There's no getting around it. Keyword research is a vitally important aspect of your search engine optimization campaign. If your site is targeting the wrong keywords, the search engines and your customers may never find you, resulting in lost dollars and meaningless rankings. By targeting the wrong keywords, you not only put valuable advertising dollars at risk, you are also throwing away all the time and energy you put into getting your site to rank for those terms to begin with. If you want to stay competitive, you can't afford to do that.
The keyword research process can be broken down into the following phases:
Phase 0 - Demolishing Misconceptions
Phase 1 – Creating the list and checking it twice
Phase 2 – Befriending the keyword research tool
Phase 3 – Finalizing your list
Phase 4 – Plan your Attack
Phase 5 - Rinse, Wash Repeat
Phase 0 - Demolishing Misconceptions
Over the years, we've had the opportunity to work with a wide array of wonderful clients. And as different and diverse as their sites and the individuals running them may have been, many had one thing in common: they were self-proclaimed keyword research mavens right out of the gate.
Or so they thought.
One of the most common misconceptions about conducting keyword research for a search engine optimization campaign is the belief that you already know which terms a customer would use to find your site. You don't. Not without first doing some research anyway. You may know what your site is about and how you, the site owner, would find it, but it's difficult to predict how a paying customer would go about looking for it.
This is due to site owners evaluating their site through too narrow of a lens, causing them to come up with words that read like industry jargon, not viable keywords. Remember, your customer probably doesn't work in the same industry that you do. If they did, they wouldn't need you. When describing your site or product, break away from industry speak. Your customers aren't searching that way and if you center your site on these terms, they'll never find you.
Another misconception is that generic or "big dollar" terms are the most important for rankings, even if the term you're going after has nothing to do with your site. Imagine a women's clothing store trying to rank for the term "google". Sure, thousands of searchers probably type that word into their search bar daily, but they're not doing it looking for you. They're looking for Google. Being ranked number one for a term no one would associate with your site is a waste of time and money (and it may get you in trouble!). Your site may see a lot of traffic, but customers won't stick around.
Phase 1 – Creating the list and checking it twice
The initial idea of keyword research can be daunting. Trying to come up with the perfect combination of words to drive customers to your site, rev up your conversion rate and allow the engines to see you as an expert would easily give anyone a tension headache.
The trick is to start slowly.
The first step in this process is to create a list of potential keywords. Brainstorm all the words you think a customer would type into their search box when trying to find you. This includes thinking of phrases that are broad and targeted, buying and research-oriented, and single and multi-word. What is your site hoping to do or promote? Come up with enough words to cover all the services your site offers. Avoid overly generic terms like 'shoes' or 'clothes'. These words are incredibly difficult to rank for and won't drive qualified traffic to your site. Focus on words that are relevant, but not overly used.
If you need help brainstorming ideas, ask friends, colleagues or past customers for help. Sometimes they are able to see your site differently than the way you yourself see it. Also, don't be afraid to take a peek at your competitor's Meta Keyword tag. What words are they targeting? How can you expand on their keyword list to make yours better? It's okay to get a little sneaky here. All's fair in love and search engine rankings.
Phase 2 – Befriend the keyword research tool
Now that you have your list, your next step is to determine the activity for each of your proposed keywords. You want to narrow your list to only include highly attainable, sought-after phrases that will bring the most qualified traffic to your site.
In the early days of SEO, measuring the "popularity" of your search terms was done by performing a search for that phrase in one of the various engines and seeing how many results it turned up. As you can imagine, this was a tedious and ineffective method of keyword research. Luckily, times have changes and we now have tools to do the hard part for us.
By inputting your proposed keywords into a keyword research tool, you can quickly learn how many users are conducting searches for that term every day, how many of those searches actually converted, and other important analytical information. It may also tune you in to words you had previously forgotten or synonyms you weren't aware of.
There are lots of great tools out there to help you determine how much activity your keywords are receiving. Here's a few of our personal favorites:
Overture Keyword Selector Tool: Overture's Keyword Selector tools shows you how many searches have been conducted over the last month for a particular phrase and lists alternative search terms you may have forgotten about. Our only complaint with Overture is that they lump singular and plural word forms into one phrase. For example, "boots" and "boot" would appear under one category of "boot". This can sometimes cause problems.
Wordtracker: Wordtracker is a paid-use tool that lets you look up popular keyword phrases to determine their activity and popularity among competitors. Their top 1000 report lists the most frequently searched for terms, while their Competition Search option provides valuable information to determine the competitiveness of each phrase. This is very useful for figuring out how difficult it will be to rank for a given term. It may also highlight hidden gems that have low competition-rates, but high relevancy.
Trellian Keyword Discovery tool: This is a fee-based tool where users can ascertain the market share value for a given search term, see how many users search for it daily, identify common spellings and misspellings, and discover which terms are impacted by seasonal trends (mostly useful for PPC).
Google AdWords Keyword Tool: Google's keyword PPC tool doesn't provide actual search numbers for keywords. Instead, it displays a colored bar, giving users only an approximation. Still, it may be useful.
Google Suggest: Google Suggest is a great way to find synonyms and related word suggestions that may help you expand your original list.
Thesaurus.com: Again, another way to locate synonyms you may have forgotten.
If those don't tickle your fancy, we'd also suggest Bruce Clay's Check Traffic tool, which estimates the number of queries per day for that search term across the major search engines.
Keep in mind that you're not only checking to see if enough people are searching for a particular word, you're also trying to determine how competitive that phrase is in terms of rankings.
Understanding the competition tells you how much effort you will need to invest in order to rank well for that term. There are two things to pay attention to when making this decision: how many other sites are competing for the same word and how strong are those sites' rankings (i.e. how many other sites link to them, how many pages do they have indexed)? Basically, is that word or phrase even worth your time? If it's not, move on.
While you're testing your new terms, you may want to do a little housekeeping and test the activity for keywords your site is already targeting. Keep the ones that are converting and drop the losers.
Phase 3 – Finalizing your list
Now that you have your initial list of words and have tested their activity, it's time to narrow down the field and decide which terms will make it into your coveted final keyword list.
We recommend creating a spreadsheet or some other visual that will allow you to easily see each word's conversion rate, search volume and competition rate (as given to you by the tools mentioned above). These three figures will allow you to calculate how viable that term is for your site and will be a great aid as you try and narrow down your focus.
The first step in narrowing down your list is to go through and highlight the terms that most closely target the subject and theme of your web site. These are the terms you want to hold on to. Kill all words that are not relevant to your site or that you don't have sufficient content to support (unless you're willing to write some). You can't optimize for words that you don't have content for.
Create a mix of both broad and targeted keywords. You'll need both to rank well. Broad terms are important because they describe what your web site does; however, they won't increase the level of qualified traffic coming into your site.
For example, say you are a company that specializes in cowboy boots. It may be natural for your site to focus on the broad search terms "boots" and "cowboy boots". These words are important because they tell the search engines what you do and may increase your visitors, but the traffic you receive will be largely unqualified. Customers will arrive on your site still unsure of what kind of boots you sell. Do you offer traditional cowboy boots, stiletto cowboy boots, toddler cowboy boots, suede cowboy boots or women's cowboy boots? By only targeting broad terms, customers won't know what you offer until they land on your site.
Targeted terms are often easier to rank for and help bring qualified traffic. They also make you a subject matter expert to the search engines, since the targeted terms strengthen the theme created with the broader phrases. Sticking with our example, targeted terms for your cowboy boots site may be "men's cowboy boots", "blue suede cowboy boots", "extra-wide women's cowboy boots", etc. Broad search terms may bring you the higher levels of traffic, but it's targeted, buying-oriented terms like these that will maximize conversions.
Phase 4 – Plan your attack
So you made your list of about 10-20 highly focused keywords, now what do you do with them? You prepare them for launch!
Chances are, if you did your keyword research right, at least some of the words on your list already appear in your site content, but some of them may not. Start thinking about how many pages you'll need to create to support these new words, and how and where your keyword phrases will be used.
We typically recommend only going after three or four related keywords per page (five if you can balance them properly). Any more than that and you run the risk of diluting your page to the point where you rank for nothing. Make sure to naturally work the keywords into your content and avoid over-repetition that may be interpreted as spamming. Your content should never sound forced.
Your on-page content isn't the only place where you can insert keywords. Keywords should also be used in several other elements on your site:
* Title Tag
* Meta Description Tags
* Meta Keywords Tag
* Headings
* Alt text
* Anchor Text/ Navigational Links
You've spent a lot of time molding your keywords; make sure you use them in all the appropriate fields to get the maximum benefit.
Phase 5 - Rinse, Wash, Repeat.
Congratulations. Your initial keyword research process is behind you. You've created your list, checked it twice, made friends with the keyword research tools and are now off to go plan your attack. You're done, right?
Unfortunately, no. As your customer's and your site's needs change over time, so will your keywords. It's important to keep monitoring your keywords and make tweaks as necessary. Doing so will allow you to stay ahead of your competition and keep moving forward.
(by Lisa Barone, searchengineguide.com)
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Five Steps to Effective Keyword Research
Wednesday, May 9, 2007
How Effective Is Your Keyword Research?
Many search engine marketers and ad agencies offer keyword research services. Keyword research and analysis aren't as simple as using the tools available at Overture and Google. Web site owners must go beyond these tools and look at the big picture.
Keyword analysis can be performed on three levels:
* Keyword research tools
* Web analytics software
* Site search engines
Data-mining all three levels provides site owners with the full perspective of how target audiences find the information on their Web sites.
Keyword Research Tools
Many of you probably already use the keyword research tools available at Overture, Google, and Wordtracker. By all means, keep using these tools. They provide great data for keyword research.
For long-term keyword analyses, I gather monthly data from Google, Overture, and Wordtracker. Additionally, I review related search results on Yahoo, Business.com, and Teoma. By researching all these resources, instead of just one, I can determine which specific keyword phrases are the most popular on all these Web search engines and look for a common denominator. I can also see subtle differences among the engines. Some searches are more popular on one engine than another.
For many sites, creating a keyword phrase calendar is a good strategy. The construction industry tends to be more active in warmer months than colder ones. The cold and flu season is coming up in the U.S., which has implications for pharmaceutical and health-related Web sites.
By creating a calendar based on keyword research over years, site owners know what pages to create for timely "natural" search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns and what ads to create for pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns.
Web Analytics Software
I always use Web analytics software (WebTrends, HitBox, ClickTracks, Omniture, etc.) to review keyword phrases. For example, if a natural SEO campaign is successful, the Web analytics software will reflect that success in the following areas:
* Top referring sites
* Top referring URLs
* Top search engines
* Top search phrases
* Top search keywords
* Top entry pages
Additionally, Web analytics software can show if site visitors access the most appropriate pages or sections on the site.
Web analytics software can also reveal untapped keyword phrases. On our own site, we found one of the most frequently visited pages is an article containing graphic design tips. Knowing our target audience seeks knowledge about that topic, we can create an article series on the topic that will provide additional entry points to our site for optimization campaigns and provide additional opportunities for link development campaigns.
Site Search Engines
If you have a site search engine, helpful information to review includes:
* Number of words entered in the search query
* Average number of words entered in the search query
* Average number of characters entered in the search query
* Search terms that yield results but no clicks
* Search terms that yield no results
One item I like to measure is search box length. Sometimes, search boxes aren't long enough. When visitors enter several keywords in the box, they can't see all the words they typed. On the flip side, some search boxes are too long. I try to determine, through focus groups and usability tests, the optimum length of the search box based on the average number of keywords and characters entered in search queries.
Need a starting point? Begin with the length of Google's and Yahoo's search boxes.
Another overlooked item in site search is those search terms that yield results but no clicks. In many of the search engines our firm creates, we use meta-tag descriptions and title-tag content for the search results. If we find a specific keyword phrase consistently yields the appropriate URLs in the search results, then we know the calls to action in the title tag, meta-tag description, or both might not be effective. We'll then rewrite that specific content and measure the resulting CTRs.
What I find interesting is if we optimize pages for better site search engine conversions, Web search engine visibility increases, too.
Analyzing Keyword Research Data
By gathering and analyzing keyword data, Web site owners gain valuable insight to user behavior and ways to create a more user-friendly site that converts visitors into buyers.
Say a site owner discovers visitors are searching for a specific keyword phrase on Google, then arriving at a specific page on his site. He then discovers same keyword phrase is a heavily searched term on his site search engine. This data indicate visitors might not be arriving at the most appropriate landing page. Increasing optimization for other site pages may be necessary.
Compare site searches that yield no results with Web search engine data. If the Web search engines indicate a keyword phrase is popular, and the site search engine shows visitors have a genuine interest in a keyword phrase, you can create new information around a topic.
Conclusion
The goal of keyword research is to:
* Discover new keyword opportunities.
* Fix missed keyword opportunities.
* Generate a calendar of keyword phrases; some keywords are more popular at different times of the year.
* Increase the number of clicks from landing pages to the site.
* Increase the relevance of landing pages from natural SEO, PPC advertising campaigns, press releases, or offline marketing efforts.
Remember, keyword research and analysis is an ongoing process.
Tuesday, May 8, 2007
Search Engine Optimization Basics Part 2 - Title Tags
As part of the continued series "Getting Back To Search Engine Optimization Basics", Andy Beal turns his attention to the much talked about Title and Meta Tags (while a Title Tag isn't really a Meta tag the two are commonly discussed as such). This week he takes a closer look at the Title tag.
When I decided a few weeks ago to write a series of articles for those new to search engine marketing (SEM), I considered whether there truly was a need to discuss the topic of Meta Tags. After all, this topic has been so heavily discussed that anyone remotely interested in search engine marketing would already have grasped this basic of techniques. My decision was justified just a few days ago when I was asked by the American Marketing Association to provide a workshop on how to create Meta Tags and discuss their benefits. It was at this point that I recalled starting out on my own quest for search engine marketing knowledge many years ago and researching the basic topics that today seem so fundamental. So for the next few parts of this series, I hope to enlighten those of you who are discovering SEM for the first time and maybe refresh the knowledge of those more seasoned marketers.
Meta Tags - an analogy
I don't recall ever reading the following description of Meta Tags anywhere else (although have been using it for years) so hopefully the following analogy will be new to you. When considering the function of Meta Tags, it helps to compare a website to an old fashion book (remember those paper things that we all used to read before the Internet). The first part of any Meta Tag is the "Title" tag. The Title tag is very similar to the title of a book, it gives a visitor the first hint as to the theme of the website. The next section of any Meta Tag is the "Description" tag. The Description tag is comparable to the summary found on the back of a book, providing a brief guide to the content of your website. The last part of any Meta Tag is the "Keywords" tag. The Keywords are similar to the index of a book, allowing anyone to clearly see if the website contains the information they are seeking. If you compare a search engine to a bricks-and-mortar library, with millions of books you'll hopefully have a good understanding as to relevance of Meta Tags for your website.
In this guide, I wish to focus on what many believe is the most important part of any Meta Tag, the Title tag. Now before we continue and discuss suggestions for the best format for your Title tag, lets stop and consider exactly how it looks in your website's HTML code.
- <"head>
- <"title>Title of Your Webpage Here<"/title> (bolded for emphasis)
- <"meta name="description" content="Brief description of the contents of the page">
- <"meta name="keywords" content="keyword phrases that describe your webpage">
- <"/head>
As you can see, the format is pretty straightforward. You will also notice that your Meta tags should be placed within the "head" area of your website as opposed to the "body" area.
Ok, now we have the basic idea of what Title tags are and we've taken a look at the standard structure, lets turn our attention to ideas for optimizing the content to ensure a successful search engine marketing campaign.
The Best Use of a Title Tag
While many people have differing opinions as to the benefits of the Description and Keywords tag, most all are in agreement that the Title tag is extremely important for any SEM campaign. The Title tag is used by pretty much every search engine that uses spiders to crawl your website. That list includes Google, AOL, Yahoo, AlltheWeb, AltaVista, ExactSeek.com and more. The Title tag is pretty much the most effective Meta Tag and is used for conveying the theme of your Webpage to the search engines. Not only is the structure and content of the Title tag used by the search engines when calculating your webpage's relevance, but it is also displayed in most search engine results pages (SERP). It therefore needs to be carefully constructed in such a way that it influences your website's position in the SERP, but is also attractive enough to encourage a surfer to click on your link.
Long gone are the days when cramming dozens of words into a Title tag would result in better search engine positioning. These days the search engines, Google in particular, prefer to see shorter Title tags that are succinct in describing the content on the page. In fact, it appears that stuffing more words into your Title tag will do more harm than good, especially when targeting very competitive search phrases.
So how should a good Title tag look? That, my friend, is one of the many questions that us marketers strive to answer. Each of us have our own ideas of what constitutes a good Title tag and the format for one page, might be totally inappropriate for another. However, I understand that to not provide an example would be a complete omission, so here goes:
- <"title>Desktop computers and computer supplies<"/title> or;
- <"title>Desktop computers and computer supplies at 123Computers<"/title>
As you can see, there are really only two identifiable phrases that make up the above Title tag, but they provide for many different keyword combinations such as "desktop computer supplies" or "desktop computer". Equally important is the fact that they focus on just one theme. Many times, I'll see websites that will try and target two or more very competitive keywords that do not follow the same theme e.g. "desktop computers and digital cameras".
You'll also notice two different formats depending on whether you wish to include your company name or not. In an ideal world of search engine marketing, webpages would not include the company name at all. Unless you're Dell or IBM, the name of your company really doesn't make much difference to the user at this stage. They are more interested in knowing the theme of your page and whether it is relevant to the search query they entered. Likewise, the Title tag is a valuable thing and adding the name of your company might reduce the relevancy of your page in the eyes of the search engines and reduce valuable space that could be used by an extra keyword. That being said, more than 80% of website owners prefer to see their company name listed somewhere in the Title tag. If that is the case for you, it is my advice to place the company name at the end of the Title tag, allowing the search engine spiders and surfers to read the keywords first and determine the relevance to the search query before seeing the name of the company.
In most cases, less is definitely more when constructing optimized Title tags for your website. Keeping to fewer keywords will help to demonstrate to the search engines and their users that the webpage is both highly relevant and solely focused on a particular product or service. In the same way, ensuring that each page has its own unique Title tag will ensure a greater chance your site will be positioned higher on the SERP.
In Summary
In finishing, I'll leave you with three things you should never do when constructing your Title tag.
1. Leave "Untitled" as your Title tag (don't get me started).
2. Use "Homepage" as your Title tag (only slightly better than "untitled").
3. Use only your company name as your Title tag. Unless your company name is searched thousands of times each month, add keywords.
The above advice should keep you busy for the next few days. The next topic in the series will cover the ideas and formats to use for your Description tag. We'll go through, step-by-step the purpose of the Description tag which search engines use it, as well as techniques for getting better positioning.
(By Andy Beal,from searchengineguide.com)
Monday, May 7, 2007
Selecting and Evaluating Keyphrases for Search Engine Marketing
Many businesses recognize that search engines can bring volumes of highly targeted prospects to their website, typically at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing. Unfortunately, these same companies often overlook the most important part of their search engine marketing campaigns, which is keyphrase selection and evaluation. Keyphrases (those phrases that potential customers are using to find products or services on search engines) are the building block of any search engine marketing strategy. It is essential that they are chosen carefully, or else the remainder of the campaign, no matter how effective the implementation, will likely be in vain. What follows is a three-step process that goes over the process of compiling, selecting, and evaluating the ongoing performance of keyphrases for search engines.
Many businesses recognize that search engines can bring volumes of highly targeted prospects to their website, typically at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing. Unfortunately, these same companies often overlook the most important part of their search engine marketing campaigns, which is keyphrase selection and evaluation. Keyphrases (those phrases that potential customers are using to find products or services on search engines) are the building block of any search engine marketing strategy. It is essential that they are chosen carefully, or else the remainder of the campaign, no matter how effective the implementation, will likely be in vain. What follows is a three-step process that goes over the process of compiling, selecting, and evaluating the ongoing performance of keyphrases for search engines.
1. Compiling a keyphrase list:
Usually, companies are sure that they already know their ideal keyphrases. Often, they are wrong. This is typically because it is very hard to separate oneself from a business and look at it from the perspective of a potential customer (rather than an insider). Compiling a keyphrase list should not be, despite common practice, a strictly internal process. Rather, it is best to ask everyone outside of your company for their input, especially your customers. People are often very surprised at the keyphrase suggestions they get- and sometimes dismayed to realize that an average customer doesn�t speak the same language that they do. Only after you have put together a list of likely phrases from external sources do you add your own. As a last step, try to add variations, plurals, and derivatives of the phrases on your list.
2. Evaluating keyphrases:
Once you have compiled a master keyphrase list, it is time to evaluate each phrase to hone your list down to those most likely to bring you the highest amount of quality traffic. Although many individuals will base their assessment of keyphrase value based only on popularity figures, there are really three vitally important aspects of each phrase to consider.
Popularity
By far the easiest of the three to judge is popularity, since it is not subjective. Software like WordTracker gives popularity figures of search phrases based upon actual search engine activity (it also gives additional keyphrase suggestions and variations). Such tools allow you to assign a concrete popularity number to each phrase to use when comparing them. Obviously, the higher the number, the more traffic that can be expected (assuming you are able to obtain good search engine positions). However, this number alone is not good enough reason to pursue any particular keyphrase, although keyphrase analysis too often stops here.
Specificity
This is more abstract than the sheer popularity number, but equally important. For example, let�s assume that you were able to obtain great rankings for the keyphrase "insurance companies" (a daunting prospect). Let�s also assume that you only deal with auto insurance. Although "insurance companies" might have a much higher popularity figure than "auto insurance companies", the first keyphrase would also be comprised of people looking for life insurance, health insurance, and home insurance. It is very likely that someone searching for a particular type of insurance will refine their search after seeing the disparate results returned from the phrase "insurance companies". In the second, longer keyphrase, you can be reasonably sure that a much higher percentage of visitors will be looking for what you offer- and the addition of the word "auto" will make it much easier to attain higher rankings, since the longer term will be less competitive.
Motivation of User
This factor, even more abstract than specificity, calls for an attempt to understand the motivation of a search engine user by simply analyzing his or her search phrase. Assume, for example, that you were a real estate agent in Atlanta. Two of the keyphrases you are evaluating are "Atlanta real estate listings" and "Atlanta real estate agents". Both phrases have very similar popularity numbers. They are also each fairly specific, and your services are very relevant to each. So which phrase is better? If you look into the likely motivation of the user, you will probably conclude that the second is superior. While both phrases target people looking for real estate in Atlanta, you can infer from the second phrase that the searcher has moved beyond the point where they are browsing local homes or checking out prices in their neighborhood- they are looking for an agent, which implies that they are ready to act. Often, subtle distinctions between terms can make a large difference on the quality of the traffic they attract.
3. Evaluating Keyphrase Performance:
Until recently, judging the performance of individual keyphrases was a dicey proposition. Although it is possible to tell from your log traffic analysis how many visitors are getting to your site from each keyphrase (valuable information, but unfortunately not enough to do much with), it was very hard to decipher which phrases were bringing you the most quality traffic. Recently, however, some sophisticated but affordable tools have been developed that allow you to judge the performance of each individual keyphrase based upon visitor behavior. This new software makes it possible to periodically analyze which keyphrases are bringing your site the most valuable visitors- those who buy your products, fill out your contact form, download your demo, etc. This type of data, rather than the sheer number of visitors from each search phrase alone, is invaluable when you are refining your search engine marketing campaigns, since you can discard and replace non-performing keyphrases and put increased effort toward the phrases that are delivering visitors that become customers. This kind of ongoing analysis is the final piece of the keyphrase puzzle, and allows you to continually target the most important phrases for your industry, even if they change over time.
Conclusion:
Keyphrase compilation, evaluation, and performance are all vitally important to any search engine marketing campaign. While high rankings in search engines are an admirable goal, high rankings for poor keyphrases will consistently deliver poor results. Integration of this keyphrase process into your overall search engine marketing strategy can dramatically improve your website performance (and thus your bottom line).
(By Scott Buresh, from searchengineguide.com)
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Search Engine Optimization Basics Part 1 - Keywords
As highlighted a couple of weeks ago, I have decided that with the growth of the search engine optimization (SEO) industry, it is important to ensure that we don�t forget the many newcomers. With many new business owners and webmasters exploring SEO for the first time, this series of articles looks to assist with the basic information needed to start a search engine marketing campaign.
In the first part of the series, I wish to ensure we discuss the importance of a solid foundation. When starting any SEO campaign it is tempting to leap straight in and start tweaking meta tags and changing text. However, like any successful marketing strategy, it is vital to ensure that you know whom your audience is and how to reach them. In the same way traditional advertising agencies survey their demographic audience, search engine marketers must ensure that their SEO campaign targets the correct keywords or search phrases. Target the wrong search phrase and you could end up with great search engine rankings for keywords that have no search requests. A few hours now spent ensuring that the correct search phrases are targeted, can save months of useless optimization.
Brainstorm
When you started your company or developed your products, you no doubt sat down with your friends, relatives and business partners and discussed the needs of your target audience. You would have been foolish to stubbornly press ahead with your products without first testing the market to see if there was a demand. Likewise, when you start out on your SEO campaign it is important to brainstorm search phrases that are likely to bring qualified visitors to your website. Sit down with your co-workers and business partners and discuss which keywords are relevant to the products and services you offer. Compile an initial list of 5-10 search phrases that you feel best represent your company and which you believe people would type into a search engine when trying to find you. Consider the following factors when brainstorming:
* Is your audience likely to search for industry standard terms or simple layman phrases?
* Which of your products are in stock? There is no point targeting search phrases that are popular if you don�t actually stock that item.
* Which products have the highest profit margin? If you had just a $0.20 mark-up on a very popular product, could you sell enough online to make a profit? A product that is less searched but has a higher profit margin would be easier to obtain a search engine ranking and would yield higher revenues.
* Identify your biggest competitors. View competitor websites and see which products they appear to target; which search phrases do they have rankings for?
Make use of any PPC data
Chances are, your decision to begin a SEO campaign is fueled by your desire to reduce costly pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns. While reliance on PPC will be reduced with a good SEO campaign, you can make use of your current PPC efforts when researching your search phrases to target. Analyze your PPC keywords and look to see which of them have brought the highest traffic levels, best click through rates and greater sales conversions. It is likely a search phrase that brought successful results through a PPC campaign will be very relevant in your quest to obtain top search engine positioning.
Expanding your Keyword list
Once you have completed your brainstorming and have compiled your list of 5-10 core keywords, it�s time to move on and expand that list. A list of 5-10 search phrases will not, as I am sure you will know, bring the amount of search engine traffic needed to make your website successful. However, that list will be a vital tool when determining which phrases to add to the mix. At this point, you need to turn to the search engines themselves and research which search phrases are actually being typed into Google, Yahoo, MSN et al. While few search engines will openly 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 primarily for the use of Overture PPC users and if you have ever endeavored on a PPC campaign with Overture, you will no 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 phrase across their network.
While this tool can be very useful, especially as it is free to use, it does have some key drawbacks. First, it does not differentiate between singular and plural search phrases. Consequently, "desktop computer" and "desktop computers" are combined together, leaving you to use your own judgment as to which variation is the most popular. For many search phrases, you can take an educated guess as to which one is likely to be the most searched, but often you will be left without 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.
If you are serious about your SEO campaign, you will consider a subscription to WordTracker to be a worthwhile investment. Starting at just $7 a day, with discounts all the way up to one year of service, WordTracker offers a similar type of research tool as Overture but with many more bells and whistles. The biggest advantage with WordTracker is that is uses Meta-Crawlers when sourcing search phrase frequencies. This eliminates inflated search phrase frequencies from Overture users checking their own rankings and thus artificially increasing the popularity of certain phrases. In addition WordTracker offers the following advantages:
* Offers a "thesaurus" and "lateral" search. Allowing you to view search phrases that are related to your main search term, but not necessarily containing that term.
* Shows search frequencies for both singular and plural phrases; allowing you to determine which is the most popular.
* Identifies which form of punctuation is the most popular.
* Allows you to place your targeted keywords into a "shopping basket" so that you can analyze all of your phrases together.
* Has an exclusive KEI analyzer that allows you to compare the popularity of the search phrase with the number of websites competing for that keyword.
Determining Competition
Once you have identified possible additions to your search phrase list, you must research further to determine if there is a good chance you will achieve your prized top search engine ranking or if the competition for that phrase is already saturated. While it can be tempting to target only search phrases that are very popular and searched hundreds of thousands of times in a single month, you must also consider the likelihood of you being able to obtain a ranking higher enough to capitalize on all of that great traffic. Many, many search terms are so saturated by competitors that it would be highly unlikely that you would achieve a high enough ranking to reward your efforts. Therefore, it is often worthwhile considering those search phrases that may not have quite the same level searches each month, but likewise do not have as many websites targeting that term.
WordTracker�s KEI (keyword effectiveness index) allows it�s users to analyze their chosen search phrases to determine the level of competition for that phrase. WordTracker has a great explanation on their website as to how to use this index, but in summary it provides a numerical scale for identifying the popularity of a keyword compared to the number of competitors targeting that phrase.
For those of you on a strict budget and opting to use Overture for keyword research, there is an alternative answer. Enter each identified search phrase at Google, using quotations around the phrase (e.g. "discount computers"). Google will then display the search results for all pages that target that phrase exactly as entered. View the top right, blue navigation bar and you will see the number of results Google matched. This number represents the total number of web pages that Google has identified as targeting that exact search phrase. This number represents your competition or your very own KEI. Make a note of this number for each of your identified search phrases and pretty soon you will be able to see which of your search phrases have the most competition and which have less competitors and therefore a better chance of obtaining top ranking.
Selecting Your Keywords
By now, you should have an expanded list of search phrases to target, taken from either Overture or WordTracker. In addition, you should also have a good idea as to the competition for each of those keywords, whether you used the KEI or Google format. Now is the time to start selecting the search phrases that will form the foundation for a successful SEO campaign. Ok, deep breath, we�re almost there.
When selecting the keywords to target, there are many factors you must take into consideration. You will no doubt have your own unique considerations, but you must also take into account the following:
* Is the search phrase relevant to your website and the page that you are optimizing?
* Is there a page within your website that would be particularly suitable for targeting the selected search phrase?
* How many other websites/web pages would you be competing against?
* Do you offer competitive pricing for the product or service that relates to the keyword?
* Will top search engine ranking for the search phrase generate enough revenue for your company?
Arranging Keywords into Themes
Once you have asked yourself the above questions, it will become easy to narrow down your list to the main search phrases that you wish to target. When doing so, remember that you should not try and target every selected search term on your index page. Your index page is the most important page of your website and likely to have the best positioning on the search engines, therefore choose 5-10 search phrases to target here and ensure that they are all closely related. Trying to target "desktop computers" and "dvd players" on your index page will get you top rankings for neither. Instead, identify the pages within your website that target those particular keywords and use those instead. The key to selecting keywords to target for each page is to think of "themes". Each page should ideally target just one theme. This will assist you in making sure that the targeted page is relevant to the selected search phrase. In turn, this will not only increase your chances of obtaining top rankings, but also increase your customer sales conversions by bringing the visitor to the most relevant page.
In summary
When researching search phrases and targeting keywords for your SEO campaign, it is important to follow the steps above. Research your industry, talk to your potential customers and make use of the themes within your website. In addition, consider these final tips:
* Determine the intent of the visitor. Thoroughly research all search terms to ensure that the searcher intended to find your product or service. E.g. reconsider targeting the keyword "DVD" if you store only sells blank DVD discs, the chances are the searcher intended to find DVD movies rather than blank media.
* Don�t always rely on the numbers. Both Overture and WordTracker use historical data when displaying search phrase frequencies and neither archive more than two months back. Therefore you must know your industry and account for any seasonal or other trends. E.g. the search phrase "red roses" will be more popular for Valentines than at Christmas.
* Look for opportunities. Identify the search phrases that have been untapped by your competitors. Some search terms may have slightly fewer searches, but may have dramatically fewer competitors.
* Target the right pages. This cannot be stressed enough. Do not try and target every keyword on every page. Identify themes within your website and group relevant search phrases around those pages. You will see much better results
I hope you have found the above useful. This series is designed to help the beginner, but I hope a few experienced SEO marketers will find something fresh to consider. In the next installment of this series, we will look at the use of Meta Tags. These once champions of SEO have recently taken a battering, but are still extremely important for the success of any campaign. We�ll look at how they are used, how to construct them and why they can help achieve top search engine rankings. In the meantime, you should have enough information to assist you in your search phrase research and build the foundation for a successful search engine optimization campaign.
(By Andy Beal , from searchengineguide.com)
Saturday, May 5, 2007
Choosing the correct keywords for your site
In this article, we focus on the correct way of finding out the keywords for which you should optimize your site for the search engines. This article will give you the formula for the Keyword Effectiveness Index (KEI) - a mathematical formula which I have developed to help you determine which keywords you should be optimizing your site for.
Step 1: Open your text editor or word processor and write down all the words and phrases that you might have searched for if you were looking for a company which offers products and services similar to yours.
For example, suppose your company organizes packaged tours to Australia. Here's a list of phrases that I might have searched for if I were planning to make a trip to Australia:
tourism in Australia
travel to Australia
travelling in Australia
travel agencies in Australia
travelling agencies in Australia
Australian travel agencies
Of course, the keywords that came to your mind may have been different. But that's not important - the important thing is to get an initial list of keywords.
You may be wondering why I have not used single word keywords. Here's why:
* Firstly, single word keywords tend to be hyper-competitive. A search for "tourism" or "travelling" in any search engine will probably generate hundreds of thousands of pages. While it is possible that you may get your page in the top 10 for such a single word keyword, it is quite unlikely.
* Secondly, because of the sheer number of pages that single word searches can throw up, most search engine users have realized that they can get more relevant pages if they search for phrases rather than individual words. Statistical research has shown that most people are now searching for 2 or 3 word phrases rather than for single words.
* Thirdly, single word keywords won't get you targeted traffic. When people search for "tourism", they are not necessarily looking for tourist destinations in Australia - they may be interested in any other country of the world. Even if you got your site into the top 10 for tourism, you gain nothing from such visitors. However, when someone searches for "tourism in Australia", he/she is your potential customer, and hence, it makes sense for you to try and get a top ranking for your site for that keyword.
Hence, whenever you are trying to generate keywords, try to be location specific. Try to think of keywords which apply to the geographic area that your product or service is designed to serve.
Step 2: Open any spreadsheet program that is installed in your hard drive. I assume you are using Microsoft Excel. If you are using some other spreadsheet program, just change the spreadsheet related procedures outlined here to fit your program.
Create 4 columns - one for the keyword, one for the popularity of the keyword, one for the number of sites that appear in Google for that keyword and the last for something I call the Keyword Effectiveness Index (don't worry - I'll explain what KEI means later on). In order to ensure that you can follow what I am saying, I recommend that you add the following column headers to the first four columns of the first row of your spreadsheet:
Keyword
Popularity
No. of Competitors
KEI
Step 3: A great way to obtain a list of keywords related to the ones you have developed in the first step is to use WordTracker's keyword generation service. Wordtracker is a paid service but you can use their free trial tool.
Click on the "Trial" option at the top of the site. In the page that appears, type in your name and email address and click on the "Start the trial >>" button. In the next page, click on "Click here to start the trial". In the next page, type in the first keyword that you developed in Step 1, i.e. "tourism in Australia", in the text box. Click on the "Proceed >>" button.
Step 4: In the next page, WordTracker will display a list of keywords related to the keyword that you had typed in. (Just scroll down the left pane to see the keywords).
Now, click on the first keyword in the left pane which is applicable for your site. In the right pane, WordTracker will show a list of keywords which contain the keyword you had clicked on in the left pane.
Then in the table that you have created in your spreadsheet, copy each of the keywords in the right pane and paste them in the first column of the table. Also, copy the number of times those keywords have been used (i.e. the figure present in the Count column in WordTracker) and paste them in the second column.
In order to ensure that you can follow me, make sure that you type the first keyword in the second row of your spreadsheet. Of course, you should only bother adding a keyword to your spreadsheet if it is applicable for your site.
Once you have added all the keywords in the right pane which are applicable for your site, click on the next keyword in the left pane which is applicable for your site.
Once again, WordTracker will display a list of keywords in the right pane which contain the keyword you had clicked on in the left pane. Again, copy the keywords in the right pane which are applicable for your site and paste them in the first column of your spreadsheet. Also, copy the figures present in the Count column and paste them in the second column beside the corresponding keywords. Repeat this process for each of the keywords in the left pane.
Step 5: Once you have finished with all the keywords in the left pane, press your browser's Back button a number of times until WordTracker again displays the text box which asks you to type in a keyword. Type in the second keyword in your original list (i.e. "travel to Australia"), click on the "Proceed >>" button and repeat Step 4. Do this for each of the keywords that you developed in Step 1.
Step 6: Go to Google. Search for the first keyword that is present in your spreadsheet using exact match search (i.e. you should wrap the keyword in quotes, i.e. you should type a quotation mark before typing the keyword and a quotation mark after typing it). Google will return the number of sites which are relevant to that keyword.
Add this number to the third column of the spreadsheet in the same row in which the keyword is present. Repeat this process for each of the keywords present in your spreadsheet.
Once you have done that, your first column will contain the keywords, your second column will show the popularity of the keywords and your third column will contain the number of sites you are competing against to get a high ranking for those keywords.
Now it's time to calculate the KEI!
Step 7: The Keyword Effectiveness Index is the square of the popularity of a keyword multiplied by 1000 and divided by the number of sites which appear in Google for that keyword. It is designed to measure which keywords are worth optimizing your site for. Higher the KEI, better the keyword. How the formula for the KEI is arrived at is beyond the scope of this article.
Here's how you can calculate the KEI.
I am assuming that you have created the spreadsheet columns in the way I recommended in Step 3 and that you are using Microsoft Excel. If you using some other spreadsheet program, you will need to adjust the formula to the requirements of your spreadsheet program. Click on cell D2. Type in the following exactly as it is shown:
=IF(C2<>0,B2^2/C2*1000,0)
Then click on the Copy button to copy the formula, select all the cells in column 4 which have keywords associated with them and press the Paste button to paste the formula. The KEI for each keyword will be displayed.
Step 8: Use your spreadsheet program's Sort feature to sort the rows in descending order of the KEI. In Excel, you would click on the Data menu, click on the Sort menu item, choose KEI from the drop-down combo box named "Sort by", click on the "Descending" option next to it, and then click on OK.
And guess what - that's it! You now know the keywords which you should optimize your site for.
You can now start optimizing your site one by one for each keyword, starting with the keyword with the highest KEI. Exactly how many of the keywords you choose to optimize your site for largely depends on the amount of time that you can spare from your normal business activities. But whatever the number of keywords that you target, it obviously makes sense to go for the most effective keywords first.
Tying up the loose ends:
The number of related keywords that WordTracker displays in the trial version is limited. In order to get all the keywords which are related to the keywords you had developed in Step 1, you would need to subscribe to WordTracker's paid service.
(Article by Sumantra Roy , taken from payperclicksearchengines.com)
Friday, May 4, 2007
Good Content: The Key To Search Engine Ranking
What drives visitors to your website and keeps them there? Good content.
Content is Key
Good content is key to website promotion success. All the bells and whistles in the world will not hold an audience like compelling information. Ask yourself: Why would a visitor stay at my website? What are they looking for? What do I have that they need? What holds them there once I've got them visiting? You have to tell your story
Know Your Audience
So how do you get your visitors to stay on your site, and to return to it? First, you need to understand your audience. Who are you trying to reach? Create your pages with them in mind. Do you want to reach a narrow audience, or will you try to reach all levels of readers? Buzz words may make sense to you in your business, but will they reach your target audience? If you are a high-powered underwater basketweaving consultant, focused only on serious underwater basketweavers, you can keep the discussion on your site fairly technical. If, however, you really want to spread the joy of underwater basketweaving to a wider audience, you may want to keep the tone more general, giving newcomers to underwater basketweaving the information they need to become as enthralled by basketweaving as you are.
Get Your Visitors Involved
So what kind of content do you need to provide for your visitors? If you have a site selling gardening books, you will have lists of the titles you have for sale, an order form, and contact information. Everybody else selling gardening books will have these pages too. How do you rise above the crowd? How do you stand out as the definitive gardening book website?
Write Articles
One technique that you can use to good effect is that of writing articles pertaining to your site's topic. After all, who knows more about gardening and gardening books than you? Not only does this give your visitors yet another reason to keep coming back to your site, but it also allows you to reach out beyond your site. There are many other websites out there looking for authoritative information on your topic. Find those sites and submit your articles to them. This creates a "win-win" situation: the other web site gains the benefit of your knowledge, while you are further recognized as an authority in the field. Getting a link from that site back to yours brings more visitors to your site, and increases your site's link popularity.
Keeping an archive of articles on your website builds your knowledge base. You can refer visitors to your articles when answering their questions. People searching for information on the topics you have written about will find your articles listed in their search results. Once they arrive at your site, maybe they will buy something from you: if you know so much about planting bulbs, maybe your site is the place I should buy my bulb- planting books.
Other Offerings
What else can you add to this mix? Think about adding professional gardening book reviews, a gardening book club, FAQ's about gardening, gardening articles, a rating system for books, audience book reviews, and other gardening-related topics. Adding this type of information gives your visitors more reasons to keep coming back to your site. Offer free tools, create a forum. Set up a newsletter for your audience with your topic, adding in a discount for your product for newsletter readers. Give your audience a reason to come back to your website.
What Results Can I Expect: Google PageRank
A primary example of how this works is Google's PageRank. One of the most important aspects of ranking for Google and other search engines is good content. Google wants their search engine users to find what they are looking for, a successful search experience for their users. The keywords included in your site are important; after all, those are the terms your potential visitors are searching for. Now not only do you have your catalog pages and ordering information, but you also have a more in-depth treatment of the topics you have addressed in your articles, book reviews, and other materials. More keywords in more places means you have a better chance of matching a potential visitor's search.
So how can you "rise above" the other online gardening bookstores out there in the search engine listings? Link popularity can be the next important piece that allows you to differentiate yourself from the rest of the pack. All other things being equal, search engines that pay attention to link popularity will list your site higher in their results if you have more links coming back from other sites which have a focus related to yours. In other words, if your gardening bookstore has a number of backlinks pointing to it from the websites of gardening clubs, nurseries, and so forth, your site will be seen as more authoritative. The more authoritative a website looks to Google through link popularity, the higher that site will rank. After all, if all these other gardening- related sites point to your site, they are demonstrating that you have something important to say. That is another reason why it is important to have your material published on other websites.
Conclusion
Maintaining good content is a stepping-stone for your visitors to delve in deeper to your website. Taking the time to build your content and provide for your audience will pay off in good search engine ranking and returning visitors.
Daria Goetsch
Thursday, May 3, 2007
How to Maximize Paid Search Results
If you face pay-per-click marketing challenges, before you decide to drop the program, try these proven strategies to get it producing your desired results.
Discover These Proven Strategies to Produce Quick Results.
Keyword-Level Tracking
Track your pay-per-click marketing at the keyword-level – referred to as the “root”. For pay-per-click marketing, it is essential that you know your “per click” results from the money you have spent.
For example, if you have 1,000 keywords active in your pay-per-click marketing program and you spend a total of $3,000 a month – do you know which of the 1,000 keywords produce the best results?
What if 80% of your sales stem from 20% of your keywords? Moreover, what if this 20% accounted for just a small percentage of your $3,000 monthly cost? If you do not have keyword-level tracking you will not be able to make these financially beneficial assessments. Time-tested experience shows that the 80/20 rule applies to pay-per-click marketing.
Does the 80/20 rule apply to your pay-per-click marketing? Get keyword-level tracking.
But Beware of Matching Options!
Although matching options (i.e. broad, advanced, exact, phrase and so on) offered by Google Adwords, Overture and other pay-per-click search engines provide “convenience” they unfortunately skew your keyword performance results.
If you setup a “broad-match” for the keyword “real estate”, you will attract visitors who have entered any possible variation of the term “real estate” including geographically specific “real estate” keywords that may have absolutely no relevance to your product or service.
Here is a scenario where matching options skew your results…
You generate $1,000 in revenue from the broad-match keyword, “real estate” yet the total click cost for it exceeds revenue and because of the keyword’s negative return, you label it as a poor performing keyword.
What if the majority of the click cost originated from irrelevant, broad-match keyword variations like “ Louisiana real estate” - while one variation, “real estate strategy” generated all of the revenue? By identifying this keyword (hard to do in a broad-match environment so rely on your web stats program), taking this one keyword and isolating it as an exact term you will reduce your total click cost while continuing to generate the same revenues.
How are your broad-match keywords performing? Isolate keywords to save click costs and to regulate individual keyword performance.
Landing Page Development
Pay-per-click marketing is unique compared to other mainstream forms of online marketing. In part because marketers have the opportunity to select specific keywords, write specific ads and direct the click-through to a specific web page. This “connect-the-dots” structure creates the need to develop consistency among the visitor’s expectation from the keyword they enter to the ad that draws their attention and down to the web page, they “land-on”. Relevancy and consistency are essential for an effective pay-per-click marketing program.
One of the reportedly major reasons why pay-per-click marketing programs fall short of their intended goal is because businesses direct all of their click-throughs to their home page. Since most businesses’ home pages are designed to serve mutliple audiences (i.e. media relations, investors, current clients, potential prospects, customer services, etc.) they do not provide the level of relevancy and consistency expected from the visitor to get them to act confidently.
What in the Virtual World are Landing Pages?
Landing pages are simply web pages designed specifically for a keyword or related group of keywords. They are highly relevant to the keyword searched and consistent with the ad’s claim. They immediately focus a visitor’s attention to a primary call-to-action (most wanted response). In essence – landing pages ask your visitors to take an action.
If your pay-per-click marketing is not living up to your expectations, consider which web pages you are sending visitors to. Are they relevant and consistent with your pay-per-click ads and keywords? Do they offer too many calls-to-action? Do they “fit” the expectations of the visitor searching on the particular keyword?
For example, are you sending a visitor searching on the keyword “Sony LCD TV” to a web page with twenty varieties of electronic products? An effectively designed landing page would present the visitor a “Sony LCD TV” with customer benefit oriented copy, an immediate “buy now” call to action and all applicable guarantee, shipping, customer service and return policies.
Make it Easy for Your Visitors and they will Reward You with Sales.
Keyword Selection
Keyword selection is important. The keywords you select provide access to “pools” of visitors at different stages in their buying cycle. By selecting the right keywords for your products or services, you can open a completely new market of ready-to-buy visitors.
Make sure that you thoroughly canvass your marketplace using strategies such as:
Your competitors’ websites
Your website’s copy
Third-party tools – Overture’s Suggestion Tool, WordTracker, and others
Your website metrics program (look for “natural search engine” keyword phrases)
Search engines like Ask Jeeves or Alta Vista (who suggest keyword variations)
Most importantly, “THINK” about your potential customers and what direct or indirect keywords they may use to find your products or services. Never give up searching for new keywords to setup and test. Both seasonal and even weekday keyword performance fluctuations should be analyzed and studied in addition to potential associations people make to find your products and services.
What about you - have you selected the right keywords?
Bidding Strategies
All pay-per-click search engines possess unique bidding nuances. However, for the two largest, Google Adwords and Overture do not become fixated on the top bid position. Test how each keyword performs against your website’s sales or lead conversion metrics up to the seventh bid position.
Depending on your product or service, you may be amazed how bid position six attracts less click-throughs but produces greater sales or lead conversion on your website. Or maybe position four generates better conversion. Regardless - test, test and test – the outcome may mean lower costs and higher sales conversions for you.
Consider this New Update in Your Bid Strategy.
Are you aware that recently Overture’s top partners, MSN and Yahoo, opened their results to up to eight “sponsor results” or paid ads on the first page? In some cases, the fourth and fifth or fifth and sixth positions will show at the bottom of the first results page and again at the top, right margin of the first results page – in essence two ads for the price of one.
Do not be lured into competing for the first place position instead keep an eye on your keyword performance (via your keyword-level tracking) and occupy whichever position provides the best sales or lead conversion.
Writing Effective Ads
Finally, always test different ads by interchanging words in the title and description. For Google Adwords, try split-testing two different titles and descriptions and add a unique tracking code to each one so you can identify which one causes the best sales conversion increase. Notice that I did not state, “the best “click-through rate increase”. Why? Because “a lot of nothing” (i.e. a lot of traffic without sales or lead conversion) is not a financially effective strategy. Consider that even a single word change on your ad can create a significant jump to your sales or lead conversion rate.
Follow these strategies to boost your pay-per-click marketing results today. Good Producing!
.....Read More......
Optimizing Paid For Inclusion Search Engines
A quick look back at history shows that paid for inclusion was one of the first pay per click mechanisms that was available to a marketer. Pioneered most visibly by Inktomi, and then soon followed by engines such as AltaVista and FAST the PFI market really took off providing a welcome manageability to getting your site listed quickly and efficiently. The paid for inclusion market has not changed much since then, with the exception of submission method maybe, but the biggest challenge to a user is how best do I use it?
Whilst paid for placement (Overture, Google AdWords, FindWhat etc) offer simple procedures to getting a site listed, part of the ever increasing strength of the PFP market, the processes that are necessary for optimizing PFI are different. With no guarantee of a high placement and reliance on relevant submitted content, i.e. does Inktomi feel this is 100% relevant to a search or 1%, the challenge to the marketer is much greater. In order to demonstrate that the challenge is not as unfathomable as it may seem here are some guidelines on how to optimize your content.
1. Understand where paid inclusion data appears within the search network - The usual place for paid for inclusion data is within the 'web pages' results. These are pages that appear when the search term has either a) limited coverage within paid for placement or directory listings or b) exhausted all of the paid for placement or directory listings and appears there after! Here is a simple example to further explain this - If you search for 'credit cards online' on MSN you'll be presented with MSN's own paid for placement mechanism 'Featured Sites', then Overture's top 3 listings 'Sponsored Sites', then 100+ listings from LookSmart 'Directory Listings' and then once they are exhausted 'Web Pages' which are Inktomi.2. Understand what you are submitting - Following on from Point 1, if the listings that appear in paid for inclusion are so low in the pecking order you must be careful of which words, phrases, listings to submit. In the example above creating a PFI listing for 'credit cards online' wouldn't make a whole lot of sense, however, 'online credit card service' would have you appear on page 1 in 15th spot as all other sources were exhausted much sooner. But what is the catch? The simple answer is volume; the number of searches for 'online credit card service' is 5% of the number of searches for 'credit card online'. Your advantage is relevancy, those 5% of searches are going to traditionally have more relevant searchers as they've really pre qualified themselves with a longer more considered search term.
3. Don't submit too little - If the volume of traffic is lower then why should you bother going to all of the effort of submitting sites to PFI? The answer is volume again. The best content to submit to a PFI engine is large bulk amounts taken from sites with lots of data on their site. This lends itself extremely well to catalogue retailers (such as BestBuy or Amazon) or publishers (such as Consumer Reports or McGraw Hill). In many instances the effort needed for one listing in PFI is the same effort as 10,000 listings. The more listings you submit the less of an issue the smaller search volume becomes as you'll get a larger percentage of the more specific searches with a larger number of listings.
4. Understand 'how' to submit - There are many ways to submit to PFI engines, many of them will help you with the whole procedure, others will recommend third parties to assist you with it. The most important variable to understand here is relevancy. You listings are not guaranteed number 1 spot, even on the 'Web Pages' or equivalent section of the site. You must ensure that if you are submitting a listings for 'Sony 28" Widescreen TV Model' the entirety of your submission, title, description, supporting text, url, all contain the same information otherwise the engine will bump your listing down for being too vague. Understand the variables of PFI too, for example, Inktomi won't allow anything but a 1to1 listing to unique URL ratio. This further lends itself to bulk submissions from a catalogue or large listing site.
5. Don't submit too much - PFI have variable rate cards per industry and vertical. As with PFP the price is often dependant upon demand for the content for example, finance and legal services are more expensive than reference or computing. For this reason it is important to do research before you submit your content. Be sure that if you are considering putting your entire catalogue of products online that each and every product if sold justifies the cost per click. In many instances the best course of action is to skim the feed your are submitting to PFI up to the point where the AOV of the catalogue products or CPA of the online lead you are listings justifies your costs. NOTE: having a good tracking tool and understanding both your direct and deferred conversion rates really helps here.
6. Creative Management - A PFI listings, as with any other, appears within the search network with countless others. Make sure you don't neglect these listings by relying on the title and description from your catalogue or website listing. In many instances normal procedure to substitute the title that appears in the engine with the title that appears on the site. Include calls to action; add your unique selling proposition and if you have a strong brand name be sure to include it.
PFI management is an integral part of an overall search marketing campaign and if your industry lends itself to this form of submission then it is a must. Optimizing your site for spiders may work well for single submissions to PFI but ensuring that your website content is visible in the easiest possible way is the overall strength of this pay per click mechanism.
What are pay per click search engines?
Definition of the Pay-Per-Click Process and PPC Search Engines 
Pay-per-click (PPC) search engines are those that offer the marketing option called "pay-per-click" to users. PPC is defined as the guaranteed placement of a small "ad" on the search results page for a specific keyword or keywords in return for a specified payment, but ONLY when a visitor clicks on that ad. The advertiser pays nothing to appear on the results page; they only pay the amount they have agreed to (or bid for) when someone actually clicks on their ad and is taken to their landing page; therefore, the term "pay per click".
A PPC listing on a search engine results page typically consists of a title, which usually is your website's name or perhaps a short heading (around 50 characters maximum) and also a short (usually no more than 200 characters long) description of your service or some promotional wording. Some PPC search engines strictly control the text that can appear in the listing, while others are more open to using the advertiser's own text.
Basic Steps to a Constructing a Pay-Per-Click Campaign
The first step in putting together a PPC campaign is to decide your budget and what level of risk you are willing to take, for both will affect which PPC search engine you ultimately choose. As one would expect, the larger properties are less risky endeavors, since they already have excellent market coverage and tend to offer a lot of assistance to their users, but they also are the most expensive in terms of the amount of money you must spend to acquire a top ranking based on a specific keyword or group of keywords.
There are plenty of free, independent tools available to help you in your research of keywords which will tell you the current bid price for certain words or phrases on the different PPC search engines.
Once you have decided upon which PPC search engine you are going to use, have put together you ad, and decided the keywords you wish to have your ad appear under, register with the search engine, fill out the necessary information to open an account, and then begin the bidding process for the keywords you have decided upon.
When you first register your keywords with the search engine you have chosen (and some large businesses will have upwards of thousands of keywords they use), you will also specify the maximum amount you are willing to bid for those keywords. The price of a keyword can range anywhere from 1 cent to $10 or more, depending upon its popularity as a search term and the search engine itself.
Key Tips to Keep in Mind While Running a Pay-Per-Click Campaign
There is sometimes fierce competition for specific keyword(s) on a given PPC search engine. Most PPC search engines automate the bidding process for you (stopping of course when they reach the maximum bid you have indicated), but personal involvement and the judicious use of third-party tools by the user is advisable to ensure that the tracking mechanisms built into the search engine's control panel are in sync with what is actually happening.
The business that bids the highest amount of money for a specific keyword will be ranked first in the PPC results, the second-highest bidder will be ranked second, etc. Typically, PPC search engines limit the number of PPC ads on a results page to less than 10, and research has shown that unless you are in the first 3 or 4 of the PPC ads, you are much less likely to be investigated by visitors.
Because the competition is so fierce in this market right now, most PPC search engines do not require a minimum amount of money be invested in a campaign - in fact, some will even give you a nominal amount of money to begin your campaign with. Some may require a deposit of a small amount (in the neighborhood of $25 to $50), but this money is then applied to your account.
Be sure to check out the fine print in the agreement to be clear on minimums required, deposits required, what happens if you decide to cancel your campaign. Be prepared to spend a fair amount of time monitoring your campaign in the beginning.
Is a Pay-Per-Click Campaign the Right Investment for my Business?
Because of the fierce competition in the pay-per-click market, it can be relatively easy and inexpensive to give PPC a try. PPC search engines offer varying amounts of support and some are easier to use than others, but the opportunity to ensure placement of your ad without necessarily investing a large amount of your marketing dollar, makes PPC an extremely attractive option and one that few business owners should completely ignore as a potential marketing technique.
To help you, a multitude of tools have been developed to automatically monitor and bid, track your Return on Investment (ROI), craft your PPC ads, and help you choose alternate keywords that may be just as effective but cost much less on the particular PPC search engine they wish to use.
Although there are hundreds of PPC search engines on the Internet, there is a core group of 5 to 10 PPC search engines that because of size, brand name, and reputation are the preferred choices for most PPC ad campaigns. These major properties are now experimenting with many variations on the basic premise, including the ability to use PPC on a local basis, extending it from keywords to context and behavior of users, offering their versions of tools that help make the process easier especially for the novice, and decreasing the amount of time it takes to see results from your campaign from hours to minutes.
Once you've mastered the basics of PPC and have learned more about the options, tools, and search engines that offer this form of marketing, you will be in a position to fine tune your campaigns and perhaps try some of the niche-market PPC search engines, which offer lower keyword costs and may be more suited to your product/service.
Keep in mind that even companies with experience in online marketing struggle with the intricacies of the techniques needed to judge which PPC search engine to use and how best to play the bidding game.
And so we come to the bottom line - PPC sounds like a great option, but what does it really cost and is it worth it for my specific business? Each campaign is different, depending upon the bid amounts, number of actual click throughs and the Return on Investment (ROI) generated.
Our main goal at Pay Per Click Universe is to help educate you to make the best choices by offering free, totally unbiased reviews of PPC search engines and the tools designed to be used in conjunction with the PPC process, both to help you with understanding the process and to evaluate its usefulness to you as a marketing tool.
Now that we’ve explained the process a little more in depth, take a look at our reviews and use the information we have provided to help you plan a campaign or fine tune your current campaigns to get the most from the marketing dollars you choose to place in what we consider to be a very competitive, efficient, and effective means of Internet marketing – the pay-per-click search engine marketplace.
(payperclickuniverse.com)
.....Read More......