Keywords are ground zero. They are essential to your online
success. You must get your keywords right or it's game over
before you even get started. Mainly because keywords are
the most important element of your online marketing.
It can't be emphasized enough, especially to beginning
online webmasters or marketers, choosing the right
profitable keywords will largely determine whether or not
you succeed with your online endeavors. You simply must get
this element right or your marketing will be in big trouble.
What are Keywords?
Lets start at the very beginning, keywords are the exact
words someone types into a search engine to find what
they're looking for on the web. Some keywords are
valuable/profitable, while others are virtually worthless.
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Profitable keywords are the ones that convert into a sale,
a lead or potential client/customer for your company or
product. These are the words someone is searching in order
to buy a product or hire a service. Someone searching for
"honeymoon vacation packages" is probably in the market to
book a honeymoon vacation and could turn out to be very
profitable for the right website or business.
Profitable keywords are the ones where the searcher is in
the right "mind-set" or frame of mind to buy what they're
searching for on the web. Tailor your online marketing to
target these profitable keywords and it can spell success.
So what's the whole process for finding or choosing
profitable keywords to use in your marketing? Lets look at
some ways to proceed...
Number of Keyword Searches?
You need to find out how many searches are made for your
chosen keywords each month. Simply use WordTracker or a
site like SEOBook. These will give you a preliminary number
of searches made each month for your keyword. Highly
popular, well-searched keywords with hundreds of thousands
of searches each month will be extremely hard to rank for
because you will have stiff competition from major
companies with limitless resources.
I like to pick less popular keywords that get only a couple
of hundred of searches each day because my chances of
getting on the first page greatly increases. But don't get
fixated on the number of searches, some keyword phrases
that only get four or five searches daily, can still be
very profitable.
For serious keyword research in a particular niche market I
like to use Brad Callen's Keyword Elite which is
professionally designed software that makes all your
keyword research so much easier. But there are plenty of
free keyword tools you can use. One handy keyword tool is
Google
Adwords external suggestion tool which will help you
find valuable keywords.
Commercial Intent of Keywords?
But how do you know if a keyword is profitable? Well, one
convenient tool is from MSN which helps you with "Detecting
Online Commercial Intention" of keywords. Just type in a
keyword and it will give you a percentage or probability
your keyword query has commercial benefit or intent.
Conversion Rate of Keywords?
Once you have your chosen keywords in place, next you want
to have a landing page that converts those keywords or
traffic from those keywords into buyers or leads for your
online business. This is another crucial element of your
online marketing - you must have a landing page or
content/site that converts into a sale or you obviously
won't make any revenue.
Keep in mind, if you're into affiliate marketing, you main
goal is not to sell but to "pre-sell" your products or
services. One effective way I have found to do this is to
give potential customers/clients valuable information they
can use in making their final purchasing choice. Comparison
sites do well, as do review sites, top ten sites...
potential customers use the Internet and keywords to not
only find products but more so, to find information on
those products. Your goal should be to provide this
valuable information to make their task a little bit easier
for them and they will reward you with a sale.
Long-Tail Keywords?
Long-Tail keywords are simply that: long three or four word
phrases that searchers use to find what they're looking for
on the web. Because they are highly specific, long-tail
keywords have proven to have better conversion rates than
general keywords. This is also just common sense, someone
searching for a "2005 ford mustang convertible" may just be
in the right mind-set to buy such a vehicle; as compared to
someone searching for a more general keyword phrase such as
"sports cars."
Study your website traffic logs religiously to find
long-tail keywords that turn into a sale. Target these
long-tail keywords in your marketing. Even buy PPC (Pay Per
Click) advertising in the three major search engines -
Google Adwords, Yahoo! Marketing and MicroSoft AdCenter -
for these valuable/profitable keywords.
And build higher rankings in organic search for these
long-tail keyword phrases. It's really not that difficult
for long phrases, especially if they're related to your
site; many times you can reach the top spot in a matter of
days, especially in Google.
How to Rank High for Your Chosen Profitable Keywords?
Of course, the million dollar question is: HOW do you rank
in the top spot for your chosen keywords? I believe the key
to ranking high in the search engines (especially Google)
is to be persistent in building your rankings for your
keywords. Take a long-term view or approach, sometimes it
may take months, even years, to rank in the top Five for
your highly competitive keywords.
The best strategy is to "stick to it" and keep building
relevant links to your keyword landing page. Create related
blogs with valuable content linking back to your keywords.
Write keyword related articles and distribute them all over
the web. Create Google Alerts for your keywords and then
place comments/links in the newly formed pages on the web
that Google is indexing.
Be pro-active, download the SEOQuake toolbar and find your
main keyword competitors. Check out their links and then go
out and get the same links. Write better, higher quality
content than your main competitors because Google always
rewards great content. Plus, use the free Addthis.com
button and let your visitors bookmark your great content in
all the social bookmark sites and build your keyword links
for you.
Do keyworded Press Releases with your embedded links and
spread them all over the web. Get these Press Releases into
Google news and other important places on the web.
PRWeb.com is really a great place for your press releases
since you can embed your keywords in your links.
If you can try to get your most important keywords in your
domain name. Many SEO experts argue the merits of this but
from my own experience and marketing - it is much easier to
rank high for your keywords if you have them in the domain
name. Again, it is just common sense, if you have your main
keyword in the domain, this keyword is obviously telling
the search engines this is what your site is all about. I
have even bought domains and created sites specifically
around certain keywords just to rank high.
Always remember, you have to be persistent, I have been
fighting some keyword battles for over four or five years!
For really profitable keywords, it can be a constant
struggle to remain on the first page, but the trick is not
to give up, just keep fighting away at your competitors.
Persistence usually pays off in the end and those
profitable keywords will have your links in the top spot.
Make ranking high for those profitable keywords your number
one marketing strategy. Concentrate all your marketing
efforts towards getting plenty of quality traffic for those
keywords and you will succeed online.
About The Author
The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous websites. For the latest web marketing tools try:
BizwareMagic.com . If you liked the article above, why not try this
Free 7 Day Marketing Course. Titus Hoskins. This article may
be freely distributed if this resource box stays attached.
