Thursday 10 March 2016

How to choose keywords to target right audience


Keywords play an important role in the search engine optimization. They not only help you rank higher in search engine results but also help you reach out to the right audience. You can significantly improve the performance of your website by choosing right keywords for your content.

However, to make the best use of keywords you will have to choose right keywords for your blog post. If you are looking for basic information such as how to use keywords in an article, I would suggest you to first read my article 8 things you must know about keyword SEO.

This article will focus on how to choose keywords to target the right audience. Keywords are of different types and you can use them to target people looking for specific information. The first thing that you to need to understand is how people search things on the web.

To choose keywords first understand how your target audience searches things


People use different words, phrases, and sentence structure to search same things on the search engines. The education level, geographical location, age and language of the people play an important role in determining their search habits.

A native speaker of English might use different terms to search the same thing. For example, if a native speaker of English is searching for article writing tips, he or she might write “How to write an article” or ‘content writing tips’. On the other hand, a non-native speaker of English might use different terms to search the same thing on the net such as “tips to write an article in English”. 

Such differences can significantly influence the search results. The Google Keyword planner also suggest keywords with different keyword phrases in a different category.

Similarly, if a person is looking for in-depth knowledge about a subject he will use different terms. For example, how to write SEO content.

A person looking for specific information might use popular terms of the industry rather than random words. For example, an experienced blogger is most likely to use the term such as how to improve audience engagement rather than how to make audience spend more time on a blog.
Although, both the keyword terms intend to get the same information, the keyword phrases significantly influence the search results.

In 2004 Google started using LSI indexing which focuses on the intent of the users rather than the actual keywords a user use to find information. This type of indexing has improved significantly over the years. It not only prevants keyword stuffing but also help users get desired results. 

However, despite same intent sometimes the keyword phrases significantly changes the ranking of the sites in search results. Thus, the keywords still play an important role in the search results and a slight variation can influence the search results. 

How to determine which keyword or keyword phrases to be used in an article


You can easily choose right keywords for your article by first identifying your audience. If you know how your audiences search information on the web, you can target those keywords to rank higher in search results.

If you are planning to target people looking for specific information, you can use the terms most popular in your industry. Moreover, Google Adword Keyword planner can suggest you several industry-related popular keywords or phrases.


However, you will also be required to understand why a person is looking for specific information. By understanding the words, grammar and structure of their sentence you can get an idea about the education level, occupation, and age of the audience.

For example, a small business owner might use this type of sentence “how to keep your customer happy” rather than how to retain or attract customer. On the other hand, a student of business management or a corporate business manager will use something like this “how to improve customer retention” or “how to retain customers” or best customer retention strategy.

So if your targeted audience is corporate businesses you must use the keywords they use to search things. Similarly, if your targeted audience is small business owners you must use the language they use to search things on the web.

Always remember even if your content appears on the first page of search engine for wrong keywords you will not be able to monetize your blog successfully despite a significant increase in blog traffic.

Identify the keywords your competitors are using


One of the best ways to identify the right keyword is to see the search engine results using targeted keyword. Simply enter the keyword (you are planning to use) in the search engines and check out the results. If your post is related to the search results you can use the keyword in your article.


Tools that can help you find right keywords


Google trends tools help you find trending topics. You can use this tool to gain insight into trending topics, and their popularity over the course of time. Moreover, Google trends help you understand how popular a topic is in different regions of the world. If you want to target a specific country or region you can use this tool to understand trends. In other words, Google trends help you understand topic interest over time, regional interest, and related searches.

To identify your audience search habits you can use Google Keyword Planner. This tool will help you understand the keywords people mostly use to search things on the web.

Google Search Console is an excellent tool to identify the keywords your website rank for in the search results. Search analytics provides you in-depth insight into the performance of your pages in the search results.

You can also use Google Analytics to understand the behavior of your targeted audience and how they use your pages. If you have monetized your blog, you will also be able to understand how effective your page is in terms of conversions.

If your page is appearing in the search results for wrong keywords, you are most likely to experience high bounce rate, low audience engagement, and conversion rates.

Conclusion: you can significantly improve the performance of your blog by using right keywords. Irrelevant keywords cannot help you appear high in the search engine results. 

Keywords that are related to your content can significantly improve audience engagement, bounce rate and conversion rates of your site. Therefore, it is important to search and add right keywords that can help you reach out to your targeted audience.

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