What are keywords? How does it help to rank a website?
What are Keywords? How does it help to rank a website?
Almost every business owner nowadays wants to create a strong online presence of their venture. If you are also among them, you need to be careful about every step you take right from the beginning. When it comes to online marketing of a business, most of you just consider the important role played by web hosting and web development companies.
Well, they are undoubtedly crucial for your business. Yet, you cannot undermine the role of search engine optimization and keywords. To make your website or your content a hit among the major search engines, you need to select the right keyword and use it appropriately.
What are Keywords?
Before understanding the usage of keywords and different types of keywords, you need to know what does the term keyword means. Keywords also are known as the SEO keywords are some selected phrases in the website content that helps people to find the content of your page in the search engines.
The more relevant is your keyword for the search engines, the better is your chance of success in the online market. When learning about the importance of keywords, you need to know that an accurately optimized website can easily help in connecting with the targeted audiences as they can easily relate the phrase used by online users with that on the website.
Though keywords are small phrases used on any website, they are an essential element of search engine optimization and can play a significant role in making your portal a success.
Why do you need to Choose a Keyword?
As it has already been said that the keywords used in your content help in tracking it by the major search engines, it is essential for you to know the mechanism of selecting keyword for your site.
To figure out the targeted keyword for your website, you need to get familiarity with the process in which people search for the services, products or information that you offer on your website. Do some research on the search skills of your targeted audiences and get your website among the top searches of the major search engines.
Successful implementation of keywords can help your site rank above other competing sites. Therefore, before using any keyword on your website, it is wise for you to make a list of keywords that will help in attracting audiences to your website.
Always remember, a successful SEO campaign can be designed only when you have the right keyword for highlighting your website. That is the reason intelligent website owners never hesitate to dedicate time for keyword searching.
How much keyword density must be there?
The optimum keyword density must be 1-3%. Too much of keyword density and you have search spam. Let’s have an idea of how to calculate the keyword density. You simply divide the number of times a specific keyword is used by the total number of words used in the text which you are analyzing. You then multiply this result by 100 to get keyword density.
The process of keyword searching involves a lot of technicalities. Yet, the process is not just about technical procedures and is often referred to as a delicate task involving different trial and error methods. To search for keywords accurately, it is always recommended to get an in-depth knowledge of the procedure and know about the different types of keywords.
Types of keywords
Keywords are classified into two different types, viz. long-tail keywords and short-tail keywords.
Long-tail keywords
Long-tail keywords refer to the phrases, which consists of three to five words. Though they are not as popular as the short keywords, they can be of great importance as they help in attracting traffic to the website. Also, they have less competition compared to short-tail keywords.
When selecting a long-tail keyword, make sure that it is targeted toward a specific search. A few examples of long-tail keywords can help in understanding more precisely. Order storybook online, running shoes for sale, best hotels in Florida are some of the examples of a long-tail keyword.
Short tail keywords
Short tail keywords refer to the ones, which have only one or two words. These keywords have more competition compared to the long-tail keywords and attract a significant amount of traffic to the site. Yet, they are less specific as the same phrases are used by different sites. Running shoes, cheap smartphones, online grocery are some examples of short-tail keywords.
How do you research the right keywords for your business?
As you are aware of the different types of keywords and their usage, it is now essential for you to know the process that you need to follow to find the right keyword for your business. When it comes to finding the right keyword, you need to step into the shoes of the visitors and find the terms that they can use for searching your website.
Following the online search trend can be of great help in this regard. Yet, it is not possible to make the search manually and you need to select suitable tools for the work.
- Word count of a keyword
- Right Keyword Search Volume
- Competitiveness of a keyword
- Keyword CPC
Free keyword tools
These are free keyword research instruments which use google autocomplete (This is a feature to speed up searches), to simply generate several relevant long-tail keywords on just any topic. Long-tail keywords are 3-4 keyword phrases; which are specific to whatever you are selling.
The free keyword tools help you choose the best keywords based on monthly searches and your industry. You can create a content calendar based on your relevant long-tail keywords. Free keyword tools help gauge the competition and you get to know which keywords have the highest search volume. You can easily boost search engine rank.
This is a tool that offers keyword ideas and traffic estimates to build a great search network campaign. You can search for ad groups and keywords depending on terms that describe your service or product. Use google keyword planner free. All you need is a google account.
All you must do is sign in to the google ads account. Click on tools and settings in the upper right corner. Under ‘planning’ click keyword planner. You get to see two different tools within the keyword planner. These are basically ‘Find new keywords’ and ‘Get metrics and forecasts for your keywords’.
The LSIKeywords.com is a generator tool for free keywords. It helps target high volume keywords. Make sure you have the generated keywords in the content on your website. It helps improve the relevancy of the search query. LSI or Latent Semantic Indexing keywords are found together within a single topic. You would find a certain number of common keyword phrases as you write naturally for a certain topic. These phrases are LSI keywords. LSIKeywords.com helps find LSI keywords with high monthly search volume, CPC and competition for free.
Ubersuggest is a great free tool that helps find several long-tail keywords in minutes. You enjoy keyword ideas that are related to your searches on Google. With Ubersuggest you can easily generate keyword ideas for your content marketing strategy.
Ubersuggest is powered by the suggest feature, a revolutionary tool by Google. It helps you get higher google rankings. Ubersuggest can be used even by small-time content creators.
Ubersuggest has an attractive easy to use interface which even the inexperienced can use. You get info on search volume, CPC and more. You don’t need a registration/login process. With Ubersuggest, keyword research is a breeze.
It helps generate LSI keywords and long-tail keywords for free. You get to see trending related keywords and search volume. With LSIGraph, you just type in the main keyword and you would see several related keywords. You get access to keyword search, CPC, LSV, and competition.
Search volume tells you how frequently the phrase was searched in the last month. CPC data tells you how valuable the keyword is. You get an idea of competition which shows how easy/difficult it is to rank keywords. You understand how valuable an LSI keyword is as you rank it on a range from 0 to 100 through Latent Semantic Value. Keywords with high LSV are easy to rank.
With Soovle you have a customizable engine that offers suggestion services across search engines. It's easy to use, fast and efficient. It offers suggestions based on your keywords and is like a search engine for search engines. It is a free keyword research tool.
Soovle puts a variety of search sites on a single page. Soovle helps better understand customers. You get an idea of how you are using keywords to search for products. You can select search engines specific to your search. It's quick and easy to use as it’s a really simple tool. You just type in the phrase and you get what you are looking for.
There are plenty of keyword tools online. While some are paid, others are free. As the name says, free keyword tools do not charge any money for using their services. Yet, all free tools are not equally worth and you need to find a credible one for your use.
Also, some free keyword tools give limited access to the services and might not provide you with proper results. Therefore, it is ideal to do some research before making the selection. Google Keyword Planner is a useful free keyword tool used by search engine optimization services.
Paid keyword tools
Paid keyword tools help you to analyze and research the list of keywords to be used in pay-per-click campaigns. Many of the paid keyword tools have a free trial version. You can check out services and then opt for the paid version.
Paid keyword tools help with backlink analysis, preparing audit reports, competitive analysis, URL ranking and much more. It's worth taking the paid keywords tools as they give a leg-up to your business. Let's take a look at some paid keyword tools.
This is an SEO tool that does your keyword research. You can easily track the keyword strategy of your competition. Semrush runs an SEO audit of your blog while searching for backlinking opportunities. Many large and small businesses use Semrush.
Semrush is great for beginners as it helps with organic keyword research, build powerful backlinks and even spy and learn competitors data.
Use Semrush smartly to identify your competitors, their top content, learn ways to monetize your website, identify top ranking organic keywords, check the breakdown of the competitors and even build high-quality backlinks.
Semrush has 3 options for monthly subscriptions. The Pro option costs $99.95, Guru costs $199.95 and the business version starts at $399.95.
Ahrefs is one of the best-paid tools around. It shows far more keyword ideas than competition. It has a keyword database that has billions of keywords across more than 170 countries. Ahrefs adds new keywords to the database each month. Ahrefs added bitcoin-related keywords in April 2018. This was the month that showed the price of Bitcoins crashing from $11,377 to $6701. No wonder people were googling this at that time.
You can enter any search query in the keywords explorer and get top-ranking search results. You can check the ranking progress for any keyword and compare keyword rankings for another domain. You get the ranking history for the top 5 ranking pages. You can easily uncover content gaps for pages and domains. Ahrefs helps you find a list of sites to guest blog.
Ahrefs has pricing plans of $99, $179, $399 and $999 a month. If you make the payment upfront, there’s a 20% annual discount.
Moz Keyword Explorer is a keyword research tool that helps save time. You can find profitable keywords and arrange keywords in lists. Find the keywords searched by people, the keywords which you are ranking for and the power of other sites that are competing for your target keywords.
Moz Keyword Explorer has a keywords suggestion panel with a sneak preview of keywords you may not have thought of. You get to see pages that contain your keyword along with a snapshot of page title and URL. Select keywords you would like to track with a keyword list or in your campaign.
A Moz Pro subscription costs $99 a month with access to Moz campaigns, keyword explorer, link explorer, fresh web explorer, on-page grader and much more.
Keywordtool.io generates a variety of long-tail keyword suggestions simply based on a particular root keyword. You need to find long-tail keywords that are less competitive and keywordtool.io helps you there.
Keywordtool.io helps understand your company’s buyers and the challenges they face, gives an insight on what your site is capable to rank for, and you also enjoy the power to find related keyword phrases.
All you must do is type in the high-level term and you get autocomplete phrases and all possible google suggest. You can easily find search volume and the competition for any master list of keywords. Keywordtool.io is a simple and perfect tool for keyword research. You can easily find valuable and rankable long-tail keywords.
The Pro Business plan costs just $159 a month and gives thousands of keywords, 50 API requests a day and even up to 10 user accounts for your team. The Pro Basic and Pro Plus plan costs $79 a month.
Want to know what your competitor is doing? Simple, KWFinder will show the best keywords they rank for. All you must do is enter their URL or domain. KWFinder helps create content based on long-term trends and historical search volumes. You can easily identify seasonal keywords and hot topics.
KWFinder shows location-specific long-tail keywords for your website. It makes the keyword research process easy. KWFinder gives possible competitors and locations for analysis, keyword metrics, helps switch between organic and paid keywords and shows how hard it is to rank on the 1st SERP. You can find exact search volume, clustered search variants, historical search volume, and trends.
KWFinder has paid plans which start at $49 a month. If paid annually it costs $29 a month. There is also a free trial version.
These tools have better accuracy than the free keyword tools and charge you a subscription fee for availing their services. Paid keyword tools give detailed information about your website traffic and also provide you with suggestions for improvement.
See Also: 7 Alternatives to Keyword Everywhere You Should Know
Where do use the keywords?
Before touching on the topic of keywords, let’s understand what is search engine optimization or SEO. With SEO you make your website's content and design visible and attractive to a search engine like Google. SEO focuses on the increase in unpaid results.
It doesn’t look at direct traffic (This is when a visitor comes directly to your website without having clicked on another link/site) or the purchase of paid placement.
Now let’s come to keywords. The SEO keywords are nothing but phrases and keywords which help people find your website through search engines. They help connect users to your site.
More than 95% of people check only the first page of the search results. Most of the clicks only go to the first three results. So you must know how to use keywords the right way.
- Do keyword research: Find the right keywords to include in your webpage for the right search ranking, Have each piece of content focus on a different keyword phrase. This prevents you from competing with your content.
- How to find the right keywords? Brainstorm terms you believe customers are likely to search. You then search for related terms just by scrolling to the bottom of the search result page. The last step would be to discover keywords which people are using through Google Analytics.
You have found the right keywords. The next question is where to use them.
- Use keywords in page titles: The page title gives the main subject of your page. It lets the user know what exactly the site is about, Use target SEO keywords at the beginning of your page title.
- Focus on the meta description: This is a snippet of about 155 characters which summarises your webpage content. It helps the search engine understand how relevant the content on your site is to the people searching for it. Make sure to use the right keywords in the meta description.
- Look at subheadings: With subheadings, the eyes of the reader can pause somewhere. It makes content scannable and shows the relevance of your content. Use keywords in at least two subheadings.
- It’s the Content: You must optimize the use of SEO keywords in your content. Avoid keyword stuffing where you add keywords in every other sentence. The main keyword must be in the first paragraph. Variations of that keyword and the keyword itself must be used across the content. Use LSI keywords or Latent Semantic Indexing keywords that focus on the context of the search, rather than the exact keyword. Write content for humans and not the search engine.
- Use images: Do remember that images are indexed and help people find your content. Use relevant images, give them a file name which shows the relevance, use SEO keywords in image titles and use them in Alt Text.
- Get the right URLs: The URL must help visitors understand what the page is all about. Make sure the SEO keywords are used in the URL.
- Make sure to link Anchor Text: The anchor text is the clickable text which gets highlighted as a link. So vary the anchor text. This can be used through LSI keywords.
- Get to social media: Social shares and visibility happen through social media. So optimize keyword usage in social media like Facebook. Use keywords very early in the social media update. Twitter updates are indexed by google. Make sure keywords are there in Tweets and use the right hashtags so that people find your content.
- Go to Directories and External Listings: Use external business listings to include keywords. Have SEO keywords in your business description.
Once you have selected the targeted keyword for your website, you need to know where to use the phrase for attracting the maximum number of traffic. Inserting a keyword anywhere on the page will not yield you the desired gains and so you need to be familiar with the specific usage.
Keywords in SEO
When you are using a keyword for optimizing a website, you need to use the keyword in the title of the page or title tag. Also insert keyword on the page description, Meta tag, body content, URLs and links. The keyword should be present in any graphic used on the site as well as in the incoming links. Yet, do not stuff the page with keywords and use the keyword density accurately.
Keywords in PPC
When you are searching for PPC keywords, you need to note that you are paying for every bid that is made on the phrase. Hence, you need to select the keywords carefully for a better result, also it is recommended to go for the long tail keyword with low cost and competition. Also, opt for companies, which offer keyword organizing and grouping facility.
How does the keyword help to rank a website?
Keywords help your site come on the first page of the search results. This is crucial as most users don’t look past the first page. They have a significant impact on organic page rank in search engines like google.
- Google spiders crawl through the web pages, then add the optimized pages to their index, finally cataloging them. People get to see the best results based on their search terms. Though the keyword isn’t the main ranking factor themselves, they are very important in content and links, which are top ranking factors. So, keyword research is very important in ranking a website.
- SEO keywords bring relevant organic search traffic to your site. This translates to leads. When people search for keywords or phrases, which are relevant to your products and services, you have a good chance of coming at the top of the search, if you include these words.
- They help users find the most appropriate content. If you use the right keywords the right way, you bring traffic and help improve the rank of the website.
Conclusion
There is no denying the fact that the keyword plays a prominent role in determining the success rate of any website. Hence, it should be selected and used in a skilled manner. In case, you do not have a clear idea of keyword analysis, opt for a professional service for your assistance.
