3 ways to master keyword research

What are keywords?

Keywords are phrases and terms that users are searching into the likes of Google and other search engines to get to the website that serves them the best for their question or query. It is important as a business to understand what your potential customers are searching for when they are looking for a product or service related to your business. 

This allows you to be able to cater your SEO strategy to focus on these keywords on your website. Increasing your keyword visibility and maximising the amount of traffic coming into your website will then help increase your conversions too.  

So now you know what they are. Let’s look at 3 ways we can help you master your keyword research and get the most out of your SEO campaigns and strategies!

1 – Understand the different types of keywords 

Informational keywords – Users that are looking for an answer to a question they have or if they are looking to find out some general information.

An example of this is: “What is the difference between SEO & PPC?”

Informational keywords tend to have a high search volume, as users are looking for information to answer their queries. This may not convert as well as transactional keywords do; however, you want your business to be the go-to website that people are going to when looking for information in your industry.

Navigational Keywords – Users that are looking to find a specific website or page. 

An example of this is: “Where is Platform 81 based” or “Adidas Running Trainers”

These users tend to know what brand or product they want to see. They are just using these navigational keywords to get on to that website.

Commercial Keywords – Users looking to find out more about the brands or products they are searching for.

An example of this is: “Audi S3 specs vs Golf R specs” or “Golf R reviews”

This is the stage when the user is thinking of purchasing a product or a service. Doing their last-minute checks to ensure they are going to be purchasing the right product for them. As shown above, this could be comparing products, exploring reviews or even getting free samples or discounts.

Transactional Keywords – Users looking to complete a purchase/action on a product or service.

An example of this is: “Golf R for sale” or “Buy wheelie bin liners”

This is the stage in the user’s journey where they are looking to purchase a product or a service. This stage of the process has a lot of competition as you would tend to find paid shopping ads as well as the organic search results. Therefore, it is imperative that you optimise these pages on your website with strong on-page, off-page and technical SEO.

2 – Use keyword research tools to help maximise your SEO campaign 

There are many great SEO keyword research tools out there that can help you with your SEO campaigns.

The keyword research tools I would recommend are MOZ, SEM Rush, Google Ads Keyword Planner & Ahrefs keyword tool.

The software’s listed above gives you an in-depth look into the keywords you are looking into research. They offer great insights with related keywords, search volume, keyword difficulty, click-through rate, search engine results page analysis & keyword gap analysis.

These features can give you a better understanding of what keywords your business should target. Allowing you to implement this into your SEO strategy. These tools have saved me time and provided great insight over the years, so it’s something definitely worth investing in.

3 – Undertake competitor keyword research 

Competitor keyword research is a great way to discover what keywords your competitors are optimising their website for and what they are currently ranking for. With the software tools listed above, you can take a deep dive into your competitors’ websites. Secondly, you will be able to see what individual pages are ranking for what keywords.

This allows us SEOs and digital marketers to see what the competition is doing. Teaching us how we can implement a better-optimised strategy to dominate the search engine’s results page.

You can also use the keyword gap tool on SEM rush and compare your website with your competitors. Additionally, you can see what keywords you rank for together, search terms that only you are ranking for and keywords that your competitors are ranking for that your business is not. This gives you a better idea of how you would need to tailor your strategy on creating new landing pages, to give yourself a better chance of ranking for new search terms.

Use these 3 tips to master your keyword research. If you would like to have a chat regarding this and see if we can help you with any SEO or digital marketing services, drop us a line and we will be more than happy to have a chat. With the digital space becoming more and more important over recent times, there’s no other time to start marketing your website digitally!