Keyword Research - The One-Hour Guide to SEO, Part 2
Summary
TLDRThis 'Whiteboard Friday' episode delves into the crucial realm of keyword research for SEO, emphasizing its necessity for understanding search demand and crafting effective SEO strategies. The speaker illustrates the importance of aligning content with popular search terms to outperform competitors and highlights the significance of analyzing search demand landscapes. The episode guides viewers on setting priorities and matching keywords to website pages, considering the evolving nature of search results and the impact of mobile versus desktop user behaviors on SEO tactics.
Takeaways
- 🔍 Keyword research is essential for understanding which words and phrases people use in search engines, enabling better content structuring and targeting.
- 🏆 Competitors who perform keyword research can choose wise search phrases that attract more searchers, giving them an advantage over those who don't.
- 🌐 Understanding the search demand landscape helps in crafting SEO strategies that can either build brand demand or serve existing demand effectively.
- 📈 Keyword research aims to create a list of terms and phrases to match marketing goals, achieve rankings, and ensure high ROI by prioritizing keyword investments.
- 📊 The importance of matching keywords to existing site pages or creating new content if matches are missing or suboptimal is highlighted for effective SEO.
- 📱 The variety of search results on mobile and desktop devices has evolved, with different types of SEO required for organic, paid, local, image, video, and map results.
- 📊 Click-through rates for mobile and desktop searches differ significantly, with mobile having a higher percentage of no-click searches and desktop favoring organic results.
- 📈 The search demand curve illustrates the distribution of search volumes, with a few high-volume keywords and a vast number of low-volume, long-tail keywords.
- 🔑 The long tail of search demand consists of numerous specific keywords with fewer searches per month, offering lower competition and more specific intent.
- 🛠️ Tools like Moz's Keyword Explorer, Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Google Trends are recommended for conducting keyword research and analyzing search demand.
- 📝 The process of keyword research should result in a prioritized list that considers volume, difficulty, click-through rate, business value, and the types of search results that appear for each keyword.
Q & A
What is the main purpose of keyword research in SEO?
-The main purpose of keyword research in SEO is to understand which words and phrases people use in search engines to find content, products, or services. This helps in structuring content and optimizing it to rank higher in search results, ensuring that the content meets the searchers' needs and expectations.
Why is it important to know the search demand landscape for SEO strategy?
-Knowing the search demand landscape is crucial for crafting better SEO strategies because it helps determine the search volume and competition for specific keywords and phrases. This information allows marketers to focus on terms with high demand and less competition, potentially leading to better rankings and visibility.
Can you give an example of how understanding the search demand landscape helped a company in the script?
-An example provided in the script is Crowd Cow, a startup that delivers beef from small ranchers directly to consumers. Understanding the search demand landscape helped them realize that there was more search demand for their competitors like Omaha Steaks than for generic terms like 'buy steak online.' This insight could guide their SEO strategy to focus on building their brand and creating demand.
What are the big picture goals of keyword research mentioned in the script?
-The big picture goals of keyword research include understanding the search demand landscape, creating a list of terms and phrases to match marketing goals and achieve rankings, prioritizing keyword investments for the highest ROI, and matching keywords to the pages on a website, creating or optimizing content as needed.
Why is it necessary to prioritize keyword investments in SEO?
-Prioritizing keyword investments is necessary to focus on the most important and high-ROI keywords first. This ensures that time and resources are spent on optimizing for terms that are most likely to drive traffic and conversions, rather than spreading efforts too thin across less valuable keywords.
How has the variety of search results changed over the past 10-15 years according to the script?
-According to the script, 10-15 years ago, search results were primarily 10 blue links. However, today, search results include a variety of formats such as shopping results, advertisements, organic results, maps, images, and videos, reflecting the evolution of search engines and user behavior.
What does the script suggest about the distribution of search demand among different types of keywords?
-The script suggests that there is a search demand curve where a small number of keywords have a very high search volume, while a large number of long-tail keywords have lower search volumes but collectively account for a significant portion of searches. This highlights the importance of targeting both head and long-tail keywords in an SEO strategy.
What is the significance of the 'long tail' in keyword research as mentioned in the script?
-The 'long tail' in keyword research refers to the large number of keywords with low individual search volumes. These keywords, when considered collectively, can represent a significant portion of search demand and offer lower competition and more specific intent, making them valuable targets for SEO.
How does the script describe the difference between head, chunky middle, and long tail in keyword research?
-The script describes the 'head' as having a few keywords with very high search volumes but higher competition and broader intent. The 'chunky middle' consists of thousands of keywords with moderate search volumes and less competition. The 'long tail' is characterized by a large number of keywords with low individual search volumes but very specific intent and lower competition.
What is the importance of understanding the types of searches that appear for a keyword?
-Understanding the types of searches that appear for a keyword is important because it helps determine the best SEO strategy. If certain types of results like images, videos, or maps frequently appear for a keyword, it may be beneficial to focus on those specific types of content to improve visibility in those search result areas.
How does the script discuss the importance of matching keywords to existing website pages?
-The script emphasizes the importance of matching keywords to existing website pages to ensure that the content is optimized for those terms. If there are no matching pages, new content needs to be created. If existing pages are sub-optimal, they need to be improved to better answer the searcher's query. This process helps in leveraging the existing content and improving the website's SEO performance.
Outlines
🔍 The Importance of Keyword Research in SEO
This paragraph introduces the concept of keyword research in SEO, emphasizing its necessity for understanding the search demand landscape and crafting effective SEO strategies. It explains that without knowing the specific words and phrases that people use in search engines, it's impossible to structure content that meets their needs. The speaker uses the example of 'Crowd Cow' to illustrate how understanding search demand can vary significantly between industries. The goal of keyword research is to identify terms with real demand, prioritize them based on ROI, and match them to the appropriate pages on a website, creating or optimizing content as needed.
📈 Understanding Search Engine Results and Keyword Demand
The speaker discusses the evolution of search engine results, noting the variety of results beyond the traditional 'ten blue links', including shopping results, advertisements, and local SEO opportunities. They highlight the importance of recognizing different types of search results and optimizing for them accordingly. Using data from Jumpshot, the paragraph presents click-through rates for mobile and desktop devices, showing a significant difference in user behavior between the two. The concept of the 'search demand curve' is introduced, explaining the distribution of search volume across a broad range of keywords, from high-volume generic terms to low-volume, specific long-tail keywords.
📝 Conducting Keyword Research and Prioritizing SEO Efforts
This paragraph delves into the practical aspects of conducting keyword research, including the use of tools like Moz's Keyword Explorer, Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Google Trends. It outlines the importance of analyzing search volume, difficulty, click-through rate, business value, and the types of search results that appear for different keywords. The speaker advises on creating a comprehensive list of keywords and prioritizing them based on various factors to ensure that SEO efforts are focused on the most valuable and achievable targets. The paragraph concludes by emphasizing the need to map keywords to existing pages and optimize or create content where necessary to improve search rankings.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
💡Keyword Research
💡Search Demand Landscape
💡Ranking
💡Long Tail of Search Demand
💡Chunky Middle
💡Fat Head
💡Organic Results
💡Zero Click Searches
💡Local SEO
💡Content Optimization
Highlights
Introduction to the importance of keyword research in SEO strategy.
The necessity of understanding which words and phrases people use in search engines for effective content structuring.
The risk of optimizing for words and phrases that have little to no search demand.
The goal of keyword research to understand the search demand landscape for crafting better SEO strategies.
Case study of Crowd Cow to illustrate the difference in search demand between branded and generic keywords.
The distinction between SEO for building brand demand versus serving existing demand.
The objective of creating a list of terms and phrases to match marketing goals and achieve rankings.
The importance of prioritizing keyword investments for the highest ROI in SEO efforts.
The need to match identified keywords to existing site pages or create new content if necessary.
Understanding the variety of search results presented by Google for different queries.
The shift in search behavior between mobile and desktop devices and its implications for SEO.
Insights from Jumpshot data on click-through rates for paid and organic search results.
The concept of the search demand curve and its impact on keyword research strategy.
The significance of the 'long tail' of search demand and its role in SEO.
The difference between 'fat head' and 'chunky middle' keywords in terms of competition and search intent.
The process of building a keyword research list using tools like Moz's Keyword Explorer.
The importance of considering business value and search types when prioritizing keywords.
The next steps in the SEO process after keyword research, including page creation and optimization.
Transcripts
[Music]
howdy miles fans
welcome to another portion of our
special edition whiteboard friday
the one hour guide to seo this is part
two keyword research
so hopefully you've already seen our seo
strategy
session from last week and what we want
to do in keyword research
is talk about why keyword research is
required why do i have to do this
task prior to doing any seo work the
answer is
fairly simple if you don't know which
words and phrases people
type into google or youtube or amazon or
bing whatever search engine you're
optimizing for
you're not going to be able to know how
to structure your content you won't be
able to get into the searcher's brain
into their head
to imagine and empathize with them what
they actually want from your content
and you probably won't do correct
targeting which will mean your
competitors
who are doing keyword research are
choosing wise
search phrases right wise words and
terms terms and phrases that
that searchers are actually looking for
and you might be unfortunately
optimizing for words and phrases that no
one is actually looking for or no
not as many people are looking for or
that are much more difficult than what
you can actually rank for
so let's talk about some of the big
goals big picture goals of cured
research
first off we are trying to understand
the search
demand landscape so we can craft
better seo strategies let me just paint
a picture for you
i was helping a startup here in seattle
washington
a number of years ago probably a couple
of years ago called crowd cow
crowd cow is an awesome company they
basically will deliver
uh beef from small ranchers small farms
straight to your doorstep i personally
am a big fan
of um of steak and and
i don't really love the quality of the
stuff that i can get from the store i
don't love the mass-produced you know
sort of industry around beef i think
there's a lot of americans who feel that
way
and so working with small ranchers
directly where they're sending it
straight from their farms is kind of an
awesome thing
but when we looked at the seo picture
for crowd cow for this
this company what we saw was that there
was
more search demand for competitors of
theirs people like
omaha steaks which you might have heard
of there was more search demand for them
than there was for
buy steak online buy beef online buy
ribeye online
even things like just uh shop for steak
or
or steak online write these broad
keyword phrases they're the branded
terms of their competition had more
search demand than
all of the keywords uh the specific
keywords the unbranded generic keywords
put together that is a very different
picture
from a world like soccer jerseys where i
i spent a little bit of keyword research
time today looking and basically you
know the brand names in that field
do not have nearly as much search volume
as the generic terms for
soccer jerseys and custom soccer jerseys
and and
you know football clubs uh particular
jerseys right those
generic terms have much more volume
which is a totally different kind of seo
that you're doing right one is very
oh we need to build our brand we need to
you know go out into this marketplace
and create demand and the other one is
hey we need to serve existing demand
already
so you've got to understand your search
demand landscape so that you can present
to your
executive team and your marketing team
or your client whoever it is
hey this is what the search demand
landscape looks like and here's what we
can actually do for you here's how much
demand there is
here's what we can serve today versus we
need to grow our brand
next goal of keyword research we want to
create
a list of terms and phrases that we can
then
use to match our marketing goals and
achieve
rankings and we want to make sure that
the rankings that we
promise right the keywords that we say
we're going to try and rank for
actually have real demand that we can
actually uh
optimize for them and potentially rank
for them or you know
in the case where that's not true
they're too difficult right they're too
hard to rank for or
organic results don't really show up in
those types of searches and we should go
after paid or maps or images or videos
or some other type of search result
we also want to prioritize those keyword
investments so we're doing the most
important work the highest roi work
in our seo universe first right there's
there's there's no point in going after
uh you know spending hours and months
going after a bunch of keywords that
if we had just chosen these other ones
we could have achieved much better
results in a shorter period
of time and finally we want to take all
the keywords
that matter to us and match them to the
pages on our site
if we don't have matches we need to
create that content if we do have
matches but they are
sub-optimal not doing a great job of
answering that searcher's query well
we need to do that work as well if we
have a page that matches but we haven't
done our keyword optimization which
we'll talk a little bit more about
uh in a future video we've got to do
that too
so an important part of understanding
how search engines work
is is to have this we're going to start
down here and then we'll come back up
is to have this understanding that when
when you perform a query on a mobile
device or a desktop device
google shows you a vast variety of
results 10 15 years ago this was not the
case right we got
we searched 15 years ago for soccer
jerseys what did we get
10 blue links and i think unfortunately
in the minds of
many search marketers and many people
who are unfamiliar with seo
they still think of it that way how do i
rank number one and the answer is
well there's there's a lot of things
number one
can mean today and we need to be careful
about about what we're optimizing for so
if i search for soccer jersey
i get these shopping results from you
know macy's and soccer.com and
all these other places google sort of
has this sliding box of shopping
sponsored shopping results
then they've got advertisements below
that notated with this tiny green little
ad box
and then below that there's a couple of
organic results what what
what we would call classic seo right ten
blue link style
organic results there's two of those
then there's a box of maps results that
show me local soccer stores in my region
which is a totally different kind of
optimization right local seo
and so i need
you need to make sure that you
understand and that you can convey that
understanding to
everyone on your team that these
different kinds of results mean
different types of seo now i've done
some work
recently over the last few years with a
company called jump shot they collect
click stream data from millions of
browsers around the world and
millions of browsers here in the united
states and so they're able to provide
some broad overview numbers
uh collectively across the billions of
searches that are performed on google
every day in the united states
the click-through rates are look
something like this
for for mobile devices on average
paid results get eight point seven
percent of all clicks
organic results get about 40 percent
little under 40
of all clicks and zero click searches
where a searcher performs a query
but doesn't click anything google
essentially either answers the results
in there or the searcher is
so unhappy with the potential results
that they don't bother clicking anything
that is 62 right so vast
vast majority of cl of searches on
mobile are
no click searches on desktop it's a very
different story it's sort of inverted so
paid
5.6 i think people are a little savvier
about
which result they should be clicking on
on desktop
organic 65 right so much much higher
than mobile
and zero click searches 34 so
considerably lower there's a lot more
clicks happening
on a desktop device that being said
right now
we think it's around 60 40. uh so
meaning 60 of queries on google at least
happen on mobile
40 happen on desktop somewhere in those
ranges might be a little higher or lower
another important and critical thing to
understand about the keyword
research universe and how we do keyword
research
is that there's a there's a sort of
search demand curve
right so for any given um universe of
keywords
there are essentially some a small
number
right maybe a few to a few dozen
keywords
that have millions or hundreds of
thousands of searches every month
something like soccer or
seattle sounders right those have those
have tens hundreds of thousands even
millions of searches
every month in the united states but
people searching for uh sounders fc away
jersey customizable
there are very very few searches per
month
but there are millions even billions of
keywords
like this when when sundar pichai
google's current ceo
was testifying before congress just a
few months ago
he told congress that 20 around 20
of all searches that google receives
each day
they have never seen before no one's
ever performed them in the history of
the search engine i think maybe that
number is closer to 18
but that is just a remarkable sum and it
tells you
about the the long tail right what we
call the long tail of search demand
essentially tons and tons of keywords
millions or billions of keywords
that are only searched for one time per
month
five times per month 10 times per month
if you if you want to get into this next
layer what we call the chunky middle in
the seo world right this is where
there are you know thousands tens of
thousands of
keywords potentially in your universe
but
they only have between say 50
and a few hundred searches per month and
then this fat head
right has only a few keywords right
there's only
there's only one keyword like soccer or
soccer jersey right which is actually
probably more like the chunky middle
right but it has hundreds of thousands
or millions of searches
the fat head is higher competition and
broader
intent what do i mean by broader intent
that means when someone performs a
search for soccer
you don't know what they're looking for
the likelihood that they want a
customizable
soccer jersey right that moment is very
very small they're probably looking for
something much broader
and it's hard to know exactly their
intent however
as you drift down into the chunky middle
and into the long tail where there's
fewer keywords
sorry where there's more keywords but
fewer uh searches for each keyword
your competition gets much lower there's
fewer people trying to compete and rank
for those because
they don't know to optimize for them and
there's more specific intent
customizable f's sounders fcoa jersey
is very clear i know exactly what i want
i want to order
a customizable jersey from the seattle
sounders
away right the the particular colors
that the away jersey has and i want to
be able to
put my you know logo on there or my name
on the back of it
what have you right so super specific
intent
as a result you need to figure out what
the map of your universe looks like so
that you can present that
and you need to be able to build a list
that looks
something like this you should
at the end of the keyword research
process and you know i
we we featured a screenshot from moz's
keyword explorer which is a tool that i
really like to use and
and i find super helpful whenever i'm
i'm helping companies even now that i've
left moz right and been gone for a year
i still sort of use keyword explorer
because the volume date is so good and
it
it puts all the stuff together however
there are uh two or three other tools
that a lot of people like
one from ahrefs which i think also has
the name
keyword explorer and one from sem rush
which i like although some of the volume
numbers at least in the united states
are not
as good as what i what i might hope for
there are a number of other tools that
you could check out as well a lot of
people like google trends which is
totally free
and interesting for some of that broad
volume data
so i might have terms like soccer jersey
sounders fc jersey
custom soccer jersey right for seattle
sounders
and then i'll have these columns volume
because i want to know how many people
search for it
difficulty how hard will it be to rank
right if if it's super difficult to rank
and i have a brand new website i don't
have a lot of authority
well maybe i should target some of these
other ones first that are lower
difficulty
organic click-through rate just like we
talked about back here there are
different levels of click-through rate
and
and the tools at least moz's keyword
explorer tool
uses jump shot data on a per keyword
basis to estimate
what percent of people are going to
click the organic results
should you optimize for it well you know
if the click-through rate is only 60
pretend that instead of 100 searches
this only has 60
or 60 available searches for your
organic clicks
95 though great awesome all four of
those
monthly searches right are available to
you business value
right how how useful is this to your
business
and then set some type of priority
to determine so i might look at this
list and say hey for my new soccer
jersey website
this is the most important keyword right
i want to go after a custom soccer
jersey for each team
in the u.s and then i'll go after
team jersey and then i'll go after
customizable away jerseys and then
maybe i'll go after soccer jerseys
because it's just so competitive so
difficult to rank for
there's a lot of volume but the search
intent is not as great the business
value to me is not as good
right all those kinds of things and last
but not least i want to know the types
of searches that appear
organic paid do images show up
does shopping show up does videos show
up do maps results show up
if those other types of search results
like we talked about here show up in
there
i can do seo to appear in those places
too
and that could be that could yield in in
certain
uh keyword universes a strategy that is
very image centric
or very video centric which means i got
to do a lot of work on youtube
or very map centric which means i got to
do a lot of local seo
or other kinds like this once you build
a keyword research list
like this you can begin the
prioritization process
and the true work of creating pages
mapping
the pages you already have to the
keywords that you've got and optimizing
in order to rank and we'll talk about
that in
part three next week take care
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