How To Carry Out Good Keyword Research
Hi, I know we have already done an article on the importance of keyword research, but until you actually sit down to do it, you will be unaware of what a headache it can be ! Ok so in this exercise I used the search term ” cash flow ” with Google’s keyword tool, so just out of curiosity, lets assume YOU are going to optimize a page for the term “cash flow” just jot down on a piece of paper what you think may be 5 good keywords to use..?
Ok lets proceed, I have done my search with Google’s keyword tool & here is my result;
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Now this is what I mean by a headache, it is just a mass of jumbled words & figures & is likely to blow the mind of anyone that is new to keywords optimization & research. But hang on a moment whilst I show you how to access & deal with this data in a much more convenient way. Now please bear in mind that the image above only shows a small sample of the results that Google threw up, in fact there were 150 keywords + an additional 50 to be considered. So in total we have 200 keywords related to the phrase “Cash Flow” and at a rate of 25 to a page, that means trying to sort out data on 8 pages! Now is that a headache or what…?
Ok so assuming you have Microsoft Excel on your PC, we will use this program to help make more sense of the data we now have on the screen.
Steps To Follow
1.Now you have just done a search & the results are displayed on your screen as in the image above, scroll down the page until you reach;
| Add all 150 » | ||||||||
| Download all keywords: text, .csv (for excel), .csv |
Then select ” .csv (for excel) ” this allows you to download and save to your PC in a format that Excel will accept.
2.Once you have the file saved on your PC double click on it and it will automatically open Excel (assuming of course that it is installed), in fact if you do not have Microsoft’s Office package, then it should also work with ” Open Office ” which is free to download from the Internet.
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3.You should now see the above image, or something very similar and quite obviously the first task is to re-size the columns A, B, C & D, so select Format from the menu at the top & then select Columns & auto width from the drop down menu.
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4.The result you get should be what is shown above, all columns are now readable however the data is still not ordered in anyway what so ever. Now select column B only, so the whole of column B is highlighted, then select Data from the menu at the top & then select sort, expand selection & descending, all in that order. This action will sort all the data based on competition only. Having completed this step & whilst column B is still highlighted, select Format again & this time select Cells, when the panel opens look through the list on the left and select ” Percentage ” this will now change the decimal numbers into a percentage of competition, which I think makes much more sense as ” 1 ” now becomes ” 100% “.
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5. Hopefully if all has gone to plan, you should now have a similar image to the one above…? Anyone can clearly see & read the relevant data & would have no difficulty in doing comparisons, which my friends is exactly what YOU will do in order to select good quality keywords & Phrases.
6. There is however one final step that I take, but this is entirely optional. I will usually choose 53% as the amount of competition I wish to deal with and all entries above 53% are deleted, I will then re-sort the data based on column ” D ” which is global monthly search volume. I can then very easily see which keywords are producing the highest search volume per month & I do not need to concern myself with comparing the competition figures as I have already selected only 53% & below.
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This final image now shows selected keywords using the highlight facility on the menu bar, the 5 keywords selected are by no means the highest for global monthly search, although they do give a combined monthly search volume of 24,600 , which for one page on a new website / blog is quite acceptable. The methods used in order to arrive at these 5 selections is detailed below;
1. The Amount of competition.
2. The amount of Global monthly search volume.
3. Whether or not I can easily include the keyword into the page copy without detracting from the original theme or subject.
There now that was not too difficult I hope..? If you make a habit of using this method for keyword research, you will soon get the hang off it & in so doing should have no trouble in increasing your website traffic. Oh and of the keywords that I highlighted..? How many matched what you had jotted down earlier..? This then should prove the importance & relevance of good keyword research.
If you have any questions relating to this article then please feel free to use the comment box below.
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dear i am agree with your tips butt it is not enough for keyword research field . you writh tips about that keywords which google have but its my humble request to you dear writ more helpful tips about how we can genrate new keywords and how we can research less competion keywords and products . i hope you know better then what i am saying about thanks
Dear Nokia,
If you had looked closely at the bottom of the article, you would have clearly seen 5 more articles related to the same subject of Keywords & Optimization.