The power of words: Finding keywords to drive your SEO strategy

Accurate keywords are the core of any SEO strategy, but how do you figure out which ones will work?

If there was one takeaway from our recent SEO training with WorldCom partner True Digital Communications, it was the importance of accurate keywords to a successful SEO strategy. Because 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results (face it, have you?) companies need to ensure their content is high quality and relevant enough to land them a spot on that first page.

Ranking for the right keywords can make or break your SEO strategy because it’s not just about getting visitors to your website, but ensuring you are getting the right kinds of visitors. Accurate keywords can address shifts in demand and respond to changing market conditions, finding the right people at the right time online. To understand how valuable a keyword truly is, we have to understand our own website and business, build hypotheses about what our target audience is searching for and run numerous tests to see what pays off.

There’s just one complication: SEO involves constant testing and improvement because search trends and algorithms are always changing. These changes are challenging to overcome as it is, but consider how your competitors will be optimizing their keywords in real time right alongside you and you’ll understand just how important constant keyword research is for your SEO strategy.

Using tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush or Keywordtool.io, you could pull together a list of hundreds of keywords you could aim to rank for. But it’s up to you to narrow them down. If you had to sum up your company, product or service in one word or phrase, what would it be? Take a stab at answering these questions to see if you can identify top keywords for your company:

• In no more than five words, what does your company do?
• Are your clients or customers local or international?
• How do you differentiate from competitors?
• Is the keyword relevant to your site’s content, or will you need to create new content to support it?
• Will searchers be satisfied with what they find on your sight when they search using this keyword?
• Will the traffic resulting from searches for this keyword result in financial rewards or other goals?

It’s a balancing act to improve your SEO without hampering a reader’s experience of your website. With the right research, regular testing and practice integrating targeted keywords within your website’s pages, you’ll slowly but surely see improvement in your SEO progress.

Looking for a partner to implement or improve your SEO strategies? Let us know how we can help.