Whether developing a keyword strategy for a sponsored campaign or for an SEO initiative, when researching your keyword options most people place a strong emphasis on search volume. It makes sense as you want to optimize your ads or your web pages for key phrases that are searched for more often, but should search volume be the defining reason as to why you select one keyword over another? The thing with search volume is that the numbers that have been communicated in the past are not necessarily accurate. The search engines do not release search volume numbers save MSN and who knows if these numbers are even accurate. Not to mention the fact that search volumes change. So why then do we depend so much on search volume? Should we be?

Ranking for a term that has no search volume just does not make sense. Or does it? You see buzz words frequently change, so just because a term that you rank well for today is not being searched for by the masses does not mean that it won't be a phrase that is searched for by many in the future. You mean to tell me that terms such as "social media marketing" or "video optimization" were being searched for 10 years ago? Highly unlikely and if they were, the volume was no where near where it is today. It just goes to show that there is more to a keyword analysis then just search volume.

In the past, using keyword research tools such as Wordtracker and formerly the Overture Search Term Suggestion tool, we were able to see estimated search volumes for phrases in a given time period. Naturally SEOs and website optimizers gravitated towards the phrases that had the highest search volumes. Think of these of the "head" phrases that were more general in nature and consisted of a single word. Phrases such as "insurance" come to mind. So of course you have all of these sites optimizing for insurance, which in turn waters down the search results. I don't know about you, but when I perform a search for something like "insurance", I expect to see sites like AIG, StateFarm, Geico, AllState, Met Life and the like show up. I don't necessarily see all of these sites showing up. The fact of the matter is that relevancy should count shouldn't it? Even with well optimized sites, shouldn't relevancy be the determining factor as to what site ranks for a given key phrase? I don't really want to see a Wikipedia listing for every query that I do. Getting back to our discussion on search volume, it is these head phrases (such as insurance) that tend to have the highest search volume. So we should include these "head" phrases in our keyword baskets? Well the answer is, it depends...

High Search Volume Does Not Equal High Quality Traffic

When we look at reasons why certain phrases have higher search volumes than others, there are two important factors that come to mind:

1. General / "Head" Type Queries are more simple in Nature - people are lazy in their search habits. Well to a point. As they become more educated about a topic of interest, they will perform more intelligent search queries. Someone interested in insurance may simply perform a search for the single word "insurance". As they become more search savvy, they may perform additional, secondary searches for terms such as "motorcycle insurance". As they go through the process their searches continue to get refined until they are searching for more long tail phrases (motorcycle insurance in Seattle). The thing is that the general-type searches will generate more search volume simply because most people will begin their search with these types of phrases until they become better educated about the subject matter that they are searching on. These general-type queries, while generating more volume, will be less qualified until the searcher becomes more educated.
   
   
2. Timing - buzzwords are hot and will have more volume associated with them during their time of popularity. You can bet that the search volume for "Britney Spears" in 1998 before she gained fame and fortune was considerably lower than in 2002 when she was at the pinnacle of her career. Fast forward to 2008 and the search volume may be even higher will all of the singer's controversy. Timing of buzz has a direct impact on search volume.

There's More to Keyword Research than Search Volume

It's true higher search volume will drive more traffic to your site. However in this day and age, unless you are an infant site just starting out, you would be better served to be concerned about quality traffic than overall traffic volume. So then how do you determine which keywords you should focus on? I'll speak to this from an organic (SEO) perspective. There are three main factors that you should focus on when doing your keyword research:

1. Relevancy - First, ensure that your keyword basket is filled with keywords that are relevant to your business and to your website.
   
   
2. Competitiveness / Ability to Rank For - How competitive are the key phrases that you are researching? Does your site have the ability to rank for these phrases? If the keywords are hyper-competitive, do you really think that you will be able to rank for them? You might want to develop a long-tail keyword strategy instead.
   
   
3. What Keywords are your Online Competitors Positioning For? - Which phrases are your competitors ranking for? This ties in with the relevancy factor. Although a keyword may have little or no search volume, if your competitors are optimizing and ranking for a key phrase relevant to your industry, you might want to do the same. If that term becomes a buzzword in the future and you are not yet ranking for it, you may have missed an opportunity to intercept some of the traffic for that term. Pay attention to what keywords your online competitors are focusing on.

Now I don't want to suggest that search volume is not an important factor when you are doing keyword research. The fact of the matter is that it is important. It's just that search volume alone is not what your keyword research should be based on. An effective organic/SEO keyword strategy should be scalable and include terms that may not have the volume or flare today, but have the relevancy, ability to rank for and popularity for tomorrow. Generating decent rankings and quality traffic from the search engines is hard work. Why not make it easier by continuing to do on-going keyword research and by optimizing your site for relevant keywords? Your boss with thank you in the future as your web properties gain qualified traffic and as a result produce more qualified leads and orders.

Labels: keyword research, keyword strategy, search volume

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Over the past 18 months or so there has been a real fascination with social networks. Not just for individuals, but for businesses and organizations, social networking questions are the topic of many a discussion. So it was only a matter of time until the major search engines would be looking at social networks as another service offering or advertising environment. In fact Microsoft even purchased a 1.5% stake in popular social network Facebook. Rumors were persisting that both Google and Yahoo were looking to enter the social networking game, in fact Yahoo even launched Kickstart an online social network that connects college students, grads and alumni.

Enter Google Friend Connect.... earlier today, Google announced a new endeavor that will allow website owners to make any site social. According to Google, "... Websites that are not social networks may still want to be social.." the result is Google Friend Connect. http://www.google.com/friendconnect (Interestingly enough the URL returned a broken link this morning.)

The project will allow site owners to insert social features to their websites that will help drive additional traffic to their site. Here's how it works. A website owner simply adds a snippet of code to their site to get social network features running on their website. They can select built-in functionality including things such as:

• user registration
• invitations
• message posting
• reviews
• third party applications available via Open Social
  

Once set up, visitors to the site who are using Google Friend Connect will be able to see, inviute and interact with new friends. In addition with authorization APIs, users will be able to interact with existing friends from Facebook, hi5, Orkut and Google Talk.

Judging from the initial response, many like what they are seeing with Google Friend Connect.

"We want to bring ourselves to every eyeball, not bring every eyeball to us," said Hadi Partovi, President of iLike. "Friend Connect is a significant opportunity for iLike, artists, and fans. The iLike Artist Dashboard™ will be the first content-management system that allows artists not only to post their songs, concerts, and videos to every leading social network from one dashboard, but also to simultaneously manage the content on their own websites."

What I like about Google Friend Connect is that it solves the issue of having to create a new login and password for each and every social network that I sign up for. In addition the fact that sites do not have to create and setup their own social network is great because I find that there are currently too many "irrelevant" social sites out there. Google Friend Connect can simply let sites become more social by allowing visitors to interact with one another. This could definitely work. I could see this becoming extremely populat a la forums and blogs.

Benefits of Google Friend Connect

• Ease of Setup - you don't have to be a programmer to set up Google Friend Connect
• Ease of Use - once set up, it's very easy to adjust and easy for visitors to start using.
  
• Social Networking without Starting a Social Network - you do not need to hire a team to plan out, set up and monitor your own social network. You can use social networking features on your own website without the hassle of setting up an actual social network.
• Increase User Interaction / Site Stickiness - talk about a great way to drive traffic to your site and have them stick around longer. Through the social network aspect people will let their friends know about your site (providing that they have had a positive experience on it)

Friend Connect will work with existing standards such as OpenID, OAuth, OpenSocial, as well as with data access APIs from Facebook, Google, and MySpace.

More details are to be released this evening at the Googleplex with their Campfire One session.

Labels: Google Friend Connect

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Would you believe that there are some business owners who are just now realizing the value of SEO? Yeah I know it amazes me too. However if you are one of those businesses or sites that recognized the value of SEO in the beginning than you are probably well on your way to online success. So then the question becomes what do you do when you have done everything that your can with SEO?

Think You Know Everything Think Again...

OK so you've optimized your title tags and on-page copy. You've interlinked your site pages. You've built up links to your web pages, then what? Where do you go with your SEO strategy once you have addressed all of the fundamentals? Well the answer is it depends. It depends on your site, it depends on your site goals, it depends on your business model. Just because you have optimized your meta tags, obtained some links to your pages and have developed content for your users, does not mean that the job is over.

An effective SEO strategy is on-going. You cannot rest on your past accomplishments in the online world. Try it and see what happens. You're bound to drop in rankings and may have a tough time getting them back. Competition in the real world is fierce, in the online world it is even worse. Competitor sites, blogs, forums and even social networks are popping up all over the place. While you may have done well with your SEO strategy in the past, you need to continuously refine it to enjoy success in the future. So if you feel like you have accomplished everything that you can with your SEO strategy, chances are you haven't.

Five Factors for Long Term SEO Success

1. Keyword Refinement - So long as search is based on keyword queries (which will be forever) you need to revisit your keyword baskets on a continual basis. Depending on how many keywords you need to focus on, you'll want to review your keywords every four to five months. Keyword research should be on-going.
   
   
2. Improve Quality of Links - Everyone thinks that you need to have thousands of links to do well in the search engines. Well the fact of the matter is, you just need to have a decent amount of quality links that help improve the relevancy of your website. Quality is more important than quantity. Improving the quality of your link inventory also needs to be on-going so long as search engines such as Google use a linking component in their algorithms.
   
   
3. Content Development - If you look at your site today, do you honestly think that you have the perfect site consisting of the perfect content that your audience is looking for? You would be naive if you answered yes. Fresh, informative content is what your site visitors are looking for. The competitive landscape of your industry changes, as a result your audience will be looking for product updates, pricing updates, recent industry statistics, and timely news to help them make a decision about purchasing your product or service. As part of an effective SEO strategy, you should be continuously be working on content for to satisfy the needs of your audience.
   
   
4. Plan for Change - Technology evolves at a staggering rate. What's hot today, will become dated in a hurry, sometimes even in months. As a result, you'll want to plan for change. Whether it will be for your next site redesign or simply for the launch of a blog or micro-site, part of your SEO strategy should be planning for change.
   
   
5. Determine/Allocate Budget for SEO - Many business plug the majority of their online budget into Sponsored campaigns. Remember that SEO can be a much more cost effective way of generating visibility and traffic to your site. Be sure to allocate budget for SEO and not just for paid advertising. Budget may be required to hire an additional person or team to manage your organic campaigns. SEO budget can also be used to hire an outside firm to help drive your SEO strategy and implement tactics needed for success.

Many suggest that search engine optimization is going the way of the Dodo, that SEO will soon be extinct. No that's not true SEO will simply evolve as will online marketing efforts. Maybe we won't call it SEO, but "search optimization" will always be there so long as advertisers work to understand their audience and their intent. Think you're finished with SEO? Think again.

Labels: B2B SEO Tips, search engine optimization

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I used to be a big fan of ASK.com. That is until a few weeks back when they decided that they were no longer going to compete as a true search engine and were going to attempt to focus on their main target demographic of middle aged women.

I liked ASK because they dared to be different. They have the best search engine results page in the business. The experience on an ASK SERP is unlike no other... that is until now. You have probably come across the posts about Yahoo India's "Glue Pages" where the interface looks striking similar to what you see on ASK.com. I performed a search for "Edmonton Oilers" and was returned with a pretty different result than I would expect to see from Yahoo. In the result I was presented with:

• Traditional Yahoo Search Results in the left column
• Yahoo News stories on the Edmonton Oilers
• A Quick-Facts Wikipedia listing for Edmonton Oilers
• Some related images
• A section form Yahoo Answers relating to the Edmonton Oilers
  

The breakdown of Glue Pages from Yahoo is as follows. Glue Pages unite your Classic Search Results with visual information from the best sites anywhere on the Web. For now, Glue Pages include images, videos, articles, and more all on one page! The goal of Glue Pages is to help you spend more time learning and less time searching. There are "Related Pages" which are Glue Pages that Yahoo thinks you might be interested in based on the topic of your search. Based on user intent, Yahoo is trying to provide you with a richer experience.

I think that it is pretty cool. I hope that they launch this with their main Yahoo search product. It will be great to take such as rich Search Results Page to the masses something that ASK failed to do. Try it yourself. I performed a number of different searches in hopes of receiving the "Glue Page" results. I searched for Google, Van Halen, Kiss, Mexican food, Toyota, Las Vegas, Iron Man and pizza just to see how the results varied with these new blended search results from Yahoo. I love the results. While relevancy will always need to be improved, the experience on a results page such as these Glue Pages is so much better than on a Google SERP and especially on a Microsoft/MSN/Windows Live Search SERP.

At the bottom of the page there is a link that you can click on to add your website to the Glue Page, it's as simple as and email that goes to: glue.publishers@yahoo.com

Hi Glue Team!

I'm interested in having my website published on a Yahoo! India Search Glue Page. Please contact me with more information.

My Name:

My Website:

Thanks!

For online marketers, it illustrates the need to optimize for blended search even more. You can expect Google to continue to increase their blended search efforts, ASK is already doing it and now Yahoo will be adding more blended search results through products such as the Yahoo Glue Pages. Glue is sticky and that is exactly what Yahoo is shooting for. they want you and I to spend more time using their search. Improving the SERP is a great start.

Labels: blended search, Yahoo Glue Page

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It's the eve of the semi-finals in the quest for the Stanley Cup. It started with 30 NHL teams and we're now left with four. Dallas, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. (Yawn...) Excuse me while I wipe the sleep from my eyes. Yet again a Canadian team will not win the Stanley Cup. Too many expansion teams if you ask me. The business of sport has had a dramatic impact on my passion for hockey.

Remember the good old days when the Edmonton Oilers won 5 Stanley Cups in 7 years? You'll never see that happen again. So as I needed my hockey fix because this year's installment of the playoffs tend to be boring, I was pointed in the direction of the NHL Network online. So what do I see when I get there? A story about the greatest (and my personal favorite) hockey player of all time Mark Messier. Don't believe me? Check out this video clip of Mark Messier, who won 5 Stanley Cups with the Oilers in seven years.

Mark Messier or Sidney Crosby? C'mon seriously? There is no comparison. We now return you to regular scheduled blog browsing.

Labels: mark messier

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