Keyword Research
I tend to think a lot of the Keyword
Research information is pure hype, with very little
practial application for the average small business
on a limited budget. So right away, just because I
called it “hype”, you know I am not going to be
telling you that keywords are the most important
thing. But you are only partly right.
Keywords aren't the beginning and end
of SEO. But they ARE what search engines pick up on.
You have to include them in certain places, and you
have to insure that you include logical ones that
are targeted to what you have to offer.
Now, what I have a problem with is
that some internet marketing “gurus” are telling you
to not even build a site before you check the
keywords and see if they have high competition or
not. They operate on a couple of assumptions, some
of which are misleading, some of which are downright
wrong. This gets pretty complex, and I may talk
myself into circles, so please bear with me here as
I try to explain what IS and what is NOT important
about keywords.
For the small business owner who
is just starting out, it is critical that you begin
with what you KNOW, and your site must be centered
on what you know you can do well. Your options for
creating products or information MUST be limited by
that, until you learn more. Do not EVER try to
produce a quality site based on something you are
not proficient in. It will be unsuccessful.
So, right off, your options are
limited. They are further limited if you happen to
be good at a business focus that is in an
overcrowded niche anyway. One reason some niches are
overcrowded is because there is NO simple way to
describe them other than the same words everyone
else is using, even if they are all offering
different facets.
Work at Home is a good one. Sure,
there are Work at Home Moms, Work at Home Dads, Home
Businesses, Small Office/Home Office Resources, Home
Business Opportunities, Home Business Reviews, etc.
But they all boil down to the same thing. If I ask
them to describe it in two words, they are all going
to say, “home business”. That is the large category
that all of them occupy, and there is NO getting
around using it.
Sure, you can create pages that
target different facets, but your home page is still
going to be about the broader category. And if that
is what it is, then that is what it IS. You cannot
suddenly decide that it is going to be for people
who own a home business and don't have kids but do
have dogs. You can create a page about that, but not
a whole site.
What IM experts tell you is that
you have to get a keyword tool and generate a list
(and they imply that the bigger the list, the better
– some of them though are trying to sell you a
keyword generation tool, so don't buy that
premise!). You plug in your broad keywords, and the
generator will spew out a list of variations that
people are looking for, usually in order of
popularity. The keyword tool is supposed to let you
know which keywords are high demand but low
competition, and which are high demand but high
competition, etc, so you can target your site to hit
one that nobody else does (or that very few others
do).
Most IM experts also tell you that
you need to research how much people are paying for
PPC advertising for specific keywords. This is their
method of indicating competition on the business end
of things. This may or may not be an accurate
representation of the competition, because of some
of the factors listed above, which apply to keyword
bids as well as to search terms. (And it is not at
ALL an indication of what you can earn if you build
an AdSense site targeted at the high paying ones, so
PLEASE do not be deceived into thinking it is!)
Now, I am not saying that a
keyword generator cannot be useful in knowing what
pages to add to your site, but there are some
problems with the assumption that a keyword tool is
your answer to conquering the net overnight!
As you are searching, there are
others in the world who are also searching. And
guaranteed, someone else is finding EXACTLY the same
information you are. If you are a startup, you can
be certain that someone else has more resources than
you do to slap a site up on that topic. Many people
are paying big dollars for that kind of information
and service, and you simply cannot compete with
that!
Popularity changes rapidly. People
are fickle, and auctions are volatile. You may be
able to spot temporary trends, but you won't be able
to specifically identify what is best or worst. And
for a newbie, by the time you get a site built, the
entire dynamics may have changed.
It is not the only thing that
affects success. There are many other elements which
must be considered, and which may, in fact, have a
more powerful influence on future traffic to your
site than the keywords you choose to optimize your
site around.
So, use a keyword tool if you feel
it can help you, but do not make all your choices
based on keyword research. It is merely a factor,
and not the determining one for a startup
especially!
Here is how I choose a good topic
for a new site:
My interests. I have many, so I
have a wide range of things to choose from. I am
best at what I love doing, so every facet of my
business centers on things I enjoy selling,
creating, or teaching about.
Recent events in my life. Many
times, something in my life will require me to
research a topic and become knowledgeable in it.
I'll bookmark sites, and learn what I can. If I have
to go digging REALLY deep, and then still end up
having to learn the hard way, then I just KNOW there
is a niche there which I can supply valid content
for! Because I make the assumption that I am not the
only person who may need that. Often these are VERY
tight niches.
Sometimes, a whim! If the idea
sounds practical, I run with it. In fact, some of my
best sites have been built on a whim, and I did not
really expect them to do well. The reality has been
pleasantly surprising!
When I see a lot of
misinformation, and not a lot of correction of it, I
put up a site to debunk the myths. This is risky,
some people would rather perpetuate the myth for
profit, so it makes enemies.
I feel you can usually get a very
good idea of what is needed just by observing. There
are a couple of factors that you must be aware of,
and some rules that will really help you if you
understand them:
Never build a site on something
you know nothing about. Do not hire someone to write
articles for you and build a site around that! You
won't even know if they gave you quality articles if
you are clueless about the topic! This is a sure
recipe for disaster.
Don't build a “work at home
directory” site, PLEASE!!!, unless you can make it
SUBSTANTIALLY different than the other 300,000 work
at home directories out there. Some people assume
that they can build a site, and offer advertising on
it for other people who are building more
substantial businesses than they are, and make their
fortune off the advertising needs of others. It
doesn't work. Short term or long term. For one,
there are other, BIGGER directories out there doing
a better job than you can, and for another,
advertising on them is largely ineffective anyway,
so people do not resubscribe at a very high rate.
The point of this is NOT to indict WAH Directories.
Just to point out that if you are going to enter a
saturated market, do it DIFFERENT!
The best thing is to find a new
twist on an old theme. I did not just put up a
Diabetes site, I put up a site for Natural Diabetes
Control. There were other sites that SAID that, but
most were selling supplements. Mine is pure
information, and it has information all gathered
together which is not found in one place already
online. And it is taking off faster than any site I
have ever built up to this one.
Let keyword analysis be a nudge,
not a dictator. It cannot accurately predict your
success or failure.
If you MUST enter a saturated
market, be prepared to put in more time marketing.
It is not impossible to break in and do really well,
but it is going to be a bit harder to get noticed.
My SuperMom site took two years to get the traffic
that most sites get within 6 months, but once it got
to that point, it has steadily grown, because it is
truly different than the competition.
All the keyword research and
targeting in the world won't make up for a bad site,
or an unoriginal one. Take this as gospel. The back
button is always accessible to a site visitor, and
they know how to use it.
If you notice that in order to get
information on a specific topic, you have to dig
really deep, and that it is next to impossible to
find it – you have to search a LOT of places to
gather bits and pieces and inferences instead of
being able to go read up on it in one or two sites,
then you can pretty well be SURE you have a
potential niche. This has proven true with many of
my websites. They may not get a huge flood of
traffic, but what they do get is a steady traffic
flow that keeps coming because the information is
truly needed, if only by hundreds of people per
month instead of thousands. I know that these people
are desperate for the information, and that they
will be there to grab every bit I can provide.
In general, accurate observation
and creativity will get you just as far as Keyword
Research. And without the observation, and
creativity, your keyword research will be useless
anyway, because keyword research can only point out
statistics, it cannot make sense of what those
statistics MEAN.
So don't buy the hype. If you
start out your sites without searching on keyword
popularity, don't feel like you missed the boat. If
the other criteria for the site outweigh the keyword
results, go forward with confidence. If you feel
like you just want it to be simpler at first, so you
can focus on learning how to build the beastly thing
and get it up there, then do it. If you think that
you have learned one level of things, and that
learning more about keyword popularity is the next
step, then go for it.
Keywords are another tool, not a
requirement. And that is my own personal opinion,
backed up by some success and experience. And you
aren't likely to hear it like this anywhere else, so
make up your own mind about whether it is
trustworthy!
Keywords aren't the beginning and end of SEO. But they ARE what search engines pick up on. You have to include them in certain places, and you have to insure that you include logical ones that are targeted to what you have to offer.
Now, what I have a problem with is that some internet marketing “gurus” are telling you to not even build a site before you check the keywords and see if they have high competition or not. They operate on a couple of assumptions, some of which are misleading, some of which are downright wrong. This gets pretty complex, and I may talk myself into circles, so please bear with me here as I try to explain what IS and what is NOT important about keywords.
For the small business owner who is just starting out, it is critical that you begin with what you KNOW, and your site must be centered on what you know you can do well. Your options for creating products or information MUST be limited by that, until you learn more. Do not EVER try to produce a quality site based on something you are not proficient in. It will be unsuccessful.
So, right off, your options are limited. They are further limited if you happen to be good at a business focus that is in an overcrowded niche anyway. One reason some niches are overcrowded is because there is NO simple way to describe them other than the same words everyone else is using, even if they are all offering different facets.
Work at Home is a good one. Sure, there are Work at Home Moms, Work at Home Dads, Home Businesses, Small Office/Home Office Resources, Home Business Opportunities, Home Business Reviews, etc. But they all boil down to the same thing. If I ask them to describe it in two words, they are all going to say, “home business”. That is the large category that all of them occupy, and there is NO getting around using it.
Sure, you can create pages that target different facets, but your home page is still going to be about the broader category. And if that is what it is, then that is what it IS. You cannot suddenly decide that it is going to be for people who own a home business and don't have kids but do have dogs. You can create a page about that, but not a whole site.
What IM experts tell you is that you have to get a keyword tool and generate a list (and they imply that the bigger the list, the better – some of them though are trying to sell you a keyword generation tool, so don't buy that premise!). You plug in your broad keywords, and the generator will spew out a list of variations that people are looking for, usually in order of popularity. The keyword tool is supposed to let you know which keywords are high demand but low competition, and which are high demand but high competition, etc, so you can target your site to hit one that nobody else does (or that very few others do).
Most IM experts also tell you that you need to research how much people are paying for PPC advertising for specific keywords. This is their method of indicating competition on the business end of things. This may or may not be an accurate representation of the competition, because of some of the factors listed above, which apply to keyword bids as well as to search terms. (And it is not at ALL an indication of what you can earn if you build an AdSense site targeted at the high paying ones, so PLEASE do not be deceived into thinking it is!)
Now, I am not saying that a keyword generator cannot be useful in knowing what pages to add to your site, but there are some problems with the assumption that a keyword tool is your answer to conquering the net overnight!
As you are searching, there are others in the world who are also searching. And guaranteed, someone else is finding EXACTLY the same information you are. If you are a startup, you can be certain that someone else has more resources than you do to slap a site up on that topic. Many people are paying big dollars for that kind of information and service, and you simply cannot compete with that!
Popularity changes rapidly. People are fickle, and auctions are volatile. You may be able to spot temporary trends, but you won't be able to specifically identify what is best or worst. And for a newbie, by the time you get a site built, the entire dynamics may have changed.
It is not the only thing that affects success. There are many other elements which must be considered, and which may, in fact, have a more powerful influence on future traffic to your site than the keywords you choose to optimize your site around.
So, use a keyword tool if you feel it can help you, but do not make all your choices based on keyword research. It is merely a factor, and not the determining one for a startup especially!
Here is how I choose a good topic for a new site:
My interests. I have many, so I have a wide range of things to choose from. I am best at what I love doing, so every facet of my business centers on things I enjoy selling, creating, or teaching about.
Recent events in my life. Many times, something in my life will require me to research a topic and become knowledgeable in it. I'll bookmark sites, and learn what I can. If I have to go digging REALLY deep, and then still end up having to learn the hard way, then I just KNOW there is a niche there which I can supply valid content for! Because I make the assumption that I am not the only person who may need that. Often these are VERY tight niches.
Sometimes, a whim! If the idea sounds practical, I run with it. In fact, some of my best sites have been built on a whim, and I did not really expect them to do well. The reality has been pleasantly surprising!
When I see a lot of misinformation, and not a lot of correction of it, I put up a site to debunk the myths. This is risky, some people would rather perpetuate the myth for profit, so it makes enemies.
I feel you can usually get a very good idea of what is needed just by observing. There are a couple of factors that you must be aware of, and some rules that will really help you if you understand them:
Never build a site on something you know nothing about. Do not hire someone to write articles for you and build a site around that! You won't even know if they gave you quality articles if you are clueless about the topic! This is a sure recipe for disaster.
Don't build a “work at home directory” site, PLEASE!!!, unless you can make it SUBSTANTIALLY different than the other 300,000 work at home directories out there. Some people assume that they can build a site, and offer advertising on it for other people who are building more substantial businesses than they are, and make their fortune off the advertising needs of others. It doesn't work. Short term or long term. For one, there are other, BIGGER directories out there doing a better job than you can, and for another, advertising on them is largely ineffective anyway, so people do not resubscribe at a very high rate. The point of this is NOT to indict WAH Directories. Just to point out that if you are going to enter a saturated market, do it DIFFERENT!
The best thing is to find a new twist on an old theme. I did not just put up a Diabetes site, I put up a site for Natural Diabetes Control. There were other sites that SAID that, but most were selling supplements. Mine is pure information, and it has information all gathered together which is not found in one place already online. And it is taking off faster than any site I have ever built up to this one.
Let keyword analysis be a nudge, not a dictator. It cannot accurately predict your success or failure.
If you MUST enter a saturated market, be prepared to put in more time marketing. It is not impossible to break in and do really well, but it is going to be a bit harder to get noticed. My SuperMom site took two years to get the traffic that most sites get within 6 months, but once it got to that point, it has steadily grown, because it is truly different than the competition.
All the keyword research and targeting in the world won't make up for a bad site, or an unoriginal one. Take this as gospel. The back button is always accessible to a site visitor, and they know how to use it.
If you notice that in order to get information on a specific topic, you have to dig really deep, and that it is next to impossible to find it – you have to search a LOT of places to gather bits and pieces and inferences instead of being able to go read up on it in one or two sites, then you can pretty well be SURE you have a potential niche. This has proven true with many of my websites. They may not get a huge flood of traffic, but what they do get is a steady traffic flow that keeps coming because the information is truly needed, if only by hundreds of people per month instead of thousands. I know that these people are desperate for the information, and that they will be there to grab every bit I can provide.
In general, accurate observation and creativity will get you just as far as Keyword Research. And without the observation, and creativity, your keyword research will be useless anyway, because keyword research can only point out statistics, it cannot make sense of what those statistics MEAN.
So don't buy the hype. If you start out your sites without searching on keyword popularity, don't feel like you missed the boat. If the other criteria for the site outweigh the keyword results, go forward with confidence. If you feel like you just want it to be simpler at first, so you can focus on learning how to build the beastly thing and get it up there, then do it. If you think that you have learned one level of things, and that learning more about keyword popularity is the next step, then go for it.
Keywords are another tool, not a requirement. And that is my own personal opinion, backed up by some success and experience. And you aren't likely to hear it like this anywhere else, so make up your own mind about whether it is trustworthy!
