SEO keyword research: important tips and practices

Want to use proven methods to find high-intent keywords?

Hope you can build a simple and powerful keyword strategy to help your target audience find you faster?

You can—especially if you have a deep understanding of your audience and create a solid keyword strategy based on intent.

On November 3, I hosted a sponsorship Search Engine Journal Webinar Introduced by Zack Kadish, Senior SEO Success Manager of Conductor.

He provides an eye-opening crash course on keyword intent research techniques, techniques, and strategies.

This is a quick review of the webinar presentation.If you want to learn more, please fill out the form to Access the entire webinar.

Let’s see how Zack breaks down some of the best practices for choosing the right keywords and where to place those keywords to ensure that you can increase your natural visibility.

The head and tail of the keyword strategy creation

Keyword research = discover + target relevant words that are important to your audience

Understanding the basics of keywords and integrating them into intent-based strategies lays the foundation for success.

Keyword research tip #1: Know how to target all suitable keyword types

To attract qualified traffic to your website, make sure to include each of the four basic keyword elements in your research, including:

• popularity.
• Associated.
• Head keywords.
• Long tail keywords.

1. Search volume

Search volume is the average number of times someone searches for a particular phrase each month.

Generally, you choose keywords with high search volume. But remember: the keyword needs to be relevant to the needs of your audience.

Pro tip: Find a balance between high search volume and keywords related to your business.

2. Relevance

Relevance helps your website appear at the right time in the right search.

Put yourself in the perspective of future visitors. What questions will they ask? What do they need to know before deciding to switch?

Pro tip: For the greatest impact and best results, choose a keyword that meets the needs of your target audience, has moderate search volume, and meets the intent of the landing page.

RSVP → Learn how to find relevant keywords that can be converted.

3. Head keywords

The central keywords are words and phrases with high search volume.

These necessary keywords are great for driving traffic, but due to fierce competition, they may be more difficult to rank successfully.

Let’s take a look at keyword phrases [reading glasses], Which has 116,000/MSV (monthly search volume). We saw:

• This vague phrase is desirable because thousands of people are searching for the keyword.
• It is difficult to rank because many other websites are also trying to rank for the same phrase.

Pro tip: balance head keywords and long tail keywords in your keyword strategy.

4. Long tail keywords

Long-tail keywords usually have lower competition and lower numbers, but they are easier to rank for.

If we drill down from the head keyword phrase [reading glasses] To long tail keyword phrase [lightweight reading glasses], There is 480/MSV, we will learn:

• Long tail keywords can account for 50% or more of total website traffic.
• Users who search for this long-tail keyword are more likely to make a purchase.

Pro tip: Use long tail keywords in your product, service, or conversion page strategy. Later customers are ready to make a purchase and will use these keywords to target your website.

RSVP → Learn how to successfully incorporate high competition and long tail keywords into your strategy.

Author screenshot, November 2021

Keyword research tip #2: Consider customer journey and user intent

Are the keyword phrases you choose consistent with the goals your customers want to achieve? Do they match the position of your visitors in the buyer’s journey?

The stronger and more relevant your keywords are to your users and their position in the buyer’s journey, the more likely it is to increase traffic.

Pro tip: You can add specific phrases to your keywords to help them match what your potential customers might search for. These intent phrases can help you show authority to every type of shopper on your journey.

Early customers: Awareness-Information Intention

Early customers want to consume content, they want to learn. At this point, your goal is to become an authoritative source of future customers, thereby increasing your chances of future conversions.

Pro tip: Think about how you would search for your product or service if you didn’t know they existed. What problems has your business solved? Create content to attract early customers by adding the following informative intent phrases to your keywords.

Early keyword phrases:

• WHO.
• what.
• when.
• Where.
• why.
• how.

Image source: Conductor

Intermediate customers: comparison-information on transaction intentions

When your future customers consider buying, please help them. Create content and clarify which items or services are better choices.

Pro tip: Think about what you would study if you were to decide between multiple services or products. Create the same content for your potential audience. Add the following transaction intent phrases to your keywords to attract customers in the middle stage.

Mid-term keyword phrases:

• Compare.
• The best thing.
• relatively.
• better one.

Image source: Conductor

End Customer: Conversion-Transaction Intent

Customers in the final stage are shoppers who convert into sales or potential customers. All your keyword research in the previous “buyer journey” phase is based on this moment.

Pro tip: Assume that you have completed the research and are ready to buy. What are you typing in Google? Your customers are doing the same thing. Add these trading phrases to your keywords.

RSVP → Get a list of transaction keywords that can convert terminal shoppers into customers.

Image source: Conductor

Keyword Research Tip #3: Use competitive data to discover semantically related keywords

Sometimes it can be difficult to know which words are really relevant.

Competitive data can help increase your relevance to a topic.

When you know the ranking of your competitors, you will know which keywords to use in your content to ensure you are found. (Of course, if relevant.)

RSVP → Learn how to discover the keywords used by your competitors.

How to put them together

Theme idea: For each page of content, discover themes that resonate with your audience. Put your customers first!

1. 1. Consider where your customers are in the buyer’s journey.
   2. Match your topic ideas to their search intent.

Keyword discovery: Plan to target 2-3 main keywords per page.

1. 1. Main keywords-target keywords.
   2. Secondary keywords-support keywords.
   3. The third keyword-support keywords.

Keyword evaluation: Remember-search volume, competition, and journey stage.

1. 1. Research and adjust potential high-volume head keywords and long-tail keywords according to the searcher’s intentions.
   2. Add intent phrases to help your content appear at the right time.

Optimizing our content is only half the story. Next, you need to:

• Monitor keyword ranking and organic traffic.
• Analyze over- or under-performing pages.

Make sure to track your content and keywords to show how keyword research can pay off for your business

RSVP → See examples of successful keyword strategies.

[Slides] SEO keyword research: important tips and practices

Check out the presentation slide below:

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Image Source
Featured image: Sammby/Shutterstock
Later picture #1: Zach Kadish/Conductor