What Are Infographics?

For those who are unfamiliar, infographics are a way of presenting information to readers visually as opposed to through a traditional piece of content. There will certainly still be text in an infographic, there are just pictures to accompany that text that help to get the point across about a topic. In general, infographics are great for a few things:

• It helps capture the attention of readers more so than a headline.
• It makes it easier to understand topics that would normally be difficult.
• Infographics are sometimes more likely to go viral; they’re very shareable.
• It is faster to read an infographic, which is a positive for most.

There are many different types of infographics out there. You can have an interactive infographic where readers can actually engage and click on the graphic and be moved to new

screens, or you can have a traditional infographic that lays out information right away. Below is an example of one of my favorite infographics from Fast Co.Design explaining why it isn’t necessarily bacon that makes you fat, but pasta (although I’m not too thrilled about its message):

Because infographics still work like a piece of content, it might make sense to put links within that infographic and then monitor backlinks. That link has a good chance of being shared and earning visibility, but companies have to ask themselves: Is a link in an infographic going to give me any SEO benefits from search engines?

What Matt Cutts Has Said about Infographic Links

Head of Google’s Webspam team Matt Cutts has touched on this subject last year in an interview with Eric Enge and SMX Advanced. As many had guessed, Google has to crack down on infographic links as more and more spammy links and spammy infographics are popping up across the web. Aside from that, Cutts gave a few other reasons why infographic links might lose a little bit of weight in the eyes of Google:

• Missed Links. Infographics are often republished, probably even more than traditional content, because they have that extra edge you want on your website. Because links in an infographic are often embedded, those republishing often don’t even realize what links they are republishing because they overlooked it in the first place.
• Careless Republishing. If someone were to see the link in an infographic he/she is going to republish, it might still be ignored. If the infographic looks nice, a person is going to republish it regardless of where the link points.
• Fact Checking. When it comes time to create an infographic, Google is noticing that the fact checking is often poor.

Because many infographics are still focusing more on aesthetics over solid information and linking, the links found in an infographic are not going to hold the same weight as those found in a traditional piece of text. This is not to say that you can’t earn a link in an infographic, it just won’t be as powerful as some of your others.

The Verdict: Infographics Not a Good Primary Linking Strategy

Despite the fact that infographic links might not be worth as much for SEO, it’s still a good idea to get involved. Infographics get shared more and typically earn higher visibility on search engines for this very reason. While infographics should probably not be your main link building strategy, they can still be dofollow and they can still give you a little extra push.

You can create an infographic on your own, but many work with an outside agency to make it happen. You can visit here to learn more about how you can get started creating your own infographic or set of infographics.

Do you have an experience linking within an infographic? What are your thoughts on the topic? Let us know your story and give us your comments in the space below.

The post The 101 on Infographic Links: Are They Worth Your Time? first appeared on StayOnSearch.

The popular quote states “content is king”, but an idiot can create content. Just because you can scrape down some thoughts doesn’t mean people will read your drivel. In fact, if you don’t know how to write exceptionally, you’re unlikely to gain or grow readers at all.

Here are some tips that can change your verbal vomit into something valuable…

Pick You Audience

The fastest way to shoot yourself in the foot is to assume you’re writing for every reader. Choose a personality, group or niche to target. The more specific you can get, the better.   Consider an obscure area within a niche that rarely gets addressed. This will help you to focus your efforts, research and writing style. By choosing your audience, you’ll be able to outline the content readers will enjoy, with quality they’ll expect.

Pick Your Subject Carefully

As much as we’d like to think we’re intelligent, entertaining and have something worth saying, it’s not enough. Once you’ve narrowed your audience, you need to laser in on your subject. Pick subjects that others are talking about. Do research to find out what’s hot in current news. Maybe there’s a debate going on in your chosen industry that you can take advantage of. Start a few fires, create a little controversy.

Don’t Write Cold

Get the bugs out of your brain before you start trying to commit anything to paper. For ten to fifteen minutes, put your pen to paper and don’t stop writing. Let it flow without questioning. Anger, gibberish, incoherent thoughts, it doesn’t matter—jot it all down as fast as you can. This exercise will clear your brain of mental cobwebs and allow the true genius of the day to surface.

Create a Unique Personality

Have you ever wanted to be someone else? Well now’s your chance. I have a friend who developed a huge following with his financial articles…by being a gnome. You heard me right—my friend created a fictional character in a cut-throat industry. It gave him autonomy, while allowing his humorous personality to surface in his writing. Consider the power and fun you can have by branding a specific personality. It doesn’t have to be fictional—but it should be unique. Let your imagination shine.

Shake It Up and Keep It Lively

If you’ve done thorough research, then you know what’s already been covered by other writers. Step it up a notch. Go the extra mile. Find the dirt, the facts, pose questions and unique points of view that cause readers to say “waaaait a minute”. Focus on creating each article as an intentional conversation starter. This is especially powerful if it specifically leads into other hot topics you’ve already covered.

Ask Yourself

Whenever you write an article, ask yourself the following questions to keep yourself focused:

• Does the article completely satisfy a reader–or include a direction to send them if they want more information?
• Is the article clear, unique and packed full of useful information a reader can use right now?
• Does the content make a call to action—pulling the reader into a conversation?
• Is this an article I would personally want to read? If not, why?
• Do I have a good balance of fact and resources with a touch of humor?
• Is this article powerful enough that people will want to share it with others?

Pull With Your Title

Use titles that not only reflect your article, but grab a readers attention. The key here is using phrases with resonance, focusing on what people will get if they read your work. Make a list of possible titles and choose the one that grabs your interest. Ten Ways To Improve Your Home Theatre System might work, but Ultimate Home Theatre Tips To Make Your Friends Squirm With Envy will likely grab more attention.

I’ll leave you with one last pointer. Write to a single person. What I mean is, choose a good friend and imagine talking to them as you write. Focus on their face, their personality and write to their understanding. By doing that, you’ll create a voice that will create a connection with readers.

Do you have any suggestions you feel I’ve missed or perhaps used something else with success? I’d love to hear about it. Leave a comment below and share your experiences with us!

The post ‪How To Write Content Your Readers Will Actually Read‬ first appeared on StayOnSearch.

Text-Based Posts

The most common thing that you will find on an Ecomerce blog is a post that is based entirely in text. One reason for these posts is that search engines look for the keywords that are listed in the articles. Text is also a great way to communicate a lot of in-depth information to your readers. Furthermore, text loads quickly regardless of the Internet speed of the reader, so you can be sure that everyone will be able to access these pages quickly and easily. Your blog will probably be driven mostly by text, even if other things are used as well.

Photographs and Pictures

You can also use photographs and pictures on your Ecomerce blog. These are often effective if you want to show people the products that you are selling. Most people will not buy something unless they can see it because this gives them a sense of what they are really purchasing. Photos have become more popular in the last few years because almost everyone has made the switch to broadband Internet connections, so the pictures can load quickly. They are often used to compliment text; but you can use them on their own if you are creative with the process.

Videos and Live Feeds

Videos can be used on an Ecomerce blog in two fashions. First of all, you could record the videos ahead of time and then upload them onto the site. You could also use a live feed that people can watch; similarly to how they would watch a television broadcast. Videos do slow your page down, so you have to be careful not to use them too often. However, many users like them the most because they are easiest for people to use. They require no work on the part of the person who is viewing the blog, and they can provide a lot of information in a short amount of time.

Incorporating Multiple Elements

As mentioned, you may want to use all of these things on your Ecomerce blog. For instance, you could use a video as a main hook that will draw in people who have never been to your site before. You could then use text-based posts to give them more information after they are interested. Pictures could be utilized to reinforce the text– to make it stronger. A blog that is laid out in this fashion will be very effective and useful.

The post Key Elements When Starting an Ecomerce Blog first appeared on StayOnSearch.

As a blogger, you have something to say, whether it’s about business, baking or birds. With regularity, you post insights, photos and tips in an effort to share your interest with readers. You believe you’re doing your best, yet your blog hasn’t attracted any new readers recently. Consider how commenting on other blogs can attract traffic to your blog.

Establish Authority and Credibility

Successful bloggers share two important traits–authority and credibility. As you post well-thought out comments on blogs, readers see a glimpse of your knowledge. Maybe your opinion on a social topic attracts attention or your product idea excites readers to learn more about what you offer. Use comments to share your authority and credibility in order to attract readers to your blog.

Build Relationships

When you take time to write a thoughtful comment on a blog, you show the blog writer that you value his or her content. As you build relationships with the blog owner and his or her guests, you also establish a network of potential readers and future partners.

Value People

People are even more important than your blog’s growth. Before posting a comment, think about its value to the blogging community. If you’re not adding quality to the conversation but instead post comments solely for your own benefit, your comments decrease rather than increase traffic to your blog.

Time your Comments

You might try to comment first in order to jump start the conversation. This tactic can also attract curiosity clickers to your blog. While this strategy works sometimes, it might not attract the long-term readers you want.

Often, in the rush to leave the first comment, the comment’s quality is less than stellar. No one will want to read your blog if your comments include disjointed content, grammatical errors or spelling mistakes.

Provide Great Content

Whether you’re writing about an SEO company or local flora and fauna, read the entire post and think through your response before commenting. When you don’t make a clear point, your credibility decreases. Instead of visiting and reading your blog, readers will dismiss you instead. Stand out in the crowd when your comments include useful, valuable and thoughtful content.

Use Context

Before you post your comment, consider if it makes sense. Will someone who reads it understand what your comments reference?

If you’re responding to something in the blog post, quote it. If you’re responding to another comment, address the poster by name. Comments that make sense can build your reputation and can attract more readers to your blog.

Link Smart

Leaving comments only builds your blog if they lead to more followers, re-tweets or bookmarks. As readers share your content, your blog grows. That’s one of the goals of comments.

To encourage readers to visit your site and share your amazing content, add a link that contributes to the conversation. Link something you wrote that relates to the conversation or share valuable content from industry experts or other sources. Quality links add value and can attract traffic to your blog.

Respond Quickly

If someone responds after you in the comments section and asks a question, respond back. Thank them for their comment and continue the conversation.

Sometimes, comments will be negative. Respond with kindness. Part of the conversation includes debate, and your ability to handle differing opinions with kindness can solidify your reputation in your social media network.

Know when to Stop

Online readers skim content. Your comments will receive more attention if you keep them brief.

Also, address one issue at a time. Instead of one long paragraph, post multiple comments. This technique allows you to make more than one relevant point, and it increases the likelihood that your comments will be read, enjoyed and appreciated.

When you’re looking for ways to grow your blog, attract traffic with blog comments. As you leave quality comments and build relationships, your audience expands. You grow your blog one well-placed and quality comment at a time.

The post How Blog Comments Attract Traffic first appeared on StayOnSearch.

When a start-up company thinks of creating a website, having to compete with this staggering amount of web pages for the attention of people numbering less than half of that seems like a futile task. What makes the seemingly monumental feat of capturing the astounding but limited number of people’s interest is Search Engine Optimization or SEO.

It is true; there are already tons of articles online giving tips and lessons on the basics of SEO. But with the ever-changing and dynamic world of the Internet, of search engines and of online marketing, there’s no other way to rise above the competition than to hire an experienced and highly-skilled professional, or a company filled with such.

Why hire an SEO company?

Through good SEO, a website will have increased Internet visibility, as it will turn up in the first couple of pages in search engine results. This is crucial as a majority of Internet users do not bother go past the third page.

If the SEO is done properly, the amount of visitors for the site would increase, and these visitors would eventually turn into actual customers who will spend on the product or service being sold.

The problem is that some companies look to cut costs, having their web designers or programmers use what little they know of good SEO. Some just try to learn it by themselves while balancing their main workload. This results in poor returns, costing more than hiring SEO specialists with years of experience and updated knowledge.

SEO is Not Cheap

What should be made clear at once is that SEO does not come cheap. It takes plenty of time and effort to come up with an efficient SEO plan, and for that plan to come into fruition. To illustrate in detail, here are seven major reasons:

1. Strategy Development

Before starting any money-making endeavor, there first needs to be a well thought out plan to ensure profit. SEO consultancies will want to discuss what exactly a company aims to achieve.

It is not simply about getting to the first page of a search engine result. Identifying the precise target market, understanding what the target market is looking for, and finding the best way to deliver what they want are just some of the things that need to be discussed during the consultation.

2. Website Design

Much like any structure, the foundation of the website will dictate how high it can go. The SEO will have to check each page in the entire website to see its potential faults and strengths, and this can be a time-consuming process if the company has a huge network.

If a website is designed first before an SEO consultancy is hired, it might be done without having crucial components like proper page linking in mind. The worst case scenario would mean having to tear down the whole website and create an entirely new one.

3. Keyword Research

One of the essential elements of SEO is knowing which keywords will get picked up by search engines and will lure eyes onto a certain website.

Certain keywords are highly competitive, which means that much bigger and more established websites have already staked their claims on them. To use those same exact keywords for a new website would invite disaster, unless the company can match or exceed the resources of those on top.

SEO consultancies will be able to point out which keywords should be used in content, in author bios, and in HTML tags to raise a website’s profile.

4. Content Creation

Once people have decided to visit a website, they need to get what they are looking for. Search engines have a way of checking for relevant and original content, so they can direct searchers to helpful content while they filter out useless information.

Providing content that people will find useful requires highly competent individuals. Getting quality work from such individuals also requires financial investment.

5. Search Engine Registration

Having a website appear in one popular search engine can be simple, but knowing which search engines can be harnessed to deliver more visitors requires the expertise of an SEO specialist. They recognize the possibilities of smaller search engines, the system updates of the bigger ones, and the changes that need to be applied on a website to rank in all known search engines.

6. Link Building

Another important process in increasing prominence for a website is through finding other relevant sites that can link back to the website being promoted. Being part of a larger network multiplies the number of visitors to one, as it is exposed to a bigger audience. It also strengthens its credibility, as it has been given the trust of other credible sites.

SEO specialists do the hard work of indicating which websites are relevant and reputable but not directly competing with the one being promoted. They also have to cooperate with the other businesses, giving and taking to guarantee both sides benefit from the partnership.

7. Traffic Checking

Getting visits and generating interest on a website is different from earning money from the number of site visitors. The underlying reason for hiring SEOs is to profit off the attention given to the website by converting curious visitors to paying customers.

Professional SEOs can track the quantity of people visiting and how many of those have started shelling out money as proof of their effect on boosting sales.

It also does not necessarily come at a fortune. What companies looking to hire SEO consultants need to know is that they will be paying for what they want to accomplish.

The danger lies in going for SEO “companies” that charge very little and promise much. These companies often employ inefficient and/or unethical methods to artificially improve a website’s page rank. These can cause more harm than good, as search engines are now penalizing websites and pages that make use of improper practices.

Disadvantages of Hiring Unreliable SEO Practitioners

• Outsourced Content Writers

Labor overseas is much cheaper, so these companies outsource their content development team to cut costs. In the process, they end up with numerous fast writers who have little to no grasp of the niche, target market, or nature of the website or business.

Some even end up with writers who do not have mastery of the English language and culture. Articles abound with typographical and grammatical errors. Search engines have ways to detect such content and filter them.

• Spam Generating Software

Because of how little they charge, it should be expected that they do not put in much work. They utilize software that can produce hundreds of automated emails, comments or forum topics that link to the website they are “optimizing”.

People will be able to tell that these are spam as they are mostly incoherent, repetitive and irrelevant statements linking over and over to certain websites. This builds a bad reputation for that business as they will be known for spamming. Search engines will then start penalizing the website.

• Black Hat SEO Techniques

These are techniques that try to cheat the systems of search engines. They require knowledge of how search engines operate, but only very little effort in carrying them out.

Examples of which are the use of programs to plagiarize content from other websites wholesale with simple rearrangement; keyword stuffing or the practice of using keywords repeated innumerable times in one page; and hiding keywords in backgrounds and cloaking pages with different content to deceive search engines.

Again, search engines are continuously evolving and upgrading to be able to catch such unscrupulous practices, banning websites that commit them.

In a nutshell, cheap SEO services only result in costing a business, either through no returns or through strict website penalties. Legitimate SEO companies might cost more initially, but their long-term effects offer handsome returns not only in sales, but in the company’s overall online reputation.

The post Why Invest on SEO Even Though It Isn’t Cheap? first appeared on StayOnSearch.

This content-packed webinar is going to be chalked full of industry secrets and the EXACT blueprint that both Jeff Vacek and Ken Preuss use to make anywhere from 17k-39k each and every month online.

This webinar is LIMITED to the first 1000 registrants, so hurry and reserve your spot.

About Jeff and Ken

Jeff Vacek and Ken Preuss are two regular guys who have been personally helping every-day folks build massively successful businesses for over 15 years combined.

Jeff is a former Information Technology professional who was laid off 4 times within a six-year period. After trying numerous things including real estate investing, a disc jockey business and several MLM’s, he began studying how the TOP entrepreneurs of today create the biggest fortunes. This led him to Information Marketing where he was able to build three separate 6-figure revenue streams and quadruple his previous income within a few months. Jeff has since generated millions in online revenue for partners, clients and students, with whom he freely shares his best underground Information Marketing strategies for generating huge revenues within a short time.
Ken is a former school music teacher who got the entrepreneurial itch and quit his teaching job to start two local businesses: a school consulting company and real estate investment. During a desperate period with almost zero business revenue coming in, he stumbled on to Information Marketing and quietly generated $12,070.80 within 59 days starting from scratch. Using specific strategies he now teaches to students across the globe, Ken was able to grow to mid-five figures monthly within a short period of time. Since that time Ken’s marketing skills have been responsible for generating multiple millions of dollars for both partners and students exclusively through the power of Information Marketing.

In 2009 Jeff and Ken combined forces to teach their proprietary and proven Information Marketing methods to dedicated people all over the world. They now have thousands of students in over 16 countries, and their reach continues to grow exponentially. Most important of all, they get to live out their shared mission of changing people’s financial lives through the power of Information Marketing.

Grab Your Seat

Click here to Register for the Webinar (tonight at 9pm EST)

The post LIVE Webinar Tonight at 9pm EST – Two 7-Figure Info Marketers Spill Their EXACT Blueprint first appeared on StayOnSearch.

What is Link Bait?

Content is golden. That is the premise behind link bait. Link bait is content that is found on your site that others link to. You’re not asking them to link to it; they are doing so because they find the content relevant and they want to link to it. What is a hot topic today? Let’s say you take that hot topic and write a blog about it. People begin to seek more info on this hot topic and come across your blog post. The content is relevant to them and quite beneficial so they post a link on their site to your blog post. It’s adding value to their site and sending more traffic your way. It’s a win-win for all parties involved.

The goal behind link bait is to create content that is meant to go viral. They want it, you’re created it; now let’s share it. The goal is to create content so rich that people will want to share it over and over and over.

How to Start a Link Bait Campaign

Starting a link bait campaign is not difficult. Everything starts with inspiration; an idea. You’re going to create your best content when you write about something that inspires you or that you know about.

Find out about the area that interests you. Is there a hot topic in that area that needs more information? Is there a demand for facts on a specific area? This is where you can really elevate your exposure by not only writing about what you know but about what others want to know about as well.

Link Bait Campaigns Step by Step

Putting together a link bait campaign is easy to do. Follow these simple steps:

1. Do the research. Find where there is a need for information that you can write on. Find the holes in the market and fill that gap with outstanding content.
2. Once you’ve found the need; now you need to create content to fulfill that need. Begin by outlining the topic you want to cover. Create a first draft and review it. You may need to go through two or three drafts to perfect the content.
3. Create the final draft and get it ready for publication and distribution.
4. Place the content on your blog or website and distribute via outlets like popular directories like Ezine articles.
5. Review your content at select intervals to see how your content is fairing. Utilize sites like SEO Moz’s linkscape to see how many links back to your content you got. Check social bookmarking results. How many people have bookmarked and shared your site?

There is a great chart at http://www.voltierdigital.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Linkbait_lifecycle_final21.png that shows you the link bait process from start to finish.

Types of Link Bait

There are various forms of link bait that you can utilize. These include:

• News Link Bait – the news is hot. People want to know what’s going on right now not tomorrow. Creating content related around what is happening now in the news is a great way to get your name out there. Staying on top of this market can easily establish you as an expert. However, this is also an area that is literally changing minute by minute so it can be quite time consuming to stay on top of.
• Debate Link Bait – debates always spark interest. There are always two sides to every story so gaining exposure is relatively easy to do. Even if someone doesn’t agree with your side there is still a level of respect and you can often still get a link to your work. The down side to this is that there are two sides to every story so you need to present a strong case or you can literally get ripped to shreds.
• Attack Link Bait – this is just as it states. You’re basically attacking something (another blog, an article, a hot topic, a belief, etc.). The upside is that there is always interest in controversy. So you are sure to get relevant links back to your content. The downside is that you are also sure to make enemies and that often is not a good thing.
• Resource Link Bait – this is a great way to make your presence known. When your content is a resource for others then you are giving them a highly valuable tool and the chances that your content will be linked back to is high. However, staying on top of these resources can be time-consuming.
• Humor Link Bait – providing humorous content is a great way to get people interested in your light hearted content that will surely tickle their funny bones. However, it can be hard to be taken seriously with the big boys in the game.
• Ego Link Bait – We all love the sound of our own voice. The same is true for the content we write. We love plugging our expertise and knowledge. However, an over-inflated ego can come back on you and sometimes have the adverse effect as people begin to avoid your content.

Writing great content doesn’t insure that it will become great link bait. There is no specific golden rule that will guarantee that you get awesome link bait results. What we can tell you is that you simply need to just practice, practice; practice. Find what approach works for you. With practice and dedication you’ll find a system that works and thus increase your chances of your content becoming great link bait.

Jeff is an internet marketing consultant and a part time blogger. He writes mostly about blogging, internet marketing, Pay Per Click Strategies and Search Engine Optimization techniques and best practices.

The post SEO Link Bait Tactics are here to Rescue Your Blog first appeared on StayOnSearch.

1.  Organic Keywords for Given Domain

Have you ever wanted to be able to take a sneak peak at another competitors analytics?  Well the next closest thing to that would be running a search on a competitors domain and view the organic keyword results SEMrush provides.  Go ahead and try it for your site…pretty accurate?

By having access to this data, you can focus on keywords that you know are already driving lots of search volume.  With that being said, if you can rank above your competitors for these keywords, you can bank on some nice traffic to your site.

2.  PPC Keywords Your Competition Uses

Want to see what PPC keywords your competitors are bidding on?  Well you can easily do that by manually entering in keywords and see if their ad shows up or not…but that could take forever.  Same yourself time and the headache and simply look at the PPC keyword results that SEMrush provides you.  This means you can sneak in on your competitors and gather PPC intelligence that you can use for your own campaigns.  Try to find some opportunities for keywords with high search volume and low cost per click.

3.  List of Google Content Network Opportunities

This is a nice feature that SEMrush has, where they place a “Adsense” note next to each of the different domains for a particular keyword.  What this means is that any domain with “Adsense” next to their domain, allows you to place a Google Content Network ad on their site.

4.  Gain PPC Ad Insights

Probably my favorite feature of the SEMrush toolset, is the PPC ads for a given domain.  This tool takes all of the PPC ads that are running for a given domain and groups them together…making it easy to see what ad copy and offers they are running at any time.  A fantastic way to steal high converting ad copy!

5.  Find Potential Advertisers

Are you a blogger in search of advertisers for your blog?  Use the potential advertiser feature, which will show you potential advertiser who are targeted to your particular niche or topic.  I found this feature particularly helpful when I first started off and had to personally reach out to get paid advertisements.

6.  Side-By-Side Comparisons

The side-by-side comparison report will show you which domains are trending up or down.  This can be a great tool for trying to figure out which websites get massive amounts of traffic – for advertising or guest blogging opportunities.  If you see a blog who’s traffic is spiking quickly, you may be able to get a great deal on advertising space, before everyone else.  If traffic is increasing fast, it may be worth it to analyze their on-page SEO to see what it is they are doing.

7.  Uncover New Keywords

Probably their most important feature is their keyword research tool.  This tool can be a great compliment to the Google Keyword Tool.  Personally I like using more than one keyword tool, because one tool is not going to find ALL of the keywords you may want to target.  Similar to the Google Adwords tool, SEMrush provides keyword suggestions, search volume, cost per click, competition and the number of site results.

Free SEMrush Pro Account for 2 Weeks

I was able to work out a deal with the guys at SEMrush, to give all of my readers a special trial of the Pro version for 2 full weeks.  All you need to do is sign-up for a free account, then use the promo code below to activate your Pro account for 2 weeks!

Promo Code: 9P15-Z5XB-J37Y-92WV

So try it out and you will see why SEMrush is a MUST have tool!

The post 7 Reasons Why You Need a SEMrush Pro Account first appeared on StayOnSearch.

The basic thing you need to remember when starting your keyword research, and you should make this your principle, is aiming for realistic keywords that will get your conversions in your market. There is no use ranking for a keyword like “business”, or even worse, keywords like “real estate” that are usually geographically tied to a location. What good would it do for a local company from Sweden to rank internationally for “real estate”? None, unless they have some prospects to expend their market, but if you are starting out in internet marketing you can only dream about this. So what we will cover in this post is how to find keywords that will get you targeted traffic, the kind of traffic that we all want, users that are interested in our ramblings and our products, and not some Siberian housewife that got lost in the search (no pun intended).

The Head, The Body and The Tail

Yeah, it actually is like the good, the bad and the ugly, but in this case we love the ugly. You see head keywords are one or two word generic keywords that get amazing number of searches per month, like “business”. Ranking for them is close to impossible without an amazing budget. Body keywords are two or three word keywords that have less searches per month, which meals less competition mostly, so in our example we can say that “business magazine” is the body. The tail would be a three or more words keywords like “New York Business magazine”. The last one has the smallest number of searches, but targets a specific area and can bring highly targeted traffic.

Even though head keywords have the greatest number of searches individually, over 70% of all searches made is, guess what, made of long tail keywords. So instead of targeting one head keyword, we can target few body keywords or dozens of long tail keywords and get some serious traffic build to our websites with less effort. So that is the theory behind keywords, the ugly truth, do small, aim big. Let’s take this to the next level and talk about some actionable tips regarding keyword research.

How to Find Traffic Keywords

Let me just say that in our business traffic=money!

Let’s first talk numbers, we won’t look at head keywords, but body keywords usually should have between 1,000 and 100,000 searches, in some cases even more, and tail keywords have less than 1,000 monthly searches, some have more, but there is a fine line between some body and tail keywords.

So if we go for one body keyword and 10 tail keywords, when we start our website, we actually aim for 5,000+ visitors a month traffic that can rise exponentially just on those keywords even without adding new ones. One body can have 1,000+, in most cases that is 10,000 or more, and 10 long tail keywords can go from 3,000 to 10,000 searches a month without variations. The numbers look great, but this is just theory, to see those numbers in our Analytics account we need to achieve top ranks. So how do we find these keywords with such numbers that we can actually rank for with some content optimization and link building?

It is quite easier to do so with an aged website, you can easily find tail keywords that are brining traffic to your website by looking at webmaster tools or using wordpress plugins like incoming search queries, but it is a totally different story with new websites that can’t rely on statistics. Google adwords keyword tool will show you approximate numbers, but they will not tell you the exact competition nor will they show you how those keywords are being used and if you are really going to get that amount of traffic. Here are a few ways I find traffic getting (money getting) keywords for new websites.

First stop, Google Trends. Before I even consider a certain set of keywords I use Google Trends to see if the head keyword is on the rise. That gives me an idea of what I can expect from this market in the near future. It doesn’t have to be on a rise, but just make sure it’s not falling. Next step visit Google Keyword Tool and compile a list of keywords you can use, sort out body and tail keywords. Don’t pick 15 keywords, go wide, choose 100 keywords and then narrow down.

Thanks to Google another way to see if any of these terms can lead us to unexplored but potential profitable keywords is to try searching for them. Just type in your search query in Google and note the suggested searches. Note down promising ones by checking the number of searches in Google Keyword tool, after that visit my personal favorite suggest tool, Google Sets.

Once you found your basic list of keywords you can see if there is anything more you missed by providing Google Sets with 5 keywords of choice and let it come up with a few more predicted keywords, in most cases these are really nice keywords we can use in our campaigns. The last two steps to make sure that you now have the right keywords are checking your keywords in WordTracker and SEOmoz Keyword Difficulty Tool.

There is a free version of WordTracker you can use. We use wordtracker to compare Google’s data, as relying only on one source is never a smart thing to do. And for the last we use Keyword Difficulty tool to get some sense of the competition and our chances for actually ranking for that keyword. Unfortunately, this is a premium tool, so you will have to pay to use it, but you can also check your competitors manually. It takes more time, but would you try a market before checking out the competition? I don’t think so.

One basic difference between my personal method and different methods suggested on the net, is that I like to pick people’s brains and use as much sources as I can. I often use Topsy and social media to find some cool keywords, and I like to compare my data before I make a decision. This may sound like a lot, but trust me when I tell you, keyword research is the best part of SEO, this is the part where there are no limits and everything looks possible. Once you go pass the keyword research you will see how good your decision making skills were, as depending on your choice you may have a hard time achieving decent ranks and traffic or have a walk in the park.

One final note on choosing keywords

Even with Keyword Difficulty Tool you should check the competition manually to get an idea of what you are going up against, this is probably the most important part of keyword research. Look for relevancy, is the whole site keyword related or just one standalone page, are they are strong brand or a blog run by a single person, link velocity, social branding, brand mentions in SERP’s and user interaction. These are simple ways that can tell you if your competitor is really a competitor or not without having to rely too much on tools or technical data.

The post How to Conduct Keyword Research for a New Website first appeared on StayOnSearch.

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