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Market Research Methods For SEO Rankings 
By Julie Francis (c) 2008 

Keyword research is the first step we take towards SEO rankings
but sometimes these market research methods have a poor effect
on our sites because we don't fully understand the concepts.
Give me the facts - I'll draw my own confusions! It is a complex
subject and even when we think we know it well, we often trip
over something simply because we don't know it's there. What you
may not know can hurt your SEO rankings and sometimes a heavy
hand with what you do know can too.

A problem that search engines encounter often is the design of
websites that purely use advanced programming such as C++,
JavaScript or CGI. If the navigation links within your site are
powered by these advanced scripts alone, the search engine will
not be able to fully browse your site. You need to provide links
in basic HTML so that the engine can read your website. Its
difficult to get SEO rankings for something that can't be read
and indexed.

It can take months for a website with a new domain name (.com,
.org or .edu) to show up on search engines. Google has imposed
an ageing delay on new websites so that it doesn't waste time on
indexing websites that don't last long. If later you want to
change your domain name, I suggest you rethink and use what you
have instead. A cosmetic facelift of your existing web pages
along with several new good quality SEO articles may serve you
better in the long run for SEO rankings. When you already know
all the ins and outs of your website, then it's so much easier
to revise than replace because of familiarity. If you think a
better domain name is called for by all means buy it and put a
blog on it, linking to your existing site. Best of both worlds
and extra links.

Some internet marketers make the mistake of placing researched
keyword requirements above that of article quality. It is
necessary to use market research methods for keyword phrases
because until you know what other people are targeting and what
the competition is for some key phrases you may be mistakenly
optimizing for SEO rankings on something you just can't have.
Once you have eliminated these saturated phrases, you have a
better idea of what you may be able to use.

At first glance, it will still seem sensible to optimize an
article for researched keywords rather than be concerned with
artistic considerations, true relevance or honest, from the
heart writing. However, bear in mind that not everyone will want
to buy your product or idea even if it is suitable to everyone.
You know that what you sell is saleable only to a certain target
market. If you prioritize keyword optimization in your article
just for SEO rankings, rather than writing the article for the
sake of the product you want to sell and to offer information to
your target audience, chances are you will attract buyers for a
commodity that you do not have.

The keyword here is relevance. A person searching the internet
for something he needs will filter out the search results by
using their own theory of relevance. My suggestion is, write
the article for the sake of your product and for your target
customers information. Place the priority of keywords as a
secondary consideration. It's all about relevance. Sure, it
would be a plus for you if you manage to pull in lots of traffic
even if they don't want anything to do with your site or
products. But believe me, misleading a person on the internet is
a risky business. Search engines analyze your hits and bounce
rates and, if your traffic clicks away after seconds, they know
your site isn't satisfying them by showing them what they need.

Be specific with your keywords. Don't generalize. The biggest
disadvantage of internet shopping is that customers cannot
scrutinize the product personally. What they usually do is find
out from other sources what the product is all about, how it
works, etc... When they decide to finally buy, they know in
detail what they're looking for and will most likely use a
specific name brand as part of their search strings. Your
keywords need to be able to match those strings in terms of
number of words matched and how the order of those words match.

For example, when looking for bras, women need to order by
using their torso and cup size. So, the bra size could be a 36 B
or a 36 C. Then there are colors to choose from like red,
burgundy and black. A bit more specific is the bra
classification. Is it a half-cup or a push-up, or is it a sport
bra? With these factors in mind, you can conclude that a woman
looking for a bra on the internet can type in "black push-up bra
36-C".

If you are selling products with criteria such as this, use
this specific information for your SEO rankings. Do you have key
phrases to match those kinds of search strings? Are the words in
your key phrases arranged in the same order? The final
consideration is the article where those keywords are embedded.
If the article is just a small jumble of words full of keywords,
the search engine will most likely discard your website in favor
of another that has a good paragraph of relevant descriptive
information. This will decrease the SEO ranking of your website
for each search results page.
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Rich Niche Blogging, a website with free tutorial resources for
bloggers, announces the release of Niche Market Research Methods
for SEO. The new ebook is designed to help writers get SEO
rankings and offers training to start a niche blogging business.
http://richnicheblogging.com/Niche_Market_Research_Methods_for_SEO.html
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