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Basic Keyword Research for New SEO Specialists

Basic Keyword Research for New SEO Specialists

Google and other search engines make use of sophisticated algorithms to make their search results more accurate, relevant, and interesting. These algorithms are constantly being updated to avoid being fooled by people who are posting irrelevant content and trying to gain popularity. As an SEO specialist, you need to stay on top of these updates to make the most of your client’s content.

According to Chris Webb,a seo specialist at Bing Digital,there are some features of the industry that remain constant through all the updates made to the search algorithms. One of these is keyword research, which is consistent and has been for a long time.

What Exactly is Keyword Research?

When you, as an SEO marketer, use keywords to find search terms people use when searching for things on sites like Google, you’re engaging in keyword research. Note that you aren’t using the keywords immediately – you’re using them to find out what people are searching for! Knowing the exact search terms people are typing into their search boxes allows you to deliver better content and more targeted marketing campaigns to your clients’ customers.

Make a List of Topics

First, you should think about your client’s business. It is okay to ask your client for help during this part of the process, as they know their company best. Think about the different topics they want to be ranked in search results for. Make sure these are as generic as they come. With the right brainstorming, you should come up with about ten different general topics to get ranked for.

For a blog, these are the most frequently blogged topics. In the retail industry, the products that are best-sellers are taken. Whichever it is, try to put yourself in the end user’s shoes and take on their thoughts for a second too. This enables you to think like the target audience so you know what you would look for. For example, in a company that made blogs, the topics would include things like “social media,” “marketing analytics,” and more related to blogging.

Start Coming Up with Keywords

Once you have figured out the general topics to focus on during your research, you need to think about the keywords you want to use for each of these subjects. Think about words or phrases that you feel would be important when ranking in the results pages of search engines. The best way to do this is to imagine you are the customer, looking for a product online, and then think about what you would ask Google.

For example, if the topic in a certain case were “digital file management,” you could come up with phrases that incorporated digital file management in a commonly searched-for context like:

What is digital file management?

Is digital file management better than paper filing?

Benefits of digital file management

How digital file management saves money

How to switch to digital file management

With the right research, you can come up with keyword phrases that will work with the algorithms of any search engine and rank your client as high up the results as they can go!

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by dansears .