A 'How-To' Guide to Keyword Research

You could smash out the best blogs and landing pages for your business, but if you don’t include keywords that are specific to your topic, your content won’t rank on search engines and reach your target audience. Keyword research identifies and analyses search terms entered into search engines for your Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Search Engine Marketing (SEM), and overall content marketing strategy.

In this blog, we leap into the world of SEO and give you a ‘How-To’ guide on how to conduct keyword research for successful content marketing campaigns in 2022.

3 Main Elements of Keyword Research

1. Relevance

Google combs through page after page of content and ranks them based on how relevant they are to their topic. Your content will only rank for the keyword you’re targeting if there is search intent behind it - and if someone searches that particular keyword, your content stands a good chance of making an impression on Google’s search engine results page (SERP). If you want your content to appear higher up, it needs to be of high quality and offer more value to your audience than your competitor’s pages.

2. Authority

Google will only direct readers to content that holds authority on the topic - so content creators need to provide helpful and valuable content using backlinks and social media to promote it to the world.

3. Volume

If you’re ranking numero uno for a keyword that no one is searching for, you can say goodbye to any inbound traffic to your website. The volume of search terms and queries are measured on a Monthly Search Volume (MSV) and refers to how often users around the world search for that specific keyword in a month.

5 Steps to Conduct Keyword Research

1. List the Topics that are Most Relevant and Important to YOUR CUSTOMERS (not just your Business)

Brainstorm generic topics about your business, and your products and services. This should allow you to come up with 5 to 10 categories you’d want to rank for. Now put yourself in the shoes of the buyer and think of the topics they would actually search for when trying to solve their problems.

Let’s take Hype & Dexter for example - these are the services we’d want to rank for:

• • • • • • Digital Transformation
          • Digital Marketing
          • CRM Solutions
          • Websites & CMS
            
            

We'll identify the terms customers might use in their searches in step two.

2. Jot Down Keywords That Relate to their Topic Category

Narrow it down to a few categories and write a list of keywords that correspond to them. Since your customers will most likely search up niche terms, jot down as many keyword phrases (long-tail keywords) you think your target audience will search for on Google. Use your preferred SEO keyword tool (we'll discuss these in step 5) to identify keywords that your audience is searching for to get to your website.

Taking our service' Digital transformation', it's too broad and people researching problems that could be solved by this service would ask questions about it first, before deciding it was the right solution. So a few keyword phrases we’d look to target are:

• • • • • • Cost of digital transformation
          • What is digital transformation
          • Benefits of digital transformation
            
            

3. Understand Search Intent

To turn a prospect into a customer, your content needs to offer value that beats your competitors and other search results on Google. It isn’t just about having the right keywords to draw them into your website, it needs to give them the answers they need. Understanding the user intent of your keywords by reading through the search results on the first page will help you structure your content in a way that’s of value.

4. Research Other Related Search Terms

If you’re stuck on coming up with new topics, a good place to start is by looking at other search terms related to your specific keyword or topic. You can typically find these under a search result on Google once you click on it and exit out of the webpage, as well as at the bottom of the SERPs. Whenever you type in something into Google, it comes up with suggested phrases to complete your search, which can also spark other keywords or ideas for your business to target.

5. Use Keyword Research Tools

Thanks to the various SEO tools available today, you can see the monthly search volumes (MSV) of the search terms people are looking for - and come up with more ideas based on exact matched keywords and long-tail keyword phrases.

Here are a few exceptional SEO tools you can use to boost your marketing strategy:

• • • • • • Google Keyword Planner
          • HubSpot SEO Tool
          • SEMrush
          • Ahrefs
          • UberSuggest
            
            

With these 5 tips on how to do keyword research, you’re on the right track to making your content rank on Google and being of value to your target audience.

If content marketing is an area you want to explore, get in touch with Hype & Dexter today. We’re experts in taking small or big businesses into the digital space and love to see them thrive with the latest technology. So if you’re looking for help with your content marketing efforts, or anything digital for that matter, H&D is the place to be.