What are Keywords and Why Keyword Research
ByWhat are Keywords
Keywords & Keyword Research
Keywords are words and phrases that Internet users type into the search engines when they are looking for something in particular. As a part of successful Internet Marketing you should always perform a thorough keyword analysis before choosing any keywords to optimize your website. This is the first, and most crucial step when setting up any successful website.
Keyword Research and Choosing Your Domain
Before you begin building your website it is wise to choose a domain name that’s keyword rich if possible. Having your target keywords in your domain name, or URL is the 1st step in affective SEO. Some search engines take into account domain names made up of keywords, so it’s good practice to have your targeted keywords in place before choosing a domain name.
Building a Website After Keyword Research
Don’t even think about building a website without first performing keyword research! Before you decide on building a website it’s important to have your keywords chosen carefully. Knowing what keywords you should target is the foundation of creating your website in the first place. I’ve noticed many novice Internet Marketers with websites related to their personal interest wondering why they’re not getting any traffic, or showing up in the search engines. Yea, they may have attractive looking web pages, plenty of articles and content, but when you take a closer look, none of the pages are optimized for any particular keyword. Doing keyword research prior to building your website can save you lots of time and stress.
Keyword Optimized Pages
Having lots of written content on your website is one thing, but having keyword optimized content is what really counts. Keyword optimized content is what tells the search engine spiders what your pages are all about. The search engine spiders can only tell what the content is about by focusing on the words spread out around your pages. So, in order to help with your search engine rankings you must first do keyword research, and use these related keywords throughout you web pages. Be sure to sprinkle these keywords around your pages naturally, and not stuff them every chance you get. This can result to poor readable content, negative rankings, and looked at as spam.
Keyword Density
Although some may say that keyword density is a thing of the past, it’s still good practice when creating your content. It’s just one of many factors which helps pages to rank high in the search engines. As stated above you don’t want your website to be looked at as spam, so keyword density is an important factor that helps the search engines to determine the relevance of your content. Having the right level of keyword density can result in higher search engine positioning. To achieve this you must balance your keywords correctly meaning, if you use too little keywords your page will not benefit. On the other hand, if you use too many keywords your page can become flagged as spamming. There are many numbers floating around on the internet regarding the proper keyword density. Some say 1-7%, while others say anything above 2% is looked at as spam. From my personal experience I generally stay between 1.5-3.5% which gives me the results I’m looking for.
