What are Keywords

We build web sites for a purpose, such as to sell a product or service. We use search engines to find those products and services typically by entering keywords and key phrases into the search engine search box. Keep in mind that all search terms entered into the search engine search box are recorded and saved for future reference.

If I want to buy a bird feeder for my backyard, I would probably go to my favorite search engine and enter a search term such as "bird feeder". Because of the generic nature of my search I will get back a huge list of results. I might get lucky and see a few of the major players in the list that also sell bird feeders, i.e., Amazon, Ebay, etc. However, what I might be interested in is a more unique bird feeder such as for a specific bird like a Mourning Dove, or possibly a squirrel proof bird feeder. So, its back to my favorite search engine to search but this time using a more targeted phrase like "bird feeder for mourning dove" or "squirrel proof bird feeder". Likely, my list of results will be more manageable and I'll have a list that I can use to do some comparison shopping.

If I want to build a new web site for a client that sells bird feeders, the very first step I want to take is to gain access to all the saved search terms and phrases that people use to find bird feeders. To get access to this information I need to use a keyword research tool, which has access not only to the search terms but information about how many times a particular search term has been used (frequency). I would also like to know about all the variations of related search terms used to find my client's product or service. If I build my client's site around the wrong set of search terms then no one will ever find the products when searching with the target keywords and phrases.

Every web site must be built around the proper set of keywords and phrases. A keyword or key phrase, then, is really nothing more than the words entered into search engines to find specific products and services. When you use search terms that are appropriate in your website's pages, search engines know what your pages are about and can index them properly under the correct search terms. If you don't use search terms that are appropriate then the best you can hope for is that the search engines will guess right about what your selling, which is a very risky proposition at best.

When I build my client's site, I have to make sure that the correct keywords and phrases occur in the content of the page at strategic positions. Some strategic positions for these keywords and phrases are the browser title, h1 and h2 tags, as the subject of the paragraph at the beginning of the content, subject of the paragraph at the end of the content, and as anchor text from some of the internal pages. I'll also want to get some external sites to link to my client's site using the keyword or phrase that I'm targeting. When others search for my client's products or services, I should expect them to find my client's products because I've optimized the pages around the appropriate keywords and phrases.

There are popular and generic keywords such as "bird feeder" and there are more specific keywords such as "squirrel proof bird feeder", often referred to as "long tail" search terms (contains more than 2 or 3 words). Optimizing pages for generic keywords with lots of traffic is futile because it is likely my client will never be able to compete for the keywords. On the other hand, if I optimize my client's site for more specific terms with less traffic, then my client will likely find a new customer...and that's really why we build sites in the first place.