An efficient search engine optimisation (SEO) campaign starts with keyword research. In fact, it is one of the key initiatives SEO services take in order to increase search visibility for your website.
Keywords are the foundation of SEO strategies. Whether you are just starting a site or working on boosting organic traffic, you need to include keywords that target your customers in a way that will enable them to find your content.
Regardless of what you write about, no matter how hard you try, if no one searches for it, you won’t get traffic from Google.
Finding keyword terms may not be your forte. Therefore, we have created a beginner’s guide to keyword research for SEO.
What Is Keyword Research?
Keyword research aims to determine the words and phrases your potential customers use when searching online. For relevant keywords, this helps content rank well on search engine result pages. The main purpose of SEO keyword research is to,
- Discover the search terms your customers use.
- Prioritise the ones you want to optimise based on the search volume, competition, and business goal.
Keyword Research: Why Is It Important?
Keywords serve as search terms for finding solutions when conducting online searches. In this way, you gain valuable insight into what your target audience searches for in search engines. Additionally, it aids in content and a larger marketing strategy.
The chances of traffic increasing are higher when your content shows up when people search. It is thus not wise to create content that nobody is searching for, which is the reason for almost 90%. 63% of the pages fail to get no traffic from Google. (Ahrefs).
To summarise, performing keyword research offers the following benefits:
- Gain valuable insight into marketing trends.
- Help you focus your content on the relevant topics your audience is searching for.
- You will rank high in the search engine results with the best-fitting keywords.
- Offering engaging and relevant business content and providing a call to action leads to the buyer’s journey from awareness to purchase.
Benefits of Keyword Research in Optimising SEO Efforts
Keyword research helps you discover phrases you use on your web page and the terms that match user queries. In turn, this eventually helps pages rise in search engine result pages (SERPs).
Unless you provide the keywords searchers use to find information, Google will not boost your page for relevant queries.
When you use relevant keywords, you can create SEO content that is informative and effective. As a result, it keeps your users on your website longer, increases familiarity, and builds trust.
You will benefit from increased organic traffic if you can produce the best content for a given search term. Plus, you will establish topical authority.
Keyword Research for Your SEO Strategy
1. Identify what’s important
The first step to finding keywords for SEO optimisation involves determining where your efforts should be directed. It is not feasible to find keywords for every page on your website, which is a difficult plan to execute.
You should therefore decide on which pages are most important for your business goals and will increase organic traffic. In addition, it is possible that your target audiences are not interested in the pages you consider important.
In that case, you can help find cues from search data. The search engines will help you focus on what information is valuable for your business goals.
2. Brainstorm Topics
A brainstorming session is an excellent way to start. You can begin by using a keyword planner to list search terms based on your idea and target pages.
You want to be as broad as possible at this stage. By the end of the process, you’ll be able to evaluate the value of those keywords and learn to prioritise accordingly.
3. Competitor Analysis
Check Out the Competitors
Knowing your competition is crucial to determining keyword information. The first step is to identify the top competitors and their keywords to rank on search engine results pages. Look for businesses that sell to similar audiences as yours. Local and international competitors will differ in this regard. While for local customers, you need to pick competing businesses in your area, the international businesses have a different set of competitors.
Next, plug in the keywords and phrases into Google and see what companies appear at the top of the organic search results. Run their URLs through Ubersuggest, a keyword tool to understand how your competitors perform in searches.
Count the organic keywords the sites rank for, backlink profile, traffic per month, and domain scores.
Find Your Competitor’s Keywords
You can easily accomplish this with Ahrefs Site Explorer’s SEO tool. With it, you can check the top-ranking pages of a domain. Identify your competitor’s most popular pages and the keywords that bring them the most organic traffic. When you come across a search term relevant to your business, put it into your keyword planner.
4. Know Your Customers
A good way to learn about what customers want is to study them. In such cases, use social media, Q&A sites such as Reddit, or discussion forums. You can benefit significantly from this method when it comes to finding keywords and content that audiences need.
5. Analyse Specific Keywords
It’s time to identify the most effective keywords for your site. Among the most important factors to consider are,
Search Volume
Monthly search volume, also known as MSV, represents the volume of monthly searches for a specific search term. It gives you an idea of how many people may see a snippet of your search engine results when it appears on the first page. Moreover, a low MSV typically indicates that the keyword is not as frequently searched as the other keywords.
Clicks
You can measure clicks by calculating how many people click a link after searching for a specific search term.
Check how often a site ranking for a specific keyword is clicked with the Ahrefs Keyword Tool. Check the search frequency of the term to estimate the click-through rate.
Traffic Potential
Find out the traffic potential of a keyword by looking at the monthly search volume and click-through rate. With Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer, see how much traffic a specific keyword attracts for top pages.
Keyword Difficulty
Keyword difficulty indicates how difficult it is to rank in the top ten organic results for a particular keyword.
Both the low and high-difficulty keywords have advantages. You get prominent placement on Google search results pages with simple keywords, but fewer people search for those terms.
If you rank for a difficult keyword, it will take time and resources, but organic traffic will increase significantly when you reach the first page of search results.
Plus, topics covered by the difficult keywords are in demand and the chances of gaining quality backlinks for your content increase.
6. Narrow Down & Group Keywords
Once you have brainstormed potential keywords, it is time to narrow down and focus on keywords for better SEO strategies. You should consider four types of keyword data when choosing a new keyword.
Relevance. Customers should deem the keyword as important, and it should naturally fit into the content used.
Search Volume. You must decide whether you want high search volume or low to medium search volumes that are easy to rank for.
Difficulty. Depending on the keyword’s difficulty you want, you should select low, medium, or high difficulty keywords.
Authority. Consider your site’s authority compared to that of the current ranking website for that keyword. Calculate how much time and resources it will take to achieve high rankings for your site.
7. Sort Out the New Keywords
To help spot opportunities where keywords can be used, break them into easy-to-manage batches to make them simpler to find. When you have a collection of related keywords, you may find it effortless to combine broad and long-term keywords.
8. Identify Search Intent of Users
Users’ search intent is crucial to understanding how they use keywords and what type of content they seek. To find out what types of pages rank for a keyword, you might do a Google search and see what the search intent for the keyword is.
Let’s look at four types of search intents,
Informational. An informational search aims to find the answer to the question, which is commonly precise and straightforward. Providing the correct information increases your chances of landing on the first page.
Navigational. Search intent of this type allows users to find a specific page on a website.
Transactional. Customers who are ready to buy something are considered to have transactional search intent.
Commercial Investigation. Consumers conduct a commercial investigation before purchasing. This type of content is sought by those seeking advice, reviews, or guidance.
9. Be Specific with Local Search Term
Local searchers are targeted toward specific places, and it usually gives results for “near me” or region-specific answers. Location capabilities allow Google to provide relevant results based on the user’s location.
Using city names, towns or neighbourhoods in your content will ensure your business shows up in local searches if it has a local presence.
10. Find Fat-Head and Long-Tail Keywords
There are two general types of keywords: fat-heads and long-tails. The search volume for each differs, as does rank difficulty.
Fat-Head Keywords
Search terms with fat-heads are typically one or two words with a high MSV. As a result of such high demand for these keywords, ranking for them can be difficult, especially for new businesses that do not yet have established topical authority.
Long-Tail Keywords
The search terms are more specific and draw fewer searches, but the keyword difficulty is lower. In addition, they target a highly specific audience.
Topic pillars and cluster pages are the building blocks of an SEO-friendly website. In each pillar, a broad topic is explained, with a link to a more detailed cluster page.
- Add fat-head keywords to pillar pages that introduce topics.
- Use long-tail keywords in cluster pages that answer specific questions or dig into a topic in-depth.
Tools for Keyword Research
Ahrefs Webmaster Tools. Signing up for an account and verifying ownership of the site entitles website owners to free access to Site Explorer and Site Audit. More features are available for a fee.
Google Keyword Planner. This tool is designed for Google AdWords campaigns. You will require a Google Ads account and billing details to access it.
Google Search Console. Your site’s performance can be viewed in Search Console, including traffic, keywords bringing traffic, and ranking for the keywords. It’s free to use.
Google Trends. See what’s popular and trending with this free keyword tool. Keywords can also be searched to compare search patterns by location and time range.
Answer the Public. Find out what people search for with your target keyword, trends in searches and real-time searches for your target keyword.
Keyword Generator. This free Ahrefs tool allows you to enter up to ten words or phrases to see keyword ideas, difficulty levels, and search volumes.
Keywords Explorer. A paid version of this tool from Ahrefs offers detailed keyword suggestions and a range of advanced SEO metrics that include keyword difficulty, clicks and search volume.
Keyword Difficulty Checker. Find out how hard it will be for you to rank in the top 10 and estimate the number of backlinks you will need.
Keyword Rank Checker. This free tool shows the current top-ranking pages for a particular keyword and the rank of a site for the keyword.
To summarize
Keyword research for better SEO optimisation may seem like a challenging process. Through our article on A Beginner’s Guide to Keyword Research for SEO, we tried to simplify it for readers. Despite its appearance, it is not as difficult as it appears; however, you should also consider doing this correctly and with proper attention.
It’s impossible to get the right results if you don’t have the right keyword, one that’s relevant and that’s searched for by your targeted users.
We at Anika Digital can assist you in researching and finding the best keywords. A detailed strategy has been developed to obtain the perfect keyword solutions.
