SEO Newbie: Keyword Selection Question

[einsmite]

Hi Warriors,

I have a new site (Wordpress) set up, and for one of my posts, I targeted a very long-tail keyword. I’ll call it Keyword A, and it’s something like “Maytag Deluxe with groovy cool feature dishwasher.”

I chose this keyword because it has 1,300 exact match searches monthly, according to Micro Niche Finder and Market Samurai. The SEO competition is pretty low too. What’s kind of strange (to me) about this keyword is that the number of broad match searches is 1,600 – not a big jump from exact match.

I just discovered that a shorter keyword phrase (Keyword B) for this same product gets far fewer exact match searches monthly (less than 100), but far more broad searches (3,600). Keyword B is of the form “Maytag Deluxe dishwasher.” Also, the competition for Keyword B is about the same for the longer tail Keyword A.

Would it be better to try and rank my post for the “really long-tail” Keyword A with more exact match searches, or Keyword B, with far fewer exact searches but far more broad? I want to get the most traffic, obviously.

I said to myself that I don’t know which an experienced SEO would choose, so I thought I’d ask!

Thanks!

[NastyBlast]

if this site is a long-term project for you ( opposed to some people who just set up a few posts on a blog for some links and then don't develop them further ).

you can build a very strong pyramid type structure. You've already done the right thing by going for the tail end. But if you want to build a really strong site for the future... Layout say about 100 keywords in descending order from shortest length to the longest length. The longest length being the base of the pyramid.

As you build the base of the pyramid up from longtail terms you're slowly working your way to the shorter terms. These longtail terms will create a compression factor towards your shorter terms that are most likely higher competition and higher volume.

By the time you get up to about 75% of the pyramid you should start seeing yourself rank for 2 – 3 word terms. you will still need sufficient content on all pages but not as much on the lower base pages.

In the end you can usually make it to page 1 for any keyword term as long as your site content is sufficient. But this is where you would have to break with using WordPress.

I understand you're using WordPress because your new and that's fine to get experience on. But in the long run WordPress sites don't go very far. Many people will argue this because they like using WordPress it's simple and easy to set up and easy to update.

But when you go into competition in the top three pages it is very rare that a blog structure can outperform custom-made websites that have more extensive link structures. Also do not be misled about the people that say how great WordPress is for Seo.

just keep in mind how often you see a blog rank on page 1... Basically never.

[einsmite]

Thanks NastyBlast for your response. I know somewhat what you’re driving at. I’m not looking to create a long-term authority site. What I’m building is a niche review site.

I know long-tail keywords are usually easier to rank for than shorter terms. But in this case, the shorter Keyword B has very close to the same level of SEO competition as the long-tail Keyword A. This is according to MNF and Market Samurai.

So my question boils down to, given the same degree of difficulty in ranking for these keywords, which would be better to go after?

long-tail Keyword A: 1,300 exact match searches; 1,600 broad
shorter Keyword B: < 100 exact match searches; 3,600 broad