Businesses with some understanding of search engine optimisation (or SEO) should have an idea of how important the role of keywords play website rankings. Keywords are effectively a way to help Google understand what your website page is about, which then helps them rank it accordingly to help potential visitors to the site. Although simple in practice, using keywords effectively is not as simple as it may first appear. There are many aspects of SEO best practice that will significantly help your website, and it’s very possible that ignoring these can cause your website to plummet through the rankings. In this article, we take a look at how keywords can be effectively utilised in your website to help keep your site at the top.
Where to get started with keywords
It doesn’t matter if it’s a SEO company in Hobart or Sydney, agencies specialising in search engine optimisation will invariably start out with keyword research. After all, how will you know what people are searching for if you don’t do some research yourself? This will involve identifying the search terms people are using – these are your keywords! For example, if you’re a website that sells board games and you are located in Melbourne, a relevant keyphrase may be “buy board games Melbourne.” Easy, right? In practice, it actually isn’t (unfortunately), as there are quite a few other things you will have to consider. The first of these is search volume – the keyword search volume translates to how many people are searching for the keyword. Effectively, the larger the search volume, the larger the potential audience, so if you find that no one is actually searching for a keyword that you think could be a winner, it might be best to find another one that people are more interested in.
Some more interesting keyword concepts to consider
After you’ve worked out some keywords that have some kind of audience, you’re unfortunately not quite done yet. You’ll next need to consider the relevance of the keyword in relation to the content on your website. Although the keyword you might have found has a large audience, directing this audience to a website that is completely unrelated is going to lead to a high bounce rate, which is not going to do your website any favours. As a quick example, using a keyphrase with a large audience like “buy board games Melbourne” won’t make sense for a fruit and veg shop in Sydney, even if the audience is large for the keyphrase – you’ll just end up confusing people. Finally, you’ll need to factor in the competition relating to the keywords you’re keen on. If there are hundreds, or even thousands, of websites like yours using the exact same keywords to get the same customers, the likelihood of success will be considerably diminished.
Learn keywords through understanding customers
Grasping what keywords will benefit your website the most is often about understanding the thought processes of potential customers. Remember to put yourself in their shoes in order to better understand their customer journeys – why might they want your product or service, and when? By understanding these fundamentals, you’ll be able to introduce much more successful seo keywords, while also ensuring that you have less competition. Plus, you might learn a thing or two about your products and services along the way!
