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Keywords Are It! Seven Powerful / Useful Keyword Marketing Tools

By Titus Hoskins in Featured

After years of running websites and earning a full-time online income, I am constantly reminded that it all comes down to keywords. Actually, it all comes down to obtaining top rankings for your profitable keywords in the search engines, mainly Google.

And that statement has to be refined even further, it’s all about obtaining top keyword rankings and keeping them at the top. You must consistently keep your keywords in the top spots on that all important first page of SERPs since your keyword rankings can make or break your online marketing.

Keyword Strategies: Increase Your Keyword Rankings

By Titus Hoskins in Featured

Keywords are ground zero. They are essential to your online success. You must get your keywords right or it’s game over before you even get started. Mainly because keywords are the most important element of your online marketing.

It can’t be emphasized enough, especially to beginning online webmasters or marketers, choosing the right profitable keywords will largely determine whether or not you succeed with your online endeavors. You simply must get this element right or your marketing will be in big trouble.

What Are Keywords?

Lets start at the very beginning, keywords are the exact words someone types into a search engine to find what they’re looking for on the web. Some keywords are valuable/profitable, while others are virtually worthless.

Profitable keywords are the ones that convert into a sale, a lead or potential client/customer for your company or product. These are the words someone is searching in order to buy a product or hire a service. Someone searching for “honeymoon vacation packages” is probably in the market to book a honeymoon vacation and could turn out to be very profitable for the right website or business.

Profitable keywords are the ones where the searcher is in the right “mind-set” or frame of mind to buy what they’re searching for on the web. Tailor your online marketing to target these profitable keywords and it can spell success.

So what’s the whole process for finding or choosing profitable keywords to use in your marketing? Lets look at some ways to proceed…

Number of Keyword Searches Made?

You need to find out how many searches are made for your chosen keywords each month. Simply use WordTracker or a site like SEOBook. These will give you a preliminary number of searches made each month for your keyword. Highly popular, well-searched keywords with hundreds of thousands of searches each month will be extremely hard to rank for because you will have stiff competition from major companies with limitless resources.

I like to pick less popular keywords that get only a couple of hundred of searches each day because my chances of getting on the first page greatly increases. But don’t get fixated on the number of searches, some keyword phrases that only get four or five searches daily, can still be very profitable.

For serious keyword research in a particular niche market I like to use Brad Callen’s Keyword Elite which is professionally designed software that makes all your keyword research so much easier. But there are plenty of free keyword tools you can use. One handy keyword tool is Google Adwords external suggestion tool which will help you find valuable keywords.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Commercial Intent of Keywords?

But how do you know if a keyword is profitable? Well, one convenient tool is from MSN which helps you with “Detecting Online Commercial Intention” of keywords. Just type in a keyword and it will give you a percentage or probability your keyword query has commercial benefit or intent.

http://adlab.msn.com/Online-Commercial-Intention/Default.aspx

Conversion Rate of Keywords?

Once you have your chosen keywords in place, next you want to have a landing page that converts those keywords or traffic from those keywords into buyers or leads for your online business. This is another crucial element of your online marketing – you must have a landing page or content/site that converts into a sale or you obviously won’t make any revenue.

Keep in mind, if you’re into affiliate marketing, you main goal is not to sell but to “pre-sell” your products or services. One effective way I have found to do this is to give potential customers/clients valuable information they can use in making their final purchasing choice. Comparison sites do well, as do review sites, top ten sites… potential customers use the Internet and keywords to not only find products but more so, to find information on those products. Your goal should be to provide this valuable information to make their task a little bit easier for them and they will reward you with a sale.

What are Long-Tail Keywords?

Long-Tail keywords are simply that: long three or four word phrases that searchers use to find what they’re looking for on the web. Because they are highly specific, long-tail keywords have proven to have better conversion rates than general keywords. This is also just common sense, someone searching for a “2005 ford mustang convertible” may just be in the right mind-set to buy such a vehicle; as compared to someone searching for a more general keyword phrase such as “sports cars.”

Study your website traffic logs religiously to find long-tail keywords that turn into a sale. Target these long-tail keywords in your marketing. Even buy PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising in the three major search engines – Google Adwords, Yahoo! Marketing and MicroSoft AdCenter – for these valuable/profitable keywords.

And build higher rankings in organic search for these long-tail keyword phrases. It’s really not that difficult for long phrases, especially if they’re related to your site; many times you can reach the top spot in a matter of days, especially in Google.

How To Rank High For Your Chosen Profitable Keywords?

Of course, the million dollar question is: HOW do you rank in the top spot for your chosen keywords? I believe the key to ranking high in the search engines (especially Google) is to be persistent in building your rankings for your keywords. Take a long-term view or approach, sometimes it may take months, even years, to rank in the top Five for your highly competitive keywords.

The best strategy is to “stick to it” and keep building relevant links to your keyword landing page. Create related blogs with valuable content linking back to your keywords. Write keyword related articles and distribute them all over the web. Create Google Alerts for your keywords and them place comments/links in the newly formed pages on the web that Google is indexing.

Be pro-active, download the SEOQuake toolbar and find your main keyword competitors. Check out their links and then go out and get the same links. Write better higher quality content than your main competitors because Google always rewards great content. Plus, use the free http://www.Addthis.com button and let your visitors bookmark your great content in all the social bookmark sites and build your keyword links for you.

Do keyworded Press Releases with your embedded links and spread them all over the web. Get these Press Releases into Google news and other important places on the web. http://www.PRWeb.com is really a great place for your press releases since you can embed your keywords in your links.

If you can try to get your most important keywords in your domain name. Many SEO experts argue the merits of this but from my own experience and marketing – it is much easier to rank high for your keywords if you have them in the domain name. Again, it is just common sense, if you have your main keyword in the domain, this keyword is obviously telling the search engines this is what your site is all about. I have even bought domains and created sites specifically around certain keywords just to rank high.

Always remember, you have to be persistent, I have been fighting some keyword battles for over four or five years! For really profitable keywords, it can be a constant struggle to remain on the first page, but the trick is not to give up, just keep fighting away at your competitors. Persistence usually pays off in the end and those profitable keywords will have your links in the top spot. Make ranking high for those profitable keywords your number one marketing strategy. Concentrate all your marketing efforts towards getting plenty of quality traffic for those keywords and you will succeed online.

About The Author:

Titus Hoskins – The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous websites. For the latest web marketing tools try: Marketing Tools. If you liked the article above, why not try this Free 7-Day Marketing Course here: Internet Marketing Tools

Keyword Marketing Explained and Simplified

By Joan Finholt in Featured

Are you sick and tired of hearing about keywords, keyword optimization, keyword stuffing, keyword ratio and more? Why all the hype about keywords? What do they really do for a business?

Keywords are important plain and simple. They are the words customers, potential customers and website visitors might use in a search engine to find your information.

For example, a person researching cell phones might use the following keywords typed into Google, Yahoo, Metacrawler or any number of the available search engines.

- Cell phones – Wireless phones – Cell phone planes – Prepaid cell phone – Best cell phone – Cellphone – Cell phone deals – Cell phone reviews

When choosing keywords for a business the first step is to consider what terms people will use to find you. To accomplish this, a three step approach is often recommended.

1. Brainstorm ideas. Sitting down with a pen and paper to brainstorm keywords may seem silly at first however brainstorming is a successful strategy. The more a person is able to think outside of the box and put themselves in their prospects’ shoes, the more productive the brainstorming exercise will be. Challenge yourself to come up with 50 potential keywords. Remember that people often misspell keywords, like the ‘cellphone’ example used in the list above.

2. Consult with associates, friends and family, current customers. Step two is to start asking around. Ask people what keywords they would use to find information on your business topic. Friends, family and associates are generally the best place to go however if a business has a close relationship with their customers, then asking a few key customers may be beneficial.

3. Research using keyword popularity tools. This third step is where business owners often skip right to. However if you don’t attack a keyword popularity tool with a plan, you can end up with thousands of potential options ‘ a real mess. Instead, take a look at keywords that you are confident in and comfortable with and then use the keyword tools to tell you how often those keywords are used. This will help business owners determine what their primary keywords are and what keywords to use in their content or on secondary website pages.

Here are a few free keyword tools:

a. https://adwords.google.com/select/ Keyword Tool

b. https://www.wordtracker.com/trial/ Free trial

c. inventory.overture.com/

d. http://keywordspy.com Free Trial

That leads us right into a very frequently asked question…where are keywords used? Several places actually…The primary place keywords need to be used is the home page or index page of a business website. This is the page people land on when they come to a website. Maybe it has sales copy, maybe it tells a bit about the company’s products or services, or maybe it offers informational copy. The general rule of thumb is to focus on one or two primary keywords. Place them in the headline, first and last paragraph and then naturally scattered throughout the copy. Keyword stuffing or jamming your copy full of you keywords makes the copy read like a phone book and the search engines don’t like it.

Secondary keywords can be used on subsequent website pages, articles, press releases, press releases, advertisements, blog posts and so on. Using the example from earlier a primary key word might be “cell phone” or “cell phones” and a secondary keyword might be “cell phone reviews”

Keyword hype is justified. They are a direct contributor to a company’s bottom line. Keywords help potential customers find the information, products, and services they’re looking for. They help people find your business. Taking the time to choose the right keywords, the most commonly used keywords, and then setting up your business to highlight those keywords will help drive traffic to your business website. The end result is more traffic and more profits.

Joan Finholt is a retired teacher and loves using the internet. She is co-owner of Bound and Determined books and yes, the domain name spelling is correct.http://www.boundanddetrmined.com

Keywords – Kingmakers of the Web

By Titus-Hoskins in Featured

Unless you go the paid route with PPC advertising,
keywords or rather top keyword rankings will be the
most important factor in the success of your website
on the net. Not exactly breaking news but many webmasters
still don’t understand this simple fact.

Keywords rule the Internet.

Getting top rankings for profitable keywords will
make you king. Currently, there are countless kings
on the web ruling over massive listings of keywords
in some pretty obscure yet profitable niches. Since
there are millions upon millions of keyword phrases
out there – with more being born each day – anyone
with just a basic understanding of how keywords work
will be entitled to a crown.

How lucrative a kingdom you create will depend upon
your own work ethic and your knowledge of keyword
SEO techniques.

Basic Keyword Knowledge – Keys to the Kingdom

Keywords are the exact words someone types into a
search engine to find what they’re looking for on
the web. Obviously, there are millions, if not billions,
of possible keywords anyone can use. The trick for
the entrepreneurial webmaster is to find the profitable
keywords.

First, these webmasters need to check to see the
number of visitors any given keywords receives in
a month. A keyword getting four or five clicks a
month is not worth considering unless it’s something
like “buying beachfront property in Malibu,” where
one click or prospect could lead to a sale and a
handsome commission.

Here’s an excellent site where you can some helpful
keyword research tools – including how to find the
number of searches made each month for a particular
keyword:

http://tools.seobook.com

Next you have to check to see how competitive your
keyword is. One simple way is to type your keyword
into Google and see how many pages are returned with
your keyword. It is usually in the millions. A more
precise way is to see how many of those pages have
your keyword in the title.

In Google, if you want to find competing sites that
have your keywords in the title, just use the allintitle
command.

Just type into Google search:

allintitle:yourkeywords

Professional marketers will use keyword research
software that will make performing all these steps
much more easier – I personally use Brad Callen’s
Keyword Elite. Because most of my marketing is done
with organic SEO traffic, doing extensive keyword
research is essential for getting it right, plus it
saves me a lot of time.

Mainly Keyword Elite shows me what keywords I have
a chance of reaching with any one of my sites.
High-demand lucrative keywords are usually out of
my reach, unless I want to do months and months of
SEO work, and even then it will take deep pockets
to compete with large companies who can afford to
spend anything to get that top ranking.

Google may have cracked down on paid link buying
but anyone with enough resources can still buy
their way into any top spot for any keyword.
There are exceptions – I have been trying for
years to get top billing for “Google marketing”
- but all I could manage was second place.
Wonder why?

Finally, you have to consider how profitable the
keyword is? This can be the real breaking point
for most novice webmasters. You must be able to
turn your top keyword ranking into a profit. In
other words you must be able to convert your
keyword traffic into a sale. Get your visitor
to buy from your site or from an affiliate link
on your site.

This will usually require some serious testing
on your part. You must test to see if your
landing page or sales letter is converting.
I find one of the best tools for testing your
webpages is Google Analytics. It will give you
vital information on your site that you can use
to increase your conversions or tell what is
working and what is not working.

Like any professional marketer, I find and use
‘long tail keywords’ to make most of my income.
Long tail refers to keywords phrases that are well
long (three or more words), yet very profitable.
For example, someone searching for a particular
make or model of a product usually has their mind
made up and is seriously considering buying that
product. Someone searching for “2008 v-6 four-door
Honda Accord” is a more targeted visitor than someone
searching for “cars.”

The great beauty of Long Tail Marketing: there
is little competition for these keywords and
you can usually get a top ranking in Google
in a couple of days – make that hours if you’re
using blogging techniques.

Keyword Page Fundamentals – Jewels in the Crown

If you’re targeting certain keywords, it helps
if you create webpages that are search engine
friendly. Again, very simple stuff, but you would
be surprised how many webmasters don’t follow
these basic site elements when constructing
their sites.

Keywords 123 – Here are some things you should do:

1. Title Tag

The Title Tag is located at the top of your
HTML page and it tells all the search engines
what your page is about. When you open your
page in a browser these are the words at the
very top of the screen. Despite its simplicity,
the title tag is crucial to ‘on-page optimization’;
it should include your main keywords and it should
be 63 characters or less if you want your
title to appear in full on Google.

Many SEO experts create webpages in a three-prong
approach. They place the title (with the keywords)
in:

- The title tag – on the webpage itself – and
in the URL for that page.

Sometimes they will just pick the main keywords
from the title and place them in the anchor url
instead. For example: www. yourwebsite.com/keywords.html

2. Meta Description Tag

The Meta Tag contains the description for your
webpage. Your description will show up in all the
search engines so you must be careful to write
precisely and objectively. It should be about
140 characters or around 20 words. Make
sure to include your keywords but don’t spam
- don’t repeat your keywords more than twice,
using variations is helpful.

Keep in mind, successful webmasters make their
descriptions stand out from the pack and entice
the surfer to click their link. Remember this
is your first contact with your potential
prospect so make a good first impression.

3. Anchor Tag or URL

The anchor tag is used to form links within
websites or from site to site. Your tag should
have your title or the main keywords from your
page title to be the most effective.

Anchor text is also important to know, these
are the underlined, clickable text or words
in a link. anchor text

If you want to check Google for all webpages
containing your keywords in the anchor tags,
just type into Google Search:

allinanchor:yourkeywords

Of course, the best way to get high rankings
for your keywords is to build relevant quality
one-way links to the page that contains your
targeted keywords. Get enough of these quality
links with your keywords in the anchor text
and you will get top rankings. Again, provided
it is not an extremely competitive keyword.

Keyword Shortcuts – The Court Jesters

On the web, like in real life, there are always
shortcuts. No, I am not talking about any sneaky
“black hat” SEO tricks… the shortcuts here are
very legit and have to do with blogs.

Another way to crack the “keyword puzzle” is
simply to use a blog. I prefer the free blogging
software from WordPress since you can host these
blogs on your own site.

Blogs are perfect for keyword marketing. Only
with blogs, keywords are called “tags” but it
amounts to the same thing. With WordPress each
category will be considered a tag or keyword.
You can create a targeted page within your blog
for your chosen keyword or keywords within minutes.
Then you bookmark this page/tag/keyword in your
favorite bookmark sites like Digg, del.icio.us,
Furl, Propeller, Reddit, Slashdot, Stumbeupon…
don’t forget to ping/click your newly created
link to let all the search engines find your
keyworded page. WordPress will also automatically
ping your posts for you.

Blogging is a simple shortcut that can put you
on the fast track for earning on the web. The
great beauty of using blogs – you don’t need
to know anything about HTML or site design for
that matter, all of it is done for you. You can
pick out your template, edit your site heading,
side panels and your footer within a couple of
minutes… and you can have your blog/site up
and running in no time.

Simply tie in your blog with all these social
bookmark sites. Google likes these social media
sites; get a front page listing on Digg and your
keywords rankings will go to the top of Google’s
pages. I did manage to get on the front page of
Digg a little while back and my keywords instantly
rose to the top spot on Google. “Internet Facts”
but that’s another story for another time.

Online marketing can be as simple or as
complicated as you want to make it. I like
the complicated stuff myself, building numerous
sites, building links, building connections,
building patterns… but coming from an artist
background I am allowed to be more than a little
eccentric.

However, most people like to take the simple
route, so here’s a recent video I watched by
Nancy Andrews that explains how all this online
marketing stuff works… I hope you will notice
one important point that’s mentioned a couple
of times in the video… all this is so simple
yet there are still very few people doing it.
How true.

Always remember there are still a lot of crowns
out there going to waste. Why don’t you grab one?
Trust me, Kingdoms are so much fun to run.

http://www.liveblueprints.com/seotalk/