How To Choose The Right Keywords: Expert’s Guide

Google algorithms are constantly evolving. Successful businesses understand the importance of staying updated with these changing algorithms as they are the key to optimising a website. The priority of a website is not just to grow traffic but also to attract a relevant audience. Selecting effective keywords and phrases that fit with your website will connect you with your target audience over time. It will help you get the desired results. Picking the right keywords is one of the key steps to ensuring that the right audience visits your website.

Mel Gibbons
27 April, 2022

Your website needs to be on the top of the SERP (Search Engine Result Page) when relevant keywords are entered in the Google search box. A company providing digital marketing services will work smartly to get higher rankings for your webpage, when keywords related to your business are searched. This is what enhances your visibility and brings you relevant traffic.

Now that we have understood how vital the right keywords are in driving business, let us choose the right keywords for your website.

How to Find and Choose Keywords for Your Website

Choosing the right keyword is similar to planning a marketing strategy and requires the same amount of effort and evaluation. Here are the steps you need to follow.

Step 1: Think like your customer

Start thinking like your customer to get an idea of the keywords with high rankings. Identify with the audience and put yourself in their shoes when making your keyword list.

E.g. If you have a restaurant that sells shawarmas, you need to know if that is how the audience is searching for your product, Would they search for ‘Best shawarmas in Adelaide’ or would they, out of habit, search for terms like gyros/ kebabs/any popular name that a wrap goes by? If they were to look for your restaurant, what would they type? Speak to a few friends and family to get their opinions about the keywords or phrases they would probably use to search for your restaurant. While you may have a very specialised cuisine offering, the generic name searched for could vary, and thinking like the customer will help you narrow that down.

Step 2: Use Google’s Keyword Planner & Google Trends to shortlist keywords

Google’s Keyword Planner will give you the traffic and search volume estimates for every keyword in your consideration set. Look at Google trends to gauge the performance of these keywords in the past and their future projections. While something may have a low search volume today, it could have upcoming potential. It may be worth holding on to such keywords to reap their benefits in the future.

Google Trends will assist you with terms that are trending currently, and that are expected to go upward. This step will help you narrow down keywords and eliminate any that are redundant. Google Trends will also give you the keywords’ monthly search volume (MSV). Showing you how frequently people are searching for a query is key to determining the kind of content you need to produce for people to discover your website.

Step 3: Give priority to the low-hanging fruit

You should prioritise keywords that have a high chance of ranking based on your website’s authority. These needn’t just be high search volume keywords. The larger established companies with more money to spend on digital marketing services, essentially go for high search volume keywords. As these are well-established brands, they are rewarded by Google with authority over many of these topics.

Consider keywords with less competition that don’t have too much content battling for the top rank. Since fewer people are trying to claim it, the spot can be yours.

Step 4: Consider the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) features while choosing keywords

If used appropriately, there are numerous SERP feature snippets that Google highlights such as image packs, paragraph snippets, list snippets, and video snippets. When you enter your keywords in the search engine, you can get a quick overview of how the first results appear. Evaluate this to understand how and where your website would appear for a certain keyword.

Step 5: Comprehend the difference between long-tail keywords and head terms and use a good mix

Head terms are short keywords that are searched more commonly and therefore, it may be tough to get a high rank for these keywords. In contrast, long-tail keywords have three or more words. Long-tail keywords have lower search volumes, yet they attract more relevant website traffic. These are easier to rank on as they are essentially not as competitive. Your keyword strategy should comprise a good mix of these keywords to balance your long-term and short-term digital goals.

Step 6: Competitor analysis and keyword performance

While you cannot copy-paste your competitor’s keyword strategy onto yours, it is always advisable to know how they are ranking for certain industry-relevant keywords. This will help you better evaluate your keywords. The competitor’s keywords will broaden your horizons and may help you realise a few keywords you may be forgetting. There may also be specific vital keywords that your competitors have missed out. Improving your ranking on those keywords will help you gain a first-mover advantage and capture a massive chunk of the market share.

Remember that the goal is to end up with a balanced-out keyword strategy that provides some quick wins and progresses you toward the challenging and bigger SEO picture.

To achieve your SEO strategy, you need a thorough keyword strategy and to excel in other aspects such as building a mobile-friendly website, focusing on easy user navigation, captivating UI/UX experience, ensuring relevance, and other such activities. Bringing in experts in digital marketing services or SEO services in Adelaide will help you realise your digital vision and ensure your website gets the visibility and footfall required for business growth.