How to Conduct Keyword Research for SEO Success

How-to-Conduct-Keyword-Research-for-SEO-Success-

It won’t be an exaggeration to say that the art and science of SEO starts with Keyword Research. As the name implies, it’s about identifying specific keywords relevant to your business and optimizing your website using the exact keywords.

So when website visitors type these keywords, if your website is optimized for them, it’s more likely that your website will appear at the top of search results, increasing the chances of traffic and conversions.

 

Why is Keyword Research so Crucial?

Keyword research enables sites to find relevant, targeted keywords that match their audience’s search intent. This increases organic traffic and conversions and, more importantly, lets Google understand website offerings and improve rankings. More than anything, it enhances user experience as they read valuable and informative content on your website.

Long story short, keyword research is the bedrock upon which your website’s SEO success is based.

 

What If you Ignore Keyword Research?

Without keyword research, websites won’t rank, as Google will ignore such sites. This means lead generation, traffic generation, and sales will go for a toss.

 

7-Step Approach to Conduct Keyword Research

Follow the seven-step approach given here to conduct keyword research correctly.

 

Step 1: Identify your Business Goal and Pin Down your Seed Keyword

The process of keyword research starts with “knowing your business goal.” First and foremost, you’ll need to have a crystal clear idea of your product or service.

I need to sound a caveat here. Think twice before entering a competitive space. Many players won’t give you an inch of space on SERPs, given that their entire marketing machinery will be working around the clock to ensure that they rank on Google and rank well.

My point: Choose a less competitive seed keyword with a reasonable volume. For instance, if you are targeting the skin care industry, rather than taking a broader approach and targeting a highly competitive keyword like “Skincare Products” for your website, you can narrow down your seed keyword strategy to “organic skincare products,” “natural beauty products,” “vegan skincare,” or “anti-aging cream. ” Take the the help of paid SEO services to be dead sure of the seed keyword you are selecting.

 

Keyword: Skincare Products
Keyword Difficulty Level: Hard
Search Volume: Less than 1000

 

 

Keyword: Best organic skin care products
Keyword Difficulty Level: Medium
Search Volume: More than 100

 

For the uninitiated, seed keywords are primarily those words that represent your product, service, or industry. Put simply, they are the core terms and phrases you use to define your product or service. Use this keyword as a base to build on your keyword list – words and phrases that potential customers might be searching for.

Pro tip: Mixing and matching both long-tail and short-tail keywords lets you optimize your content for better search engine ranking.

 

Step 2: Check Out Volume, Difficulty Level, and Keyword Intent

Boot up your Excel sheets and list all the likely keywords your target audience could use in searches. The keywords could be related to the pain points your customers seek solutions for. For instance, if artificial skin care products are proving ineffective and customers are looking for an alternative, your seed keyword “natural skincare products” could fit the bill.

Look for long-tail keywords and keyword variants along with their volume and difficulty level. According to SEOwind’s CEO, Tom Winter, keywords with low to moderate difficulty and a search volume of 10-300 are ideal for targeting.

Use keyword research tools such as Google Keyword Planner, Semrush, Ahrefs, or Moz to identify relevant keywords and their search volume and competitiveness.

Next, look for search intent. What do customers think when they type a keyword into the Google search box? Are they looking for more information, referred to as informational intent? Or do they have a commercial intent, i.e., the customer is in the process of buying and is interested in gathering as much information in that regard? Or is it a transactional intent, i.e., looking to buy something right away? Or it could simply be a navigational intent, i.e., looking for a specific website.

Slash and dice the pages that already rank on SERPs for natural skin care products to gather more data on your search intent. Are there more informational blogs (informational intent) or product pages that talk primarily about cost coupled with a short description (commercial intent)? Or are videos about huge discounts on natural skincare products ranking higher (transactional intent)? Or it could even be a mix of any of these intents.

 

Best Organic Skincare Products

Informational Intent Keywords ●     “How to choose the best skincare products”
●     “Benefits of using natural skincare”
●     “Tips for healthy skin”
●     “What are the latest skincare trends?”
Commercial Intent Keywords ●     “Best skincare products for acne”
●     “Reviews of organic skincare”
●     “Compare anti-aging creams”
●     “Information on natural skincare ingredients”
Transactional Intent Keywords ●     “Buy best skincare products”
●     “Order top-rated skincare”
●     “Purchase anti-aging skincare”
●     “Subscribe to skincare box”

 

Additional Considerations:

  • Long-tail keywords: Combine keywords to reach a targeted audience, such as “best organic skincare products for sensitive skin.”
  • Local keywords: To localize, include your city or region, e.g., “best skincare products in Kuala Lumpur.”
  • Seasonal keywords: Target seasonal trends, e.g., “winter skincare tips”.

All this “intent research” will allow you to understand what’s essential in Google’s eyes regarding a specific keyword query. So, find out what kind of intent resonates with your keyword “natural skincare products.” If content with product descriptions backed by customer reviews primarily shows up in Google searches, you should follow suit and create similar content with unique detailing.

 

Step 3: Identify Keywords your Competitors are Ranking For & Steer Clear Of Them

As mentioned above, it’s better to steer clear of keywords your competitors already rank for in your niche. Why? Because it might take ages for you to rank for those competitive keywords, and that too, if luck is on your side. Playing with competitive keywords like playing with fire, you will only end up with burnt fingers.

You’d better go with low-competition keywords and Google them. You can find them with Google Keyword Planner, along with their pay-per-click rates. However, it’s not that you won’t face any competition there. You may encounter quite a few popular brands backed by popular TV and radio commercials that rank well for low, competitive keywords. So, your chances to rank even for low-competition keywords will be challenging. One surefire to tackle competition is to find out what their content lacks and then connect the dots with your unique angle.

 

Step 4. Focus on Keyword Clustering

Keyword clustering is combining keywords with the same or similar intent. Instead of creating multiple pages, you can target the keyword clusters with one page.

 

This is how you can create keyword clusters for keywords like “organic skincare,” “natural beauty products,” and “anti-aging.”

Keyword Clustering for the term “Organic Skincare”

 

 

Keyword Clustering for the term “Natural Beauty Products”

 

 

So, you can create a page or a blog post for both these keywords and their variants, not individual pages for each keyword listed above.

However, apply an ample amount of thought to the kind of content that you plan to create for these keywords. Nail down the search intent. And how can you make your copy stand out in the sea of the same copies? Coming up with thought-leadership content is the need of the hour.

 

Step 5. Keep an Eye out on SERPs

Keywords and keyword clustering are all crucial to ranking high on search engines. But then, I guess that isn’t enough. You also need to look out for “People Also Ask” and other related searches, which are kinda hints from Google to searchers as to what they should click next. You can grow your keyword list based on this info.

 

Step 6: Check Whether your Keyword strategy is Working

Once your fully optimized landing page or blog is up and running, it’s time to wait and watch. This wait-and-watch period could last from 1 to 6 months. Your content should have made it to the first page by this time.

You could simply type the keyword in the search box to check Google rankings. Another way is to use Google Search Console to determine the keywords for which you are ranking. You could use a keyword tracking tool to monitor the rankings.

Whichever tool you use to track your keywords, the idea is to see if your efforts are worth it. If not, it’s time to go for a re-run. In other words, write more content with a different set of long-tail keywords. And then sit back and see how it fairs. Yes, evaluation of how your keywords are performing is an endless exercise. Ranking on page one for your seed keyword may take a hell of an amount of time and effort. You may have to rework the same content over and over again, but that’s how the online industry works. You can consult SEO companies to help with keyword strategizing and content development.

 

Step 7: Build on your keyword List and Content Regularly

As mentioned, you need to keep reworking your content. But parallelly, you will have to build your keyword list as well. Why? Over some time, users may start using different keywords, and even the search intent might take a U-turn—informational intent could be hijacked by transactional intent; you never know. So, there’s no way out but to be on our toes and keep building the list.

And with AI taking over the online space, you can never be sure how your keywords will behave. Even blogging could go out of the window, which makes it all the more important to keep your keyword strategy updated.

 

Keyword Research is the Axis on which SEO Revolves

There you go! Seven steps that could help you pin down targeted keywords, optimize your website content, and, in turn, attract more organic traffic. But then, don’t forget it’s not a once-and-done-forever thing. Content revisions based on old and new keyword research should be an ongoing process in your organization to ensure the continuous success of your business. Customers are fickle, which means their search queries could keep changing, which means you can never give your keyword research a rest. Good Luck!

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    Comments
    1. CodeSquadz Education on November 27, 2024

      Keyword research is essential for SEO success as it helps identify the terms your target audience searches for. Start by brainstorming topics, using tools like Google Keyword Planner or Ahrefs to find relevant keywords. Analyze search volume, competition, and intent to prioritize keywords that align with your content goals and audience needs.

      Reply

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