6 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}
6 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}

Quick Question About Keyword Research

by deloriagod
5 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Alright guys I've continuously failed at keyword research but I think I've found a good one this time. But I want to make sure I've got the concept right:

I used Adwords Keyword Tool and look for exact searches then hop over to Google and do an exact search for the keywords I have in mind, correct?

I've found a keyword with 14,800 exact monthly searches and 500,000 exact match competing sites. The top sites are all sites that appear to be selling their own products (while I'll be selling affiliate products) but they don't look that hard to beat (all that most will have on me is domain age).

I haven't gone looking for domains since I read that thread about some companies snatching up recently searched for domains. But does this sound like a decent keyword to target? And am I on the right track as far as doing keyword research goes?
#keyword #question #quick #research
  • Profile picture of the author Mary Green
    Who exactly are the top sites? Are you talking about PPC or SEO? For being new to keyword research 500,000 competing sites doesn't sound like the place to start. You want way fewer competitors.

    I'm assuming you mean PPC because you didn't mention researching the top sites for backlinks, age, etc. But I know there aren't 500k ppc competitors unless they are all ridiculously stupid, so... can you restate the problem?
    Signature
    Free Guide- 52 Time Saving Social Media Tools on Social Media Fuze
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2508396].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Brad Callen
    Originally Posted by deloriagod View Post

    Alright guys I've continuously failed at keyword research but I think I've found a good one this time. But I want to make sure I've got the concept right:

    I used Adwords Keyword Tool and look for exact searches then hop over to Google and do an exact search for the keywords I have in mind, correct?

    I've found a keyword with 14,800 exact monthly searches and 500,000 exact match competing sites. The top sites are all sites that appear to be selling their own products (while I'll be selling affiliate products) but they don't look that hard to beat (all that most will have on me is domain age).

    I haven't gone looking for domains since I read that thread about some companies snatching up recently searched for domains. But does this sound like a decent keyword to target? And am I on the right track as far as doing keyword research goes?
    Do not use the adwords tool for SEO research. You would want to use the SKtool for that as those figures do not include the content network figures. It's never a bad idea to compare the sktool with something like wordtracker or wordstream either. Lot's of inconsistencies and you can never be 100% certain until you are ranking and actually seeing impressions/clicks.

    Mary asked a good question though, PPC or SEO?
    Signature
    iWriter.com - The Original Content Creation Service. Now with over 350,000 active writers. Let us write or re-write your articles, eBooks, blog posts and more... for as little as $1.25! 3,711,814 articles written to date!
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2508578].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author deloriagod
      Originally Posted by Brad Callen View Post

      Do not use the adwords tool for SEO research. You would want to use the SKtool for that as those figures do not include the content network figures. It's never a bad idea to compare the sktool with something like wordtracker or wordstream either. Lot's of inconsistencies and you can never be 100% certain until you are ranking and actually seeing impressions/clicks.

      Mary asked a good question though, PPC or SEO?
      SEO. SKTool shows some scary low monthly searches. I think I'm going to have to look for a new keyword if it's correct. The keyword I'm currently looking at is showing 14,800 exact monthly searches in Adwords Keyword Tool and 100 exact monthly searches in SKTool.
      Signature
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2508602].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author deloriagod
    Sorry I should have explained better. This is for SEO. Basically on my last website I didn't look at exact searches for the keyword and I've been wondering why my traffic was so low until it clicked and I searched it. That keyword has 1000 exact monthly searches with 189,000,000 exact matches competing. I currently rank #6 in that keyword for my main site and my blog that ties into it ranks #12. I feel there wasn't a whole lot of work done by my competition though because I gained my ranks within a month.

    So this time around I want to be sure I'm doing everything right. The main keyword I'll be shooting for has 14,800 exact monthly searches and 500,000 exact match competing sites (when I do an exact search on Google). Most of the top sites have less than 200 backlinks to the pages they are ranking although some over 1000+ to the overall domain and all of them have at least a few years of domain age. I looked over the Meta tags of the site ranking #1 and found they don't even have the keyword I'm aiming for in there.

    The niche is non-seasonal and has potential to get bigger in the future. I don't know if I'm leaving out any essential details, but I'm mostly looking to see if I've done my keyword research right (find exact searches with keyword tool, find exact matches on Google, analyze top 10, determine if it would be worthwhile)
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2508591].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Teleologist
    I have never understood why it matters how many competing pages a keyword has. If you are trying to get a top three spot on the first page of Google then you are only competing against those three sites. If you think you can out-rank one those top three sites then why should it matter if there are a million other pages? Now it's certainly more difficult to find sites you can out-rank where there are a million competing pages but if you somehow manage to find a keyword with a million competing pages where you can out-rank one the top three positions then by all means go for it.
    Signature

    Jack Wyatt

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[2509318].message }}

Trending Topics