ADVANCED SEO GUIDE
Intelligent | Effective | Ethical
Profitable Strategic Search Terms
Strategic
Search Terms are those that have the most traffic volume,
with the most profit potential, and with beatable competition.
Strategic Search Terms are the result of research with which you will optimize your site for, and build backlinks with, for success in Google's search ranking for those terms.
I
highly
reccommend
the free keyword search tool Market Samurai.
All the necessary features used in this Guide to seo traffic
remain active
after
your 30 day trial, and you don't need to give them your credit card for
the trial.
I recommend you spend some time with this tool and familiarize yourself with it, but not now. Finish the Guide and then go back and work through the recommended tools. You will use Market Samurai often and it will make a big difference in the profitability of your website.
I'm not going to give you a tutorial on how to use Market Samurai here. They'll do a much better job of that. But here is what you need to get from that tool - all the potential Strategic Search Terms highly relevant to your business, as well as the data from the following search options:
Recommended Market Samurai Settings
Organic: Adwords: Competition: Commerciality:
Total Searches Adwords CPC SEO Comp SEO Value
(min. 10 per day) Title Comp
Title/Comp
You have an option of retrieving BROAD | PHRASE | or EXACT volume data. I highly recommend you work with PHRASE volume. The difference is that BROAD volume is the search volume for every search containing either word. It returns the most volumous, but has little bearing on the traffic you will expect from a high ranking.
PHRASE returns the volume for every search using the exact phrase and is the most relevant volume for what you will actually rank for. EXACT is the search volume for when your keyword is searched for, not one character more, or less. EXACT volume data will underestimate what you will rank for when optimizing your Strategic Search Terms, while PHRASE will over estimated it, but is closest to traffic reality
You can set up a free Google Adwords account, give Market Samurai your log-in info and retrieve as many as 800 potential Strategic Search Terms.
You should have a good intuition about what keywords you will seed the program with. Be as general as possible, without including terms that are obviously too boad for your business. For example, if you are a DUI attorney in Maryland, don't search for just DUI. That will attract terms out of the geographical area of your business. Maryland DUI Attorney ~ will work. Maryland DUI is broader yet, and therefore is a better seed word, while both will very likely produce all relevant potential keywords.
Reduce irrlevant search terms using the positive/negative keywords at the screen where you generate the keywords, and you can also filter keywords for insufficient volume, and Adwords CPC. Notice how small changes in plurals or synonyms makes a vast difference in volume, (e.g., you would never know without doing this research that ~ Maryland DUI lawyer ~ has 50% less search volume than ~ Maryland DUI Attorneys.
I can't suggest a minimum search volume. That is to business specific. One search for a cancer research center may be worth tens of thousands per conversion, and justify going after smaller volume traffic search terms, while other small margin businesses will require larger volume to be profitable. You will have to be the judge of that. But in general you will be selecting the Strategic Search Terms with the most volume that are profitable (discussed next) with beatable compteition (discussed in Step 2).
Filter Your Results For Profitability
Microsoft has developed a theoretical profitability program for search terms called OCI (online commercial intent). Market Samurai will pull that data for you when you select the OCI option before analyzing the potential keywords. I find OCI results a lot less reliable compared to the available data on what advertisers are actually spending on the potential search terms.
Adwords CPC is that amount advertisers are actually spending on a cost-per-click basis and is a better indicator of whether the search term actually attracts customers who are ready, willing, and able to buy from you.
The higher the Adwords CPC for any given serch term, the more tested the serach term is for producing revenue.
Sort The Results By Profitability
Filter and delete all search terms irrelevant to your business, as well as all search terms with insufficient PHRASE volume for your business needs. Sort by the results by PHRASE volume (by clicking the search column header) for all remaining potential search terms, and download to a Excel spreadsheet using Market Samurai's download option.
In the spreadsheet create a column at the end of the data titled "PROFITABILITY". In that column multiply the PHRASE volume of each potential search term by the Adwords CPC for the same search term. Sort the data based on this new column in ascending order.
You will have prioritized all relevant potential search terms based on a combination of their volume and proven profitability. We are now ready to research the competition for the most profitable search terms in your business and make final selections for your Strategic Search Terms.
Strategic Search Terms are the result of research with which you will optimize your site for, and build backlinks with, for success in Google's search ranking for those terms.
I
highly
reccommend
the free keyword search tool Market Samurai.
All the necessary features used in this Guide to seo traffic
remain active
after
your 30 day trial, and you don't need to give them your credit card for
the trial.I recommend you spend some time with this tool and familiarize yourself with it, but not now. Finish the Guide and then go back and work through the recommended tools. You will use Market Samurai often and it will make a big difference in the profitability of your website.
I'm not going to give you a tutorial on how to use Market Samurai here. They'll do a much better job of that. But here is what you need to get from that tool - all the potential Strategic Search Terms highly relevant to your business, as well as the data from the following search options:
Recommended Market Samurai Settings
Organic: Adwords: Competition: Commerciality:
Total Searches Adwords CPC SEO Comp SEO Value
(min. 10 per day) Title Comp
Title/Comp
You have an option of retrieving BROAD | PHRASE | or EXACT volume data. I highly recommend you work with PHRASE volume. The difference is that BROAD volume is the search volume for every search containing either word. It returns the most volumous, but has little bearing on the traffic you will expect from a high ranking.
PHRASE returns the volume for every search using the exact phrase and is the most relevant volume for what you will actually rank for. EXACT is the search volume for when your keyword is searched for, not one character more, or less. EXACT volume data will underestimate what you will rank for when optimizing your Strategic Search Terms, while PHRASE will over estimated it, but is closest to traffic reality
You can set up a free Google Adwords account, give Market Samurai your log-in info and retrieve as many as 800 potential Strategic Search Terms.
You should have a good intuition about what keywords you will seed the program with. Be as general as possible, without including terms that are obviously too boad for your business. For example, if you are a DUI attorney in Maryland, don't search for just DUI. That will attract terms out of the geographical area of your business. Maryland DUI Attorney ~ will work. Maryland DUI is broader yet, and therefore is a better seed word, while both will very likely produce all relevant potential keywords.
Reduce irrlevant search terms using the positive/negative keywords at the screen where you generate the keywords, and you can also filter keywords for insufficient volume, and Adwords CPC. Notice how small changes in plurals or synonyms makes a vast difference in volume, (e.g., you would never know without doing this research that ~ Maryland DUI lawyer ~ has 50% less search volume than ~ Maryland DUI Attorneys.
I can't suggest a minimum search volume. That is to business specific. One search for a cancer research center may be worth tens of thousands per conversion, and justify going after smaller volume traffic search terms, while other small margin businesses will require larger volume to be profitable. You will have to be the judge of that. But in general you will be selecting the Strategic Search Terms with the most volume that are profitable (discussed next) with beatable compteition (discussed in Step 2).
Filter Your Results For Profitability
Microsoft has developed a theoretical profitability program for search terms called OCI (online commercial intent). Market Samurai will pull that data for you when you select the OCI option before analyzing the potential keywords. I find OCI results a lot less reliable compared to the available data on what advertisers are actually spending on the potential search terms.
Adwords CPC is that amount advertisers are actually spending on a cost-per-click basis and is a better indicator of whether the search term actually attracts customers who are ready, willing, and able to buy from you.
The higher the Adwords CPC for any given serch term, the more tested the serach term is for producing revenue.
Sort The Results By Profitability
Filter and delete all search terms irrelevant to your business, as well as all search terms with insufficient PHRASE volume for your business needs. Sort by the results by PHRASE volume (by clicking the search column header) for all remaining potential search terms, and download to a Excel spreadsheet using Market Samurai's download option.
In the spreadsheet create a column at the end of the data titled "PROFITABILITY". In that column multiply the PHRASE volume of each potential search term by the Adwords CPC for the same search term. Sort the data based on this new column in ascending order.
You will have prioritized all relevant potential search terms based on a combination of their volume and proven profitability. We are now ready to research the competition for the most profitable search terms in your business and make final selections for your Strategic Search Terms.
