Many are asking if keywords remain relevant in 2015, and the short answer is, yes. Keywords still play a key role in online marketing, no matter the medium, whether for ranking pages on your site or blog, videos, imagery, paid search or more, keywords are one of the fundamental items you’ll want to consider when planning your web content.
Keywords remain the primary way Google ranks your content, whether that’s in the form of web page, blog post, video or anything else. Google’s ranking algorithm considers how well you are optimized for the particular keywords, and ranks you in the search results accordingly. For this reason it’s imperative to be sure we are targeting the proper keyword from the beginning.
To help with that, let’s have a look at 5 items you’ll want to consider as you choose the keywords for your content.
5 Things to consider when doing keyword research
Decide what you’ll use keywords for – Presumably you have a plan for these keywords, and if not, this is a great time to clarify this. Will they be used for new content, web pages, social media, visual content (videos and more) or what? Knowing this going in is helpful, especially when it’s time to cross-promote.
Figure out the keywords common to your market – Even just looking at the top site in your market you’ll be able to tell several of the more prominent phrases people are optimizing their content for. This will provide you a decent starting place for your research.
Spy on your competition – There are tools you can use, or in the absence of tool help, you can simply look at your competition’s content and glean what they are targeting by the words they are using in their titles, URLs, and what the content is about.
Employ tools to help do the work – Luckily for us there are oodles of keyword research tools out there, most of them sport a free version, such as the Google Keyword Planner, SEMRush, and Keywordtool.io.
Learn the intent of the searcher – Now put on your thinking cap and attempt to get into the mid of the web searcher who’s searching for you. What is their intent, and how will these keywords differ from what you’ve found thus far. Google estimates that 15% of web searches have not been seen before, so take the time to understand what they’re typing in the search box!
