Keyword Research for Search Engine Marketing
This is where everything starts in search marketing, and believe it or not this is often where things go wrong. If you ask any experienced search marketers the things that make a difference in their campaign, they will tell you keyword research is only secondary to good conversion tracking. The bottom line is you need to know what your target audience is searching for.
Many people, including a lot of search marketing firms, think that keyword research is a sample matter of doing some queries through Word Tracker or the Overture search tool. Those things are part of the process, but there is so much more.
The first place to start is your current data. If you already have a active website, what are people finding you for now? One previous business magazine client of mine was surprised to find that one of their top search terms were “Russel Simmons”, because they had a well ranked article on the entrepreneur. This is a prime example of where you can find some quick easy wins in search traffic increases. When they added a few more links to that article, they moved up a few spaces on the 1st page of Google, and traffic skyrocketed. This is the type of data you can find on your own analytics.
The next place to look is your customers. A few calls to clients can reveal a wealth of knowledge. Start an informal research group with a few customers and ask them questions like “How would you describe my product to others?” or “What would you say is the best feature of my product?”. These are questions that can start to flush out some good, well targeted search terms.
And don’t forget the check what your competitors are buying on the paid placement side, or what they have in their meta data. You never know when they know something you don’t.
Collecting this type of data and cross referencing it with other data and tool is what gives you a great catalog of terms. And a little more research will tell you which terms will produce not only traffic, but dollars.
If this is the type of research you’re looking for, then I might be the right person to do it. A good keyword research campaign will take about 30 days. But if it’s done right, this should give you a good road map to success in search marketing.
