Keyword research is critical to determine profitable markets and to create web pages that get listed in the search engines and are then found by visitors.
A ‘keyword' is the word that surfers type into the search box at Google to find sites and pages that are relevant to their interests. A ‘keyword phrase' consists of 2 or more keywords.
For example, ‘buy shoes' is a keyword phrase.
There are two steps in the keyword research process:
- First you'll do basic keyword research to determine if there IS a market.
My ‘ball-park' figure for a good market is around 50,000 searches per month. I use Google's Keyword Planner, which is a free tool provided by Google AdWords. The planner helps you find keyword ideas and estimates how they might perform if you were launching an advertising campaign. I also use a service called Wordtracker.
- Secondly, you'll do keyword research to build a BIG list of keywords and keyword phrases that are RELEVANT to your site's main topic. This will help you sort your main topic into categories (topics), sub-topics and get ideas for individual products and services that you can promote.
The keyword list you build can be used to attract traffic to niche-specific pages for keywords that show high demand and low competition. The more keywords you find in your research, the more visitors you will attract to your site.
A large keyword list is especially useful if you intend to attract traffic to your site using pay per click advertising like Googe Adwords and other PPC venues.
For example, back in 1998 I plugged a keyword phrase into an Overture advertising campaign for my my dating site. NOTE: Overture became GoTo.com which was then acquired by Yahoo!
To this day, that phrase has no competitors.
Zip, zero, zilch… nada.
That little phrase generates approximately 20 sales per month. The average commission earned per sale on that particular program is $25.00. Gross earnings are $500.00, minus the approximately $50.00 I spend on advertising, which leaves me with $450.00 to spend on new shoes.
I can't promise that you will find a ‘magic keyword' like I did, but it certainly doesn't hurt to try!
Use a combination of keyword research tools to research potentially profitable markets and to find little-used keywords and keyword phrases for your own sites.
Happy researching!
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