Value of Ranking for Keywords No One is Searching For

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My cofounder wants to create pages targeting long-tail keywords NO ONE is searching for. Granted they get us to the 1st page of Google for those keywords. Is their ANY value in his actions or is he wasting our time? In my mind, it's a waste of time lol.
#search engine optimization #keywords #ranking #searching
  • If it is something realted with upcoming market, it can be useful. Otherwise it is a total waste of time.
  • You should go with the trend. As you said no one a searching for it then IMO there will be no much values of it even for coming up on first page.
  • What is the point of ranking for stuff nobody is searching for?
    • [1] reply
    • Come on Mike you know at least one answer

      Sales tool for a product launch or SEO WSO
  • Erm, if no-one is searching for it then you can't be ranking for it. Rankings don't exist in and of themselves, they are created on-the-fly by Google in response to a search. Theoretically there is an infinite number of possible searches. Why not rank for "kjkjhgsdfjkghdfkjghdkjhdf"? Oh wait, this thread probably will within a few hours, that's useful!
  • (HOWEVER, there might some benefit to writing content related to your main subject and targeting a general long-tail area to generate long-tail searches that you won't find in any keyword tool, and in doing so also bolster your site's ranking in general for the main keyword. Maybe that's what he meant...)
    • [1] reply
    • How are you determining that no one is searching for it? If you're trusting Google then you should know that big G considers 20 or less people a week to be "no one." Also, being relevant for one thing makes you relevant for related things as well.

      Just like with distribution, if you are selling enough units (i.e. keywords) then you don't need to make a very large margin (i.e. traffic) on each one. If it's valid for sales it is also valid for SEO.
  • Banned
    Make sure to add a G+ author profile image to those pages.









  • If the page provides value to visitors who are already on your site, then yes you should build them. If no one sees them except the search engines, then it is only useful for internal linking (creating internal juice) and possibly building authority (to a small extent maybe).
  • Nothing wrong in selecting long tail keywords but it's trends and traffic estimation is less then you can use those keywords in content and build backlings and improve authority.
  • Well there's a common theory that says ranking pages pass stronger authority. If that were true then perhaps they could be used to internally pass more authority to pages targeting more worthwhile terms. Would be an interesting experiment.
    • [1] reply
    • If that were true every indexed page would pass more authority since only a page with duplicate content would not rank for some unique phrase.
      • [1] reply
  • I wonder how you can think of chasing the keywords that no one else wants to have. We can only wait to see if it goes right direction, or it's just a big waste of time, energy and mind.
  • Banned
    Reminds me of that participation trophy kids get while playing on a Tee ball team.

    Sure your #1, but so is everyone else (ranking for keywords with no searches).
  • Ranking for a KW with an extremely small potential audience can be worthwhile.

    A few months ago I wanted to grab the attention of the board of directors of an industry body - a total potential audience of just 12 people.

    I wrote an article with KWs that they were the only people likely to be searching for.

    It worked - one of the directors saw the article and it was even included in their next newsletter - and I got to begin a dialogue with someone who is almost impossible to reach via email or phone.
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