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Your website is one of the most important tools for your business. With it, you can answer customer questions, drive in new leads, and build your audience. That's why it's not enough to just add content to your website, you need to add the right content. Keywords are the way to make sure you are driving the crowd most likely to convert into customers.
Creating a list of keywords is only half of the battle, though. Strategically incorporating your keywords, reviewing long-tail keywords, and understanding semantic search help in optimizing content for higher search rankings.
Keyword optimization is more than just throwing a bunch of words relevant to your business on a page. Your team should be creating relevant content that provides real value to your audience and accurately answers their search queries. They should seamlessly appear in ways your audience can't detect. Understanding how your pages perform can help you adjust keywords and keyword variations to bring you the best result.
When optimizing your content, there are a few places you should look to first. These are key areas that your selected words should appear, ensuring you pin your site to the top of the search engine results page.
It's not enough to focus on one keyword, though. Too much of that and you'll get docked for keyword stuffing, ultimately hurting your site more than helping it. To combat that, make sure to incorporate long-tail keywords in your content as well. Rather than focusing on one or two specific words, long-tail keywords add more dimension and detail to your content - helping to narrow the audience down to who you can help.
Long-tail keywords often have less competition than your run of the mill keywords, assisting in boosting your rankings. A good mix of keywords and long-tail keywords gives you the variation that makes reviewing your content enjoyable for the reader, while diversifying your content enough to drive in the right leads.
To better understand, let's use a boutique as an example. Their main keyword may be "clothing," a word with lots of competition that doesn't necessarily garner the right audience. Some long-tail keywords they could use that would benefit their SEO strategy include: "women's small summer dresses"; "vegan leather women's footwear" or "checkered dress pant for women".
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While keywords and long-tail keywords are a crucial component to any SEO strategy, it's important to note that Google has gotten increasingly more attuned to the way users search. Through all the iterations of Google updates, each new wave was a step in further understanding what someone is looking for. Most of us don't search the way we would ask a question, but rather input short snippets of words and hope Google knows what we mean, and often it does. This is called semantic search.
Semantic search thinks through the user's intent as well as the semantic meaning of the terms used in the query. Basically, searching isn't just about what words you put in the search bar, but what you're trying to get out of the search from that combination of words. Google is sophisticated enough to dissect that all within a few seconds.
For example, if someone was looking for the newest Tom Holland movie, they wouldn't open up their browser to search, "What's the name of the new Tom Holland movie that just came out?" rather, the query could look something like "Tom Holland new movie." Odds are, in the top search results, an IMDB listing will show all the details of the newly released film.
Although the title of that page is not "new Tom Holland movie" but rather "Every new Tom Holland Movie" or "Chaos Walking" Google understands that the user is searching for details on the movie, and also understands timelines against the current date, to pull the answer that makes the most sense.
Tools like HubSpot make search engine optimization and ranking for your keywords easier than you would think. By providing an array of tools, HubSpot helps guide brands to optimize pages and offers suggestions you may not have previously considered. By using a similar software, you can learn how you can improve your keyword rankings and what other keywords your brand should explore.
By working your keywords into your content throughout various locations seamlessly, you'll be well on your way to a successful SEO strategy. SEO, however, is not an instant fix. It can take weeks and months to really see an improvement.
The Modern Driven Media team has expertise in keyword research, blog writing, SEO strategies, and website design. For assistance with your website optimization, contact us.
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