What is a Keyword Strategy and Why Do You Need One?

To have a successful online presence, you need to have a keyword strategy.

What is a keyword strategy?

It is simply the process of finding and targeting keywords that will help you rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs) and attract more visitors to your website. In this blog post, we will discuss what a keyword strategy is and why you need one. We will also provide tips on how to create your keyword strategy. But before we explain what a keyword strategy is, let’s look at what a keyword is first.

What is a keyword, keyword phrase, or long tail keyword?

A keyword is a word or phrase used when searching for something on the internet. For example, if you are a plumber, some of your keywords might be “plumbing,” “plumbers,” or “leaky pipes”.

You might also see the term “keyword phrase”. A keyword phrase is a group of words that are related to each other. For example, if you are a plumber, your keyword phrases might be “plumbing services,” “emergency plumbing,” or “drain cleaning.”

You might also see the term “long tail keyword”. A long tail keyword is a keyword phrase that is more specific and descriptive than a shorter, more general keyword. For example, if you are a plumber, your long tail keywords might be “commercial plumbing services,” “residential plumbing services,” or “plumbing repairs.”

Generally speaking, the more specific your keywords are, the less search engine volume. The volume is how many searches were made for that keyword during the month. So something like “yellow butterflies flying over pink elephants” is going to have a much lower search volume than just “yellow butterflies” or “elephants”. So when you are looking at keywords you want to target, you need to find a balance between specificity and search engine volume.

Why is a key strategy important?

A keyword strategy is important because it helps you focus your content marketing efforts on the right topics. It also allows you to track your progress over time and see which keywords perform well for you. Additionally, a good keyword strategy can help improve your SEO (search engine optimisation) and increase your chances of ranking higher in SERPs.

How do I choose the right keywords?

There are a few things to consider when choosing keywords for your website or blog:

• Relevancy: Choose keywords that are relevant to your business or website. There really is no point in ranking for keywords that are not relevant to your business.
• Search Volume: Choose keywords that have a high search volume. This means that people are searching for these terms on the internet.
• Competition: Choose keywords that you can realistically rank for. If you choose keywords with too much competition, it will be difficult to rank in SERPs. However, it can be useful to look at some of the keywords that your competitors are ranking for and look at ways to rank higher for those.
• Intent: Choose keywords that match the intent of the searcher. For example, if you are a plumber, you would want to target keywords like “plumbing services” or “drain cleaning” because these are terms that people would use when they are looking for a plumbing service.

Once you have considered all of these factors, you can start to create a list of keywords for your website or blog. If you’re not sure where to start, try using a keyword research tool like Google Keyword Planner inside of Google Ads. This tool will help you find relevant keywords for your website or blog. Another very useful tool is SEMRush; though this is not free and requires a paid plan, it is a very powerful tool for keyword research.

Yet another useful tool is Answer the Public – this can be used to find out what kind of questions are being asked around your keywords. For example, the keyword “Elephant” results in questions like “what is a baby elephant called”, “can elephants paint”, “how do elephants drink water” and hundreds of others. This can be useful for building a list of topics for content such as blogs and news articles that directly “answer the public” interests.

How do I use keywords on my website or blog?

Once you have a list of keywords, you need to start using them on your website or blog. Here are a few places where you can use keywords:

• Page Titles: Use keywords in your page titles. This helps search engines understand what your pages are about and can help improve your SEO.
• Headings and Subheadings: Use keywords in your headings and subheadings. This helps search engines understand what your pages are about and can help improve your SEO.
• Page URLs: Use keywords in your page URLs. This helps search engines understand what your pages are about and can help improve your SEO.
• Alt Text: Use keywords in your alt text. This is the text that appears when an image cannot be displayed. It helps search engines understand what the image is about and can help improve your SEO.
• Meta Descriptions: Use keywords in your meta descriptions. These are the short descriptions that appear beneath each of your pages in SERPs. They help search engines understand what each page is about and can help improve your SEO.
• Within the content of the pages themselves.

You should aim to make one keyword or keyword phrase the focus for each page of content on your site. Within that page, you would use the keyword within the title, headings, subheadings, URL, image alt text, meta descriptions, and content. However, don’t go overboard with keyword stuffing – this is when you stuff so many keywords into your content that it becomes difficult to read. Not only will this irritate your readers, but it will also likely result in search engines penalizing your site for keyword stuffing. It needs to be done as naturally as possible to provide the reader with quality content.

You should also aim for between 500 to 600 words for each page. This helps to ensure that your pages are long enough to include all of the relevant information but not so long that they become bloated and difficult to read.

Conclusion – A few final thoughts

A solid keyword strategy is essential for any business or website that wants to rank higher on search engine results pages. By choosing relevant, high-volume, and low-competition keywords and using them throughout your website or blog, you can improve your chances of ranking higher in SERPs. Several tools are available to help you with keyword research, such as Google Keyword Planner, SEMRush, and Answer the Public. Once you have a list of keywords, use them in your page titles, headings, subheadings, URLs, image alt text, and meta descriptions. And finally, aim for between 500 to 600 words per page of content.

If you follow these tips, you will be well on your way to improving your SEO and ranking higher in SERPs.

If you need help with your keyword strategy, we can help build one for you. We use SEMRush for keyword research, and we can provide a list of recommendations to help you improve your search engine rankings. Plus, we can help you action those recommendations, including search engine optimisation, content creation, and ongoing keyword and position tracking. Feel free to contact us for more information or book a free discovery session to discuss via a zoom session.