Q and A: How often should you review your target keywords?

Dear Kalena...

I have been reading about keywords. I know the importance of them. But one thing I have not been able to find a definitive answer on is keyword age. I believe that over time the keywords and phrases become aged and eventually become old or obsolete. Right? How often do keywords need to be changed or re-tailored?

Chris

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Chris

Thanks for the caffeine injection! Regarding your question, you are spot on that keywords can age. The keywords that searchers use change from month to month based on world events, popular culture, seasonal trends and economic fluctuations. You can see this in action by looking at Google Hot Trends, which lists the 100 most popular search queries on any given day.

That's why it's so important to review your keywords on a regular basis to ensure you are targeting keywords and phrases that people are actually searching for. I generally recommend that my clients review their keywords at least every 6 months. That means conducting a fresh round of keyword research using tools such as:

• Keyword Discovery
• WordTracker
• Good Keywords
  

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Q and A: How do you know what keywords are adequate for each page?

Dear Kalena...

I am just knowing your blog and I am admiring it because: first, you are a very savvy writer about the SEO subject; second, I can see that you have many readers in the FeedBurner feed; and, well, a PR of 5, not bad at all. My question is this: Many websites have no keywords in their pages. When I see the source code, nada. Of course many of these pages are really sales letters and maybe is not interesting for the owners to concern about meta tags. So, what is the best way to know which keywords are the more adequate for a certain page if I intend to use PPC as an affiliate? Thank you in advance and I would like to read your answer.

Regards,
Jesus in Mexico

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Jesus

Keyword research is a tricky business. Sites that don't use keywords within their visible text and META tags may not be looking to rank well in the organic SERPs. Perhaps they are using PPC landing pages, email marketing or social media to drive traffic. Or maybe they just don't know how to optimize their pages.

Targeting keywords is a different kettle of fish for SEO and PPC. If you are researching keywords to use within your regular site pages to help the site rank in the organic search results (SEO), I recommend using services such as KeywordDiscovery and WordTracker. WordTracker actually have a 15 percent discount offer on until the end of November, so be sure to use coupon code us-annual-15 if you decide to subscribe.

If you are looking for the best keywords to use for your PPC campaigns, I would recommend that you use the Google Keyword Tool, the Overture Keyword Selector and/or the keyword suggestion tool built into Yahoo Sponsored Search. If you plan to use landing pages for your PPC campaign, you don't necessarily need to optimize them for crawlers. If the page content is very similar on each, you might want to prevent them from being indexed by search bots anyway.

No matter what keyword research tools you plan to use, start your search by compiling a seed list of keywords and phrases that you imagine your potential customers/visitors might type in to search engines. Ask your family, friends and colleagues for more keyword ideas and build up your seed list until you feel confident you have exhausted all avenues. Then start using the keyword tools. You'll be amazed at how many more keyword combinations you'll find!


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Q and A: Is there a direct relationship between keyword conversions and KEI?

Dear Kalena...

Regarding the KEI (in Word Tracker): Is there a proven direct relationship between conversions and the KEI? It seems like it would be most effective to take the time up front to find words with a high KEI rating instead of using words from Google soley based on whether the competition bar was smaller than the average usage bar (thats how I decide which words make the cut). Have you found that to be the case?

Thanks,
Bill

Kalena's Answer:

Hi Bill

KEI was developed several years ago by Sumantra Roy of 1st Search Ranking, to provide a rational basis for keyword selection. Wordtracker provides a detailed explanation of the KEI formula on their site.

KEI is certainly a helpful indicator of the type of competition you face from other sites when targeting the same keywords. But many industry experts believe that KEI has outlived its usefulness and that it no longer provides accurate guidance on keyword selection. This is because KEI only looks at the title tags of competing sites and doesn't consider the content of the META tags or the anchor text of competing sites.

One way to help narrow down your keyword selections is to look at the top 20 SERPs for the keywords you are considering and see how well those sites are optimized to determine if you could outrank them if you targeted the same keyword/phrase.

Just like anything else in SEO, you should consider KEI as part of your keyword selection process, but don't rely on it as your sole indicator of good keyword choices.

Hope this helps!

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Q and A: Is it best to use single keywords or variations and phrases in PPC campaigns?

Dear Kalena...

I am in the process of setting up a PPC campaign on Google AdWords and I have found a keyword that looks promising. So what I have done is to use the Google Estimator.

With this keyword I have used exact match, phrase match and broad match and the google traffic estimator gave me estimates for my keyword. I notice that the traffic estimates vary a lot through the three of them. So I just tried one keyword and the estimates were higher.

Is it best to use one keyword or is it best to use the variations on the keyword you like? I hope you know what I mean.

Graeme

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Graeme

You've got to be very careful when choosing your keyword matching types. Broad match and phrase match will always show a higher number of searches in the Keyword Estimator than exact match because using those matching options result in your ad being shown for more variations of your keyword.

The use of broad match for your keywords will trigger your ads to appear for a much wider number of search queries and save you time researching an exhaustive list of related keywords to target. However broad matching can drain a PPC budget very quickly and result in your ad being shown for unsuitable or less relevant search queries, lowering your conversion rate and increasing your overall cost-per-conversion. For these reasons, broad matching options should be used cautiously and in close consultation with negative keywords.

In my campaigns, I use a combination of phrase match and exact match and I use 2 or 3 word keyword phrases and variations instead of generic keywords. It requires more keyword research, but it means I know *exactly* what search combinations will trigger my ads to appear so I can better design my ads to suit. It also saves me money. Knowing which matching options to use for which keywords and phrases and when to adjust them will give you much better control over your campaign’s performance and click-through costs.

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Q and A: Which is the better domain to promote via search engines?

Dear Kalena...

I have a favor to ask you. I hope to launch the revised version of my site shortly and I'm re-considering the URL to submit to the Search Engines. Would my site be better served under the name of:

WorldTradeDirectory.com (Google Search Results for keywords: "world trade directory": 101,000,000 )

or

WWWorldTrade.com (Google Search Results for keywords: "world trade": 701,000,000 )

I'm just not sure if the "WW" before "World" will either help or hurt its spiderability if someone just types "world trade" in searching.

Thanks !
Jorge

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Jorge

When it comes to promoting your domain name, you should always choose the one that is most logical from a user perspective. I'm not sure if you've bought either or both of these domains but to me, the first one is the only choice. It's much easier to remember and to type. The second one is just silly.

Here's a heads up: there is very little search engine advantage to having your keywords in your domain name these days. If you insist on using them, they should be separated via hyphens e.g. world-trade-directory.com because search engines can only distinguish individual keywords if they are separated by hyphens.

But that causes usability issues, so what some people do is buy both hyphenated and un-hyphenated versions of a domain and park the unhyphenated one on the same IP address as the hyphenated version, while only promoting the hyphen one via search engines. I personally wouldn't bother with any of it. If any search algorithm advantage of having keywords in your domain still exists, it's miniscule. Choose the first domain option above and keep it simple.

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Q and A: How can I attract more visitors to my site?

Dear Kalena...

I have a web site www.millerandzois.com that has been doing very well. The purpose of our site is to provide information both to injury victims and to other Maryland lawyers. We are first on key search terms such as "Maryland Personal Injury Lawyer" and other key phrases the injury victims and other personal injury lawyers might use. But in terms of overall number of visits, we have been flat lining in recent months. What can we do to make a good site like this even better?

Thanks.
Ron

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Ron

You have a niche target market, but that doesn't mean you have to limit your target keywords. It seems to me that you are casting your net too shallow. Have you performed more detailed keyword research into your market? There are probably hundreds, if not thousands of keyword search combinations that people would use to search for your services. You need to utilize a reliable keyword research tool or two (such as Keyword Discovery or WordTracker to discover the widest combination of search terms possible.

Once you have your search terms, you need to integrate them into your web site pages and/or develop new content around them. You should also commence a link building campaign to attract more traffic from related sites. If you can secure more incoming links to your site from highly trafficked sites, you can leverage that traffic to the advantage of your own site.

Another tactic to consider is the use of Pay Per Click campaigns such as Google AdWords and Yahoo Search Marketing to bring in more traffic. Good luck!

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Q and A: How do I get the right types of Google ads to come up on my site?

Dear Kalena...

How do I get the right types of Google ads to come up on my site? I am getting a lot of weather ads on my home page that have nothing to do with the content on my site.

Thanks,

Bruce

Kalena's Answer:

Dear Bruce

You need to optimize the content of your pages so they contain more keywords and phrases related to the type of ads you want triggered. For example, if you had a page about blue suede shoes but had more text on the page talking about athlete's foot, then ads about the latter topic would be triggered.

Your home page has an article talking about warmer temperatures and then you have links to Colorado weather, so the AdWords bot has assumed your page is mostly about weather and ads have been triggered accordingly. Try to theme your articles so they are about topics you want to see reflected in your ads. Also, try to use keywords within your articles, especially in the first paragraph that is usually featured on your home page.

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