Today, I want to talk about one of the more basic aspects of your content and SEO strategy: the humble keyword. Now, in the past, I’ve kind of downplayed the importance of keywords in the larger SEO picture, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t important. In fact, a single keyword can actually be a very useful gauge of the effectiveness of your content strategy. Let me explain…
Keyword Overkill
The issue I have with keywords isn’t their use as much as their misuse and overuse. As a provider of high-quality SEO writing services, our company knows well that keywords work best when they meet several criteria: They come in at or below Google’s recommended density (about 1.5%), they are well-chosen based on search statistics, and they flow organically in the copy.
I’ve often seen instructions in style guides to use too many keywords or use them in a manner that makes the sentences sound weird when you read them aloud. If this is you (and you know who you are…) I would issue you a challenge for your next project: throw out the idea of seeding with a dozen keywords in a 500-word article and focus on one. Then publish another article that also focuses on just one (but choose a different one from the first article).
Split Testing
Your audience is very likely to respond to specific words, phrases, and topics, but if you’re seeding your copy with too many keywords, you’ll have a hard time figuring out what those words and phrases are. The topics are easier to isolate, but they still need to contain the right language to elicit the responses you’re intending.
This is, in part, why I say limit your article to one keyword. You can then test out a few articles and see which ones get the most play. Then, you can apply the winning keywords to other topics and see if people still take the bait. If they do, you know that you can start using that keyword everywhere in your content strategy and it will garner attention. It’ll work on landing pages, in your blogs, in your tweets… the possibilities are endless, and, yes it absolutely can come down to finding just one winning keyword.
Use Your Keyword in Your Headlines
During the testing stage, it is vital that you include your keyword in the headline, because that is what people will notice first (at least in terms of written content). You might want to split test a single article by manipulating the title to include different keywords and see which one gets the most clicks. Then, brainstorm ideas on topics you can use to showcase the winner and continue gaining momentum with it.
Keyword Phrases and Long-Tail Keywords
You can even expand your experiment to include not just single-word keywords but also keyword phrases and long-tail keywords (specific phrases that people are likely to use in a search). If you decide to go that route, be sure to make the phrases organic; even if you have to manipulate the keyword as listed in Google’s keyword planning tool (or whatever tool you choose to employ to develop your keyword strategy), it will absolutely still be effective.
Think about it: “We offer the best dry cleaning services in Miami” reads much better than “We offer the best dry cleaning services Miami,” but you’d be amazed how many marketers will opt for the latter simply because that’s what Google says works. Don’t obsess over exact phrases. If it doesn’t read right, it won’t help your SEO. The balance of maintaining the essence of the keyword and making it flow logically in a sentence is the winning combination that boosts your rankings and encourages clicks.
Duplicating Your Results
Finally, you want to develop winning content around other successful keywords so that you can continue developing a diversity of content without your message getting stale. Resist the temptation to use keywords you already know work as an insurance policy in new content. Remember, the goal here is to develop an arsenal of single keywords or keyword phrases that deliver consistent results. You can do that by walking over your own footprints and duplicating the steps you took to uncover the previous winner, and you can do this repeatedly.