Archive for the ‘Keyword Research’ Category

In my preview post for SES Toronto, I counted John Alexander’s Keyword Forensics session as one of my “Must See” presentations for the 2011 conference. The promise of really digging down into keyword discovery and keyword analysis techniques sounded far too good to pass up. After all, keyword research is an essential part of any SEO process.

The session starts with an inspiring quote on the projector “Keyword Forensics – Exploring the Hidden User Search Behavior for Keywords That Are Often Missed by Keyword Researchers.”

I research keywords!  What am I missing?

Here are some good nuggets from the presentation:

Understand the Difference Between Keyword Research vs. Keyword Forensics

Keyword Research: Researching identified keywords to determine which phrases will provide the most search traffic.

Keyword Forensics: Discovering keyword variations associated with a root word.  According to Alexander, keyword forensics does not begin with any assumptions.  The purpose is to uncover how people search.

Exploring User Behavior

Challenge: One of the challenges one encounters when researching user behavior for most people is the need to lose the “keyword hunt mindset”.  The more you tend to guess at the most logical keywords, the less likely you are to find exactly what phrases people are actually searching.

Solution: Don’t guess or assume search phrases.  Uncover popular keyword phrases in tools like Wordtracker by entering a root word and discovering how that word is most often being used.  For example, entering the root word “buy” will produce variations like “What do people buy?”

Wordtracker 101

Wordtracker is Alexander’s weapon of choice for keyword forensics. Here’s a little Wordtracker 101.

First, enter a root word into the search query. Second, sort by KEI and consider the following:

Keyword Effectiveness (KEI):  The higher the number here, the better. Use this metric to identify popular keyword phrases with little competition.

In Anchor and Title: Count of the number of pages for which the exact keyword phrase appears in both the title tag and as anchor text on the page. This metric gives you an understanding of what kind of keyword focused content needs to be generated to achieve a quality search engine rank.

Think Laterally About Behavior

A person searching for baby names=diaper purchasing prospect. A brand doesn’t need to sell baby names (although that would be an interesting business model!)  in order to provide relevant content. Imagine a diaper company that aggregates all common and uncommon baby names on one site. People searching for baby names, i.e. likely parents to-be, will be introduced to the brand in an organic manner. The diaper brand can then provide special offers or relevant links to visitors so they can learn more about the products or receive discounted pricing.

To wrap up the session in a nutshell, Alexander takes a very creative approach to keyword discovery and encourages others to do the same.  Put even more succinctly, SEOs should discover keywords and not assume them. If you’re in need, here’s a list of keyword research tools you might find useful.

Stay tuned for more posts from SES Toronto. Follow @TopRank and #sesto on Twitter for real time updates.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2011. |
SES Toronto: Keyword Forensics | http://www.toprankblog.com

In my preview post for SES Toronto, I counted John Alexander’s Keyword Forensics session as one of my “Must See” presentations for the 2011 conference. The promise of really digging down into keyword discovery and keyword analysis techniques sounded far too good to pass up. After all, keyword research is an essential part of any SEO process.

The session starts with an inspiring quote on the projector “Keyword Forensics – Exploring the Hidden User Search Behavior for Keywords That Are Often Missed by Keyword Researchers.”

I research keywords!  What am I missing?

Here are some good nuggets from the presentation:

Understand the Difference Between Keyword Research vs. Keyword Forensics

Keyword Research: Researching identified keywords to determine which phrases will provide the most search traffic.

Keyword Forensics: Discovering keyword variations associated with a root word.  According to Alexander, keyword forensics does not begin with any assumptions.  The purpose is to uncover how people search.

Exploring User Behavior

Challenge: One of the challenges one encounters when researching user behavior for most people is the need to lose the “keyword hunt mindset”.  The more you tend to guess at the most logical keywords, the less likely you are to find exactly what phrases people are actually searching.

Solution: Don’t guess or assume search phrases.  Uncover popular keyword phrases in tools like Wordtracker by entering a root word and discovering how that word is most often being used.  For example, entering the root word “buy” will produce variations like “What do people buy?”

Wordtracker 101

Wordtracker is Alexander’s weapon of choice for keyword forensics. Here’s a little Wordtracker 101.

First, enter a root word into the search query. Second, sort by KEI and consider the following:

Keyword Effectiveness (KEI):  The higher the number here, the better. Use this metric to identify popular keyword phrases with little competition.

In Anchor and Title: Count of the number of pages for which the exact keyword phrase appears in both the title tag and as anchor text on the page. This metric gives you an understanding of what kind of keyword focused content needs to be generated to achieve a quality search engine rank.

Think Laterally About Behavior

A person searching for baby names=diaper purchasing prospect. A brand doesn’t need to sell baby names (although that would be an interesting business model!)  in order to provide relevant content. Imagine a diaper company that aggregates all common and uncommon baby names on one site. People searching for baby names, i.e. likely parents to-be, will be introduced to the brand in an organic manner. The diaper brand can then provide special offers or relevant links to visitors so they can learn more about the products or receive discounted pricing.

To wrap up the session in a nutshell, Alexander takes a very creative approach to keyword discovery and encourages others to do the same.  Put even more succinctly, SEOs should discover keywords and not assume them. If you’re in need, here’s a list of keyword research tools you might find useful.

Stay tuned for more posts from SES Toronto. Follow @TopRank and #sesto on Twitter for real time updates.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2011. |
SES Toronto: Keyword Forensics | http://www.toprankblog.com

If you’re wondering, “Who’s Brian Larson?”, you’re not alone. Before I jump into the details of some of the can’t miss sessions at the upcoming SES Toronto conference, I’ll borrow a line from Austin Powers: “Please allow myself to introduce…myself.”

I’m a SEO Account Manager at TopRank Online Marketing – which means I have the enviable job of developing and managing SEO programs for several TopRank clients. One of the many benefits of my job is that I have the opportunity to work daily with some of the most intelligent and forward thinking companies around (you know who you are).  As I head to SES Toronto, I go with my clients’ goals and needs at the front of my mind.

Now that I’m not a complete stranger, let’s get on to the good stuff.  SES Toronto is just around the corner and it’s time to start making the difficult decisions surrounding which sessions to attend.  Here are my 4 “Can’t Miss Sessions” for this year’s SES Toronto conference:

1) Content Marketing Optimization

This is a no brainer.  Although there are numerous SEO strategies, good content marketing is the engine that drives a successful online marketing program.  TopRank CEO Lee Odden (I call him “boss”) leads a presentation on unlocking the SEO potential of a brand’s content.   In the session, Lee will offer insight into how companies can elevate their content-based optimization strategies and increase process efficiencies for content creation and promotion.

My TopRank Account Manager Take: Content development and promotion is core to our work.  The minute I stop proactively looking for ways to elevate our approach to content marketing is the minute our content begins to lose its relevancy.

If you listened to Lee speak before, you know you will walk away with a ton of ideas.  If you haven’t heard Lee speak, you really should.

2) Keyword Forensics

Cleverly titled, this session seems to have the meat to support such a promising name. John Alexander, of SearchEngineWorkshops.com and Search Engine Academy, will focus the session on uncovering keyword variations overlooked by most Webmasters. Alexander also promises to dive into the hidden behavioral trends of different search personas. Understanding these trends will help determine what search results are REALLY most valued by your target audiences.

My TopRank Account Manager Take: This session immediately piqued my interest because I personally view the selection of keywords as the make or break point for a SEO program.  Why?  Keywords dictate strategies and tactics.  Keywords also represent different persona and audience needs.

To start a program with the wrong keywords is akin to heading north to go south=it’s not going to work out well.

3) Competitive Analysis

Search strategies cannot be developed in a vacuum.  Analyzing the competitive landscape and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of the competition is key to the development of a successful SEO program.  In Competitive Analysis, Chris Boggs moderates a panel discussion on assessing the competition to:

• determine link acquisition opportunities
• discover untapped types of content
• identify competitive keywords/identifying non-competitive keywords
• uncover avg. ad spend

My TopRank Account Manager Take: There are literally too many tools for surveying and analyzing online marketing competition.  The problem is that when one stops to consider all these options, it can likely turn into the classic: paralysis by analysis.

When a panel of pros meets to share the tools they use to assess the competition, I’m all ears.

4) Killer Facebook Targeting Tactics

As Facebook continues to evolve at an impressive rate, so too do the online marketing opportunities within this 700+ million member social network.  From Facebook Ads to Fan Pages, and Sponsored Stories to Groups; options to target and engages audiences are abound.   Marty Weintraub, President of aimClear, another fine Internet Marketing agency from Minnesota, hosts this Facebook targeting session, with a focus on reviewing some of the most successful Facebook marketing campaigns to identify their common characteristics.

My TopRank Account Manager Take: Too often companies view the success of their social media efforts in terms of Fans, Friends and Followers instead of affecting business outcomes.

The fatal flaw for many companies is the assumption that audiences can’t engage and transact with a brand through their social channels – that those interactions must happen on a corporate website.  Facebook may be the leader in providing companies with a variety of ways to create a rich user experience for their audience.  I can’t wait for this one.

Of course I’ll be sitting in on more sessions than 4, but these are my core.  Both Lee and I will be liveblogging sessions so be sure to watch for the #SESTO hash tag on Twitter, our Facebook page or just come back to Online Marketing Blog.

If you’re new to SES conference, I’d recommend reading this helpful post on how to get the most out of marketing conferences.

Here are the conference details:

SES Toronto
June 13-15, 2011
Hyatt Regency Toronto

There’s a 20% discount for TopRank Online Marketing Blog readers – just use the discount code: TRB20.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2011. |
4 Must See Social Media & SEO Sessions at SES Toronto | http://www.toprankblog.com