underneath your search.
ii. Second: Put a
few spaces in front of search terms to see a completely different set of keyword
ideas generated by google search suggestions.
b. Use Quora
i. Search topic and see which keywords show up.
c. Use Reddit
i. Search
topic.
ii. Scan threads
for keywords and phrases that come up many times.
d. Use Google Searches Related To feature
i. Type topic
into google search bar.
ii. Scroll to
bottom of results and observe other Searches
related to your keyword search. These make great longtail keywords you can
target with your content.
e. Use Wikipedia
i. Type in
topic in search bar.
ii. Within each
article, observe the other entries (blue hyperlinks) that article links to for closely
related topics that might end up being keyword ideas.
iii. Scan the Table
of Contents for the article, which will include keywords closely related to
your topic.
f. Now that
you have a list of potential keywords, choose the best from your list.
4.
Analyze
Each Keyword's Commercial Intent
a. Can you monetize
the traffic? How likely is someone searching for a given keyword to buy from
you, or buy anything at all?
b. Use Google Keyword Planner
i. Type in
keyword and look at Suggested Bid
column. Shows how much advertisers are spending on AdWords for a single click
for that keyword. The higher the bid, the more valuable the keyword is.
c.
Count Google
Ads
i. Type your
keyword into Google search bar.
ii. Then observe
how many Google Ads appear in search results. The more Ads, the higher the value
of that keyword: Advertisers are fighting to bring searches for that keyword to
their site.
5.
Look at Each
Keyword's Search Volume and Keyword Trend
a. Google
Keyword Planner only includes a general search volume range for each keyword,
which is ok, but less than ideal.
b. Two
freemium sites that provide specific search volume for keywords:
i. SEMrush.com
ii. KWFinder.com
6.
OPTIONAL
STEP: Analyze Keyword Growth in Google Trends
a. In the case
where you have two keywords with similar search volume and commercial intent, Google
Trends may help you see which term is growing in popularity, and which is losing
favor.
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