Keywords: are you missing the magic words for your web site?

Overview: if you have started investigating ways of increasing your web site's visitor numbers then you may have discovered 'keywords', magic words that can miraculously attract more visitors to your site. And, to keep you on your toes, this term actually has at least two distinct meanings.

The first keyword is a type of 'Meta tag' - hidden text within a web page that may boost its ranking in search engine results. Find out if this type of keyword magic actually works in my article on 'meta tag myths'.

The second (and more important) type of keyword describes the words that people are typing in to search engines in order to find web sites like yours. If you pick the right words then you have the opportunity to catch the attention of everyone searching on those words. In fact, key words could more accurately be called 'key phrases' since searchers usually end up entering 2 or 3 words in order to narrow down the results.

For example: someone wanting to learn more about restaurants in my area might search for 'harrow restaurants' or 'north west london restaurants' or 'eating out in middlesex' and so on. These could all be important keywords for a Harrow restaurateur, although not for one based in Brighton.

If there are several Harrow restaurant sites listed in the search results then they are competing with each other to get to the top of those lists and improve their visibility to potential visitors. What makes the difference is how effectively they incorporate those keywords into their web pages (paid-for placements also make a difference in some situations, and I'll cover that in a future article).

However, there is no point being number one in a list of results for keywords that no-one is actually ever going to search on. So, to bring visitors to your site, you have to focus your attention on popular keywords that real people are regularly typing into search engines. Fortunately, there are services that keep track of the actual phrases that people are typing into search engines.

Articles intro

Web design briefing
How visitors find you
Keywords
Domain names
Content
Home page etiquette
Keep your site legal
Get listed
Search engine optimisation
Link popularity
Meta tag myths
Web page titles
Traffic building
Visitor analysis

How to choose keywords for your web site:

Draw up a long list of potential keywords: use brainstorming and do some research. Ask existing clients what phrases they might use to find web sites like yours. If you have the resources, actually sit at a computer with them and give them the task of trying to find similar sites. Take note of the phrases that they use.
Add any relevant general words: searchers often narrow down their search by adding specific regions (E.g. Europe, UK or London) or descriptive words such as 'free'.
Identify popular keywords: which words on your list are actually being searched for by real people, and how often? Use a service such as WordTracker to do your own research or hire a consultant to do it for you.
Identify how much competition there is for those keywords: either try searching on those phrases yourself and see how many results you get, or, again, use a tool like WordTracker.
Choose 2 or 3 popular phrases that are relevant to each of the main pages in your site. For example, choose different keywords for the home page than the job vacancies page. Bear in mind that it may be easier to get good results from phrases that have less competition.

Next step - optimisation:

Search engine optimisation (SEO, or keyword optimisation, as it's sometimes called) is the process of adapting web pages so that they will appear as high up in the list of search results as possible. Most users don't look beyond the third page of results so your pages have to be in the top 30 and ideally in the top 10 results for your targeted keywords.

I'll be writing more about what this involves in future articles, and, in case you're getting worried, it doesn't necessarily mean big changes to your web site. Sometimes all that's required are a few changes to the text. In the meantime, you'll find my articles on writing engaging titles and meta tag myths are both relevant.

If you are starting a new site then it pays to identify your keywords early on so that your web designer and copy writer can build them into the design.

More info:

Check out the Webpronews article on 'Keyword research - getting started'.

Also try the Search Engine Guide on 'Finding keywords that drive traffic to your site' and 'How To Integrate Keywords Into Your Web Site Copy'.

If you are interested in doing your own search term research then try out the industry standard tool, WordTracker.

Read Search Engine Optimization consultant, Jill Whalen, on 'making key phrases work for your site and the search engines'.


	Remember: if you want to attract visitors to your web site then you have to find the magic words (and, for once, they aren't 'please' and 'thank you'). Finding relevant, popular keywords is the first step to improving your web site's visibility in search engine results, and its chances of attracting significant numbers of visitors.
	07 January 2003, new links added 12 July 2004.

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