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SEO: Keyword Research Process

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Using keywords on your site is about matching the language on your site to the language that your customers use when they search for you. We do this to an extent in real life, but don’t realize it because it’s normal and natural. For example, a plumber doesn’t take out a billboard announcing that they will “fix all your sillcocks!” Instead, the plumber announces that they can “fix all your outdoor faucets!” Same service – different language. Keywords are simply how people search for your product or service. Your end goal is to help your customer find what they are looking for. Google is just the intermediary between you and your customer.

 

The goal of SEO and the effective use of keywords is to help Google understand your site. However, you have to keep in mind that Google is not stupid. Google is going to catch any attempt to deceive or manipulate. But Google is not a human, and it’s not your customer. Google loves SEO when done well. Your goal with understanding how to use keywords on your site is to help Google understand what your website, and each page on your site is about…so that customers searching through Google can find what they are looking for. Again: your goal is to help the person searching  by helping the search engines – not trying to trick, spam or manipulate the person searching by spamming the search engines.

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  1. Brainstorm for Keyword Ideas. Make a copy of this Keyword Research Template. Use Wikipedia for Topic Ideas and Synonyms.

  2. Choose Target Keywords: Once you have a list of possible keywords & phrases, start by reviewing the first page of Google for each keyword. Look to see if there are well established sites with high quality content. Eliminate overly competitive keywords and focus on keywords you actually have a chance to rank for. Your chosen keywords will be the centerpieces of your content.

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This webpage can take you through the process of choosing keywords.

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On-Page SEO Checklist

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Pick One Keyword Per Page. You’ll generally want to start with lower-volume keywords.

Write Title Tags Search Engines Love. Every page of your website should have unique title tag, preferably starting with a relevant keyword. Include modifiers like “best”, “2016” etc. to stand out and to pick up long tail searches. Keep title tags 55 characters or less or they’ll appear truncated in search results.

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When adding keywords to your website, it is important to include your keyword in 6 places on each page of your website. Including your keyword in these 6 areas will help search engines identify the subject of your page and rank your page in search results.

  • Page Title

  • Meta Description

  • Header

  • Sub Header

  • Body Paragraphs

  • Image Alt Tags

Page Title & Meta Description:

Page Titles & Meta Descriptions are a more technical part of keywording your website. However, it is important to recognize how valuable they can be for your internet marketing efforts. What are Page Titles & Meta Descriptions? These parts of your website page actually show up in search results, they are the first impression a searcher gets of your website page.

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Link Building 

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​Now it's time to encourage people to your site to buy your product. How will you make the most of online phenomenon to promote your product and your website?

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Online Marketing Strategies 

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Social media marketing.

Social media marketing isn’t the get-rich-quick scheme you may have been promised, but there is significant potential in building and nurturing a social media audience. Again, content will come into play heavily here, as it will likely be the factor that attracts your audience to begin with. Here, you stand to gain greater brand visibility, a greater reputation and far more inbound traffic with your syndicated links.

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Search engine optimization (SEO)

SEO is the process of making your site more visible in search engines, so you get more traffic from people searching for the products or services you offer. Much of your organic search position ranking comes from the technical structure of your site and your ongoing content development strategy.

So, SEO is not much more of an investment if you’re already creating new content regularly -- and it’s well worth that extra investment if for no other reason than to make sure your site is properly indexed.

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Content marketing

Content marketing takes a variety of forms, and depending on how you form your strategy, could accomplish a number of different goals. For example, you could use white papers, ebooks and other long-form content to attract downloads, signups and conversions, or you could use an on-site blog to attract more inbound traffic to your site.

You could even use content as a form of help and troubleshooting, or some combination of these applications. Content marketing is incredibly versatile and useful, and, if it's valuable, your customers will expect you to have at least some of it in place for them.

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Presenting your Marketing Plan

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Marketing Plan Report
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Introduction: Outline the mission of your business.

Identify KPI: Key Performance indicators are the factors that indicate your business is a success online.

Social Media initiative and strategies: How will you harness social media to market your product?

SEO: List your keywords and how you will use them as tags.

Content initiative and strategies: What content will you create in order to market your product? How will you use that content?

Competition: What is the competition doing with their marketing in social media and in content publishing?

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Infographic

 

To succinctly describe your marketing plan, create an infographic that summaries your report. 

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Here is an example Marketing Plan and the Infographic that communicates the plan.

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