Research Keyphrases for Better Business Blogging

June 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

If your blog is a business blog then the chances are you’re hoping to promote your products or services, and get more sales, right?

Well the great thing about blogs is that they do well in Google, IF you think about how you’re blogging.

You may already know the keyphrases you’re aiming to get good results for on your website, so let’s translate that info into your blogs.

Today, instead of writing a blog, pop over to the Google Keyword Tool and type in your keyphrases to see what other variations come up.

Pick a few of these variations and start thinking how you can incorporate them into your blog titles and copy.

In the 30 Day Blogging Challenge Ebook I talk about the structure of a blog that is written to do well in the search engines, but for that you’ll need to buy the book ;)

Now, don’t just choose generic phrases that have lots of searches – think carefully about this – you want targeted relevant traffic to your blog, right? So think targeted and niche, not generic and widespread.

For example:

Generic phrases:

plumbers

accountants

tax returns

gifts

hotels

kids clothes

business advice

Targeted phrases:

plumbers in berkshire

advice from accountants

last minute tax returns

mothers’ day gifts 2011

low cost hotels in bristol

designer kids clothes

local business advice and help

You can get some great traffic and quick wins on search engines by using less generic phrases.

I cover this in depth in 299 Steps to Blogging Heaven.

Also consider downloading my free 67 Tips on Blogging for SEO.

Your challenge today is to find a handful of useful phrases you could use in your blogging.

This is an extract from the latest Nikki Pilkington ebook The 30 Day Blog Challenge – kickstarting your blogging in just 30 days – get it now while it’s still only a fiver!

Filed Under: 299 Steps, Blog, Blogging, Bonus Tips, Content, Google, Key Phrases, Titles & Tags Tagged With: , , , ,

Choosing keyphrases – size isn't everything!

October 1, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Measure UpIt’s tempting when choosing keyphrases to focus on to only choose the ones that have thousands of searches a day, and while I agree that phrases with very few searches are pointless, there is a happy medium.

The thing to think about is relevancy – how relevant is your blog, your site and your company services / products if your blog post were to show up as a result of a search on the phrase you’re thinking of.

If you sell unique personalised christening gifts, then who is more likely to be interested in your blog post or web page?

  • the person who searched for ‘gifts’ or ‘cheap gifts’?

or

  • the person who searched for ‘unique christening gifts’ or ‘personalised christening gifts’?

Clearly the second person knows what they want, and are a better target – the first could be looking for completely different types of gifts and not have a Christening in sight!

It’s better to focus on the second lot of keyphrases, even though they have fewer searches, than it is on the first, which will also have lots more competition.

Remember, size isn’t everything when it comes to choosing keyphrases :)

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Taken from 299 Steps to Blogging Heaven

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Creative Commons License photo credit: chefranden

Filed Under: Blogging, Key Phrases Tagged With: ,

Do I need a keyword rich domain to do well in Google?

June 2, 2010 By 1 Comment

I get asked this question a lot. “If I want to be on the front page of Google for ‘widgets in Barnet’ then I need to buy www.widgetsinbarnet.com , don’t I?”

Now, there’s a lot of disagreement on the truths and lies about domain weighting – does Google give a higher position to someone with the right domain name? Will you be penalised if you don’t have keywords in your domain name?

All I can tell you is that in my experience:

1) If 2 sites are exactly the same in every way looks wise, same optimisation, same links in etc, and one of them has a keyword rich domain name, then yes, the chances are that Google will prefer them over the site with no keyword rich domain name.

2) If 2 sites looked exactly the same, but only one was optimised, and the other one had the keyword rich domain, 9 times out of 10 in my experience, the properly optimised site would get higher listings.

3) Having a keyword rich domain is only one part of the SEO ‘jigsaw’ – if you don’t have one, don’t worry about it – work on the optimisation of the site that is on the domain name that you DO have, and capitalise on the fact that your domain has been around a while.

I'd love to hear your thoughts below!

Filed Under: Domain names, Key Phrases, Musings Tagged With: , , ,

When traffic being LESS can be a GOOD thing

February 9, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Heather_R's Twitter StatsYeah, I know, it sounds weird doesn’t it?

One of the things I talk about a lot is increasing traffic to your website, but I’ve recently had a conversation with a client in which I had to remind him that less traffic can actually be a GOOD thing!

Let me explain. Getting lots of traffic to a website is great – it’s great for the stats, great for the ego and great if keeping your job revolves around how many people visit your website. Yep, great. But it’s NOT great if that traffic isn’t buying. Or if that traffic costs you a lot of time / money / effort. Or if that traffic doesn’t stick around, or never comes back.

In those scenarios, that traffic is just pointless numbers. And then it’s not so impressive. eh?

In my client’s case, his Google Adwords campaign was bringing him a LOT of traffic. It was also costing him a lot of money. And making very few sales. We took out the generic keyphrases and replaced them with a lot more niche phrases, and his traffic went down by 40%. He panicked. He’d logged into his Google Analytics account and found out that his traffic was down by 40% and felt that there was something massively wrong with what we were doing.

Until he looked at his cost per sale.

As Google Adwords is a pay per click system, he had to pay for every single click he got to his website from that source. And on the generic traffic he was creating, those clicks cost A LOT. The keyphrases we replaced them with were more niche, less competitive, and cost a lot less. So he saved money.

But that’s not all.

The keyphrases we replaced them with were also a lot more focused, and more likely to bring INTERESTED customers to his website – customers who picked up the phone and bought, who emailed and asked questions and who purchased his services.

Niche and targeted traffic is always going to be better for most websites than wide and generic numbers – it’s more likely you’ll find people who are interested in your products or services, and that you’ll spend a lot less money / time / effort attracting them.

Huge amounts of traffic is great, but at the end of the day it’s cost per sale that counts – is your traffic generating enough sales to cover it’s cost in financial and time terms?

If not, maybe it’s time to realise that LESS traffic can be a GOOD thing…

Filed Under: Google Tagged With: , , , , ,

Poll your customers for new keywords ideas

February 8, 2010 By 1 Comment

It’s not always easy knowing which keywords and phrases to target when optimising your website – and as I say in my latest blog over on Birds on the Blog, it’s all too easy to fail to see beyond high traffic and high competition phrases.

So why not try asking other people what THEY would use to search for you? This great tool from Seed Keywords allows you to set up a scenario (eg “If you were searching for a website that sells XXXXX, what would you type in to Google?”) and then invite people to contribute, anonymously.

If you can get enough people to contribute, you can get a great overall picture of the type of things that current and potential customers could be typing in to find you – and I bet there’ll be a few surprises!

Set up your ‘scenario’ then promote it via:

  • Email to current customers
  • Your Facebook fan page
  • Twitter
  • On your blog
  • In your email signature
  • On LinkedIn
  • Everywhere!

In fact, why not post a link to your scenario below and I’ll promise to drop and make some suggestions on each and every one.

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