It is not possible to implement a successful SEO strategy without first finding the best keywords and search phrases to target. When you research your market's keyword demand not only do you learn which phrases to target with your SEO, you also learn a lot about your customers.
Keyword research will provide you with intelligence on market demand and will also allow you to provide a service or product that internet users are already searching for. When you know what people are looking for and the search phrases that they use to find these products or services, you can plan and implement an effective SEO strategy and position yourself perfectly.
In this article we will be taking a closer look at keyword research and how to choose the best keywords for your SEO campaign. With the information that you obtain from your keyword research you will be able to determine the potential value of the search traffic that can be generated by your chosen keywords and this will allow you to decide on a SEO budget.
Keyword Research - Where to Start:
- Make a list of search phrases or words that describe your market
- Use phrases consisting of 2 - 5 words
- Research the demand, popularity and competition for each keyword or phrase on your list
- Use Google AdWords Keyword Tool or Wordtracker's Free Basic Keyword Demand Tool to research your words.
- Trim your list down to the 20 keywords with the highest number of monthly searches and lowest number of competitors
How to Determine the Potential Value of a Search Phrase:
- Buy a campaign for the chosen keyword on Google AdWords
- Choose "exact match" and point the traffic to the most relevant web page on your site
- Track the impressions and conversions for at least 200 clicks
- If the keyword generated 1000 impressions over a 24 hour period and 50 visitors came to your site with 5 visitors converting to a profit (not revenue) of $100, then a single visitor for that keyword is worth $2.
- The 1000 impressions in 24 hours should generate a click-thru rate of 30%-40% for the #1 ranking website on the organic search results for that keyword.
- This will result in 300-400 visits per day valued at $2 per visitor.
- In this example the keyword would potentially be worth $600-$800 dollars per day.
Choosing the Best keywords for your SEO Campaign:
- Is the keyword relevant to what your website offers?
- Will visitors using this search term to find your site, find what they are searching for?
- Will the traffic resulting from this search term convert into sales?
- Search for the term in the major search engines. If there are search advertisements along the top and right-hand side of the organic results, this phrase is valuable and is a good keyword for conversions.
- How difficult will it be to reach the top 10 results? If the top 10 spots are occupied by strong and established competitors you might have to work hard for months before your website will feature in the top results.
Keyword research is extremely important to your website SEO and the benefits are numerous. If you take the time to conduct proper keyword research you will be able to target search phrases that can convert into sales. Successful and profitable keyword optimization and SEO campaigns need to be focused on keywords with a high return on investment. The time and money that you invest in a search engine marketing campaign must be weighed against any returns generated from the campaign.
Based on your dieoriptscn, it is difficult to tell what is actually occurring on your site. If you setup separate actions for each type of conversion (sign-up and sale), you should be able to tell how many people clicked on one of your AdWords ads and either performed a sign-up, sale or both. The first conversion will be counted as a 1-per-click conversion. Each subsequent conversion will be a many-per-click conversion.