|
 |
Expanding Your Keyword List
Once you have finished your brainstorming and
have amassed your list of 5-10 core keywords,
it’s time to move on and enlarge that list.
A list of 5-10 search phrases will not, as I am
sure you will know, transport the amount of search
engine traffic desired to make your website successful.
Nevertheless, that list will be a vital tool when
determining which phrases to add to the mix. At
the moment, you require to turn to the search
engines themselves and research which search phrases
are really being typed into Google, Yahoo, MSN
et al. While few search engines will candidly
tell you which search phrases are the most often
searched, there are a couple of very useful tools
you can use to expand your list.
The first and most well known, is the Overture
Search Suggestion Tool. This great little research
tool is first and foremost for the use of Overture
PPC users and if you have ever endeavored on a
PPC campaign with Overture, you will without a
doubt have come across it. Take any of your main
search phrases and enter them into the suggestion
tool. Overture will then spit out all other popular
search terms that contain that phrase. In addition,
Overture will place the search phrases in order
of popularity and give you an idea of the number
of searches per month for each expression across
their network.
While this tool can be very helpful, particularly
as it is free to use, it does have some key drawbacks.
First, it does not distinguish between singular
and plural search phrases. As a result, "website"
and "websites" are joint together, leaving
you to use your own judgment as to which variation
is the most popular. For many search phrases,
you can take a well-informed guess as to which
one is probable to be the most searched, but often
you will be left devoid of a clue as to whether
to target the singular or plural. Secondly, the
Overture Suggestion Tool does not handle punctuation
very well, preferring to ignore it completely.
Thus "kid’s toys", "kid’s
toys", "kid- toys", "kid’s
toy" would all be shown as "kid toy".
Again, this never used to be a big problem, but
go to Google and search for each of these phrases
and you will see different results for each one.
|
|
|
|
