What are keywords and why are they important?

There are many aspects to digital marketing success and particularly to Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). SEO itself is the process of getting traffic from the “free,” “organic,” “editorial” or “natural” search results on search engines.

All major search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo have primary search results, where web pages and other content such as videos or local listings are shown and ranked based on what the search engine considers most relevant to users.

Keywords and keyword phrases are an essential aspect of online success. They are the starting point I recommend businesses work on before they begin their website design. Keyword research and development is important to your success. You need to choose them wisely and research them carefully. They boost search engines, enhance navigation, attract eyeballs and motivate conversions, so you need to position them strategically throughout your website copy, blogs and images. However, don’t forget to use them in your social media tweets and posts as well.

There are two different types of keywords: broad keywords and long-tail keywords. Broad keywords are short words or phrases that, while they may apply to your own industry and company, they might also apply to every company in your industry or even to those in other industries. Long-tail keywords are usually longer words or phrases that are more specific to your company or industry.

When you’ve taken the time and made the effort to plan and implement a keyword development strategy, you’re on your way to an online presence that will attract the target audience your business wants.

Here are seven questions to ask yourself as you’re creating and implementing your plan:

Question 1:  What keywords and keyword phrases do your target audience use to find information?

Your audience and prospects are looking for your information. Your job is to determine what keywords they’re using to look for you. Ideally, you want keywords that are in high demand, which make it interesting to go for the keyword, but they also need to be low supply, which means there is less competition for the keyword so that it is easier to rank well in the search engines. Once you’ve uncovered the low supply, high demand keywords, you can position them strategically in your content and on your website.

Question 2: What keywords and keyword phrases does your competition use?

Finding low supply, high demand keywords is just the beginning. You also want to know what keywords your competition is using to target prospects. You can then use this information to further develop your keyword strategy.

Question 3: What strategies will you use to research keywords and keyword phrases?

Here are just a few options to consider:

• Test and track activity on your website
• Use keyword research tools, take a look at the list in question 4
• Research what your competition is using
• Ask your audience, customers and/or website visitors
• Follow your intuition
• Look at trends
• Pay attention to popular terms on social networking sites.

Question 4: What keyword research tools will you use to research and develop your keywords and keyword phrases?

Here are just a few free services you can use:

* Wordtracker

* SEMRush

* Google AdWords: Keyword Planner

* Bing Webmaster Toolbox

* Keyword Discovery

Question 5: What keyword tools will you use to analyse and research your competitors’ keywords?

Here are a few tools to review:

* Adgooroo

* KeywordSpy

* SpyFu

* Moz 

* Google Alerts

Most of these are only free for a trial period but that should let you see which you prefer and whether you need to continue with them.

Question 6: How will you track keyword trends and popular search terms?

Here are some useful trend research tools to investigate:

• Google Trends
• Google Alerts
• Twitter popular topics

Question 7: Where do you/will you use your keywords?

These are just a few important places to consider positioning your keywords on each web page or post:

• Above your logo
• In your page URL
• In your subheadings
• In your headlines
• Within your content
• In anchor text
• In your image alt tags

If you have a WordPress.org website, I would recommend you use either one of these two great plugins, Yoast SEO or All in One SEO to guide you through where you should place your keywords.

Once you have completed your keyword research, it’s important to create a plan and a system to keep it organised. It’s also important to review your plan on a regular basis and update it.  Keywords change and customers evolve.

Keyword development isn’t a "set it and forget it" tactic. You’ll want to continue researching and planning on a regular basis. For example, on a quarterly basis, review your existing keywords by reviewing your analytics and looking for new and trending keywords. Make keywords an important part of your traffic generation strategy and create a plan to research and develop them on a consistent basis.