Difference between Long-tail & Short-tail Keywords?

It's not splitting hairs at all. Long/Short tail keywords have been reduced down to a pretty simplified explanation without anyone really knowing where it comes from.

Personally, my definition of "long tail keywords" was always keywords that were completely unique, therefore, you couldn't optimize for them. The only way you could increase your likelihood is by putting more words on the page.

The bigger concept of "The Long Tail" is one that every marketer should know.

They'll be even more confused if the "short, bite-sized" answers aren't facts.

I'm not going to apologise for trying to correct the misconceptions of others, nor am I going to apologise for explaining what the term really means. (Backed up by the link to Wikipedia that someone posted)

You can choose for yourself whether or not you want to take the answer on board, as can everyone else.

As the OP hasn't returned, we don't know whether he or she was interested to know what the term really means or whether they were happy with random explanations.

Well, I'd rather stay out of the semantic discussion about what the literal definition of "long tail keyword" is, as that rarely results in making any more money. I'd rather think in terms of the principles that can improve my success.

What most successful marketers realize is that the keyword someone is searching for is simply a clue to what their intentions are, and if you can figure out the intentions of your visitors, you can make more money.

You're not going to persuade anyone to buy anything who is not interested in buying something. And like it or not, we make our money by selling stuff. We're internet marketers. That's what we do.

So a keyword gives us a little inside information into what a person's intentions, mindset, wants, needs and possible next actions are. The better we are at figuring those things out and providing relevant solutions, the more money we will make off our websites.

There are several factors I like to consider when doing my keyword research...

Question #1 -How easy will the keyword be to monetize?

General keywords are going to be harder to monetize, because the person's intentions are not as clear. The more focused a person's intentions are, the easier it is going to be to present them with a product that meets their immediate wants and needs and make your sale or commission.

Whether a keyword is short or long is irrelevant. Some very long keyword phrases are still very general, and some very short keyword phrases are very specific.

The length of a keyword is not what determines how easy it will be to monetize. The meaning and implications of the keyword are what are important here.

Question #2 - How much competition is there, i.e. how many other marketers are targeting that keyword?

If you are bidding on PPC, high competition would mean higher cost per click for you. If you are doing SEO, higher competition would mean more time and energy spent optimizing your site and building backlinks. I do a lot of SEO, so I generally think in terms of SEO competition.

There is not necessarily a causal relationship between the length of a keyword and the amount of competition. However, in most cases, longer keywords are easier to rank for, because in the eyes of non-human search engine algorithm, they are more specific. To a search engine, more letters equals more specific, but we know that's not true.

A three word keyword will most likely be easier to rank for than a two word keyword. However, that may not be the case. It all depends on the keyword.

Question #3 - How much search volume does a keyword have?

Search volume is obviously very important. The more searches there are for a keyword, the more people you have to market products to. If you are doing SEO, given the option between ranking for a low volume keyword or a high volume keyword, ignoring all other factors, you're always going to choose higher volume.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that low volume is better. It's not. Low search volume doesn't mean lower competition or higher monetization value. They are independent of each other and should be considered separately.

Sometimes very general keywords have low search volume, and sometimes very specific keywords have high search volume. Sometimes keywords with low search volume are highly competitive, and sometimes keywords with high search volume have low competition.

There's no perfect sweet spot for the search volume, monetization value and competition for a keyword. It all depends on your specific market and your approach.

Here's an example:

I have one website that ranks #1 for a very specific keyword in the fitness niche.

In answer to question #1, the keyword is very easy to monetize, because I have a pretty good idea of my visitors intentions. Because of this, I can send my visitors straight to a relevant product, and the traffic converts pretty well.

To answer question #2, the keyword is 3 words long, and I have an exact match domain. There was a bit of competition, and it took a little work, but I was still able to rank the site #1 with a little time and effort.

To answer question #3, the search volume is not terribly high. My ranking gets me about 1500 visitors per month. However, the other two factors allowed me to make money off it.

Here's another example:

I have a website that is ranking #1 for a high traffic, 2-word keyword and #2 for a high traffic 1-word keyword in the spirituality niche. It is not "long tail," or whatever you want to call it. They are keywords that give you only a general idea of what the visitor is interested in.

So question #1 is how easy will it be to monetize? Well, I don't know their exact intentions, wants or needs, so it takes a bit of work to monetize it.

Question #2 is how much competition is there? Well, I am pretty good at SEO, so the competition levels were within reasonable reach of my resources and abilities. It took a bit of work, but it was manageable. Honestly, the competition was about the same for the keyword in the first example.

Question #3 is how much search volume is there? Well, the #1 and #2 rankings get me 1500-2000 visitors per day. I get 500-700 email opt-ins per day to my list. So there's a pretty decent amount of search volume.

In this case, I make money off the keyword, because the search volume makes up for the lack of specificity. I have my email autoresponder sequence set up to systematically segment my list into smaller chunks. Then I market specific products to those smaller niche markets. I may have lower conversion rates overall to all of my traffic, but I can promote multiple products to them over time, and the sheer volume makes up for it.

The second website makes a lot more money. In all honesty, the SEO competition was about the same. They both took about the same amount of time and effort to rank for. The second site took more time and effort to set up an effective conversion funnel, but it was definitely worth it.

Both approaches can work well, and there's plenty of other approaches that can work too. You just have to realize what the different factors involved are, and how to use the information you have available to devise the best strategy.

If someone is searching for "pet shops," their intentions are not terribly clear. Maybe they're looking for the nearest pet shop, but maybe they're not. Maybe they're thinking about opening a pet shop. Maybe they're interested in buying pet products online. Maybe they're not. It's a general keyword. It will take some work to monetize.

It probably has fairly high competition, but it may not.

Most likely it has a ton of search volume.

If someone is searching for a keyword like "Pet shops London," you have a much better idea of what their intentions are. It will be much easier to monetize. If you have a pet shop in London, you would benefit highly from ranking for this keyword, because it is very specific.

Most likely the competition levels are not terribly high for this keyword, so it may be easy to rank for.

"Pet Shops London" has very low search volume. So you have to look at the competition levels and monetization potential to determine if it's worth targeting.

High traffic can sometimes make up for low monetization potential and/or high competition.

High monetization value can sometimes make up for low traffic and/or high competition.

The ideal keyword has high traffic, low competition and high monetization value, but keywords like that rarely exist. In reality, you can't have all three.

If you're just starting out, if you follow the advice of most internet marketing programs, you will probably be looking for low competition keywords with fairly low traffic but fairly decent monetization potential.

I prefer to put more emphasis on the traffic and monetization potential and less emphasis on the competition. If a keyword will make me money and gets a lot of traffic, then it's probably worth my time, money and effort to beat out the competition.

That's just my preference.

Call me dumb, but I didn't get it. Mind enlightening me?