Seo | eBiz Profit Solutions

5 Steps to Optimizing Keywords for Targeted Traffic

January 20th, 2010

If you’ve been attempting to make money online for any amount of time, you have heard of search engine optimization, SEO and SEO services.

Search Engine Optimization or SEO, is the process of using keywords to draw targeted traffic to your online business.

Keywords and keyword phrases are two very important components of SEO. They are used in conjunction with other optimization techniques to bring targeted traffic to your website(s).

You will find keywords used in your headlines, content and elsewhere, appeal to search engine robots. The engines employ robots or “spiders”, to visit and collect information from your website for listing in their SERPS (search engine results pages).

But, you don’t want to please just the spiders.

You should also use highly specific words that your potential customers may choose to search for your website. Then, when your content does rank within the first page of search results, yours will be the first link people see when searching for those words.

Website content is not just something for visitors to read. It is also a good way for you to make sure that the correct visitors arrive at your site in the first place. It is very important that you use the right keywords and keyword phrases across your site, so that you gain the acceptance of the search engines and become visible.

Doing your Homework.

If you thought that homework stopped when you graduated from school, you’ve got another thing coming.

If you are in business, then you will be learning constantly for as long as you want to take your business as far as you possibly can. To that end, it is time to do a little homework for your content – keyword research.

Don’t worry, you don’t have to be a research expert to be successful at this task. Keyword research is simply finding the words that will rank your content and your website head and shoulders above the rest.

Are you ready?

Conducting Keyword Research

Here are 5 things you can do to get started:

1. Create a list of words

Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. If you were them, what word would you use to help find your site? Write as many of these down as possible. Even better, use an Excel spreadsheet or similar, as it would be easier to work with later. Choose single words and multiple word phrases.

2. Ask your customers

You have existing customers. Use surveys to determine how they found you. If it was through an Internet search ask what words they used. It seems too easy, but you’d be surprised at just how many online business owners overlook this simple resource.

3. Use keyword software tools

They are especially helpful if you have determined your keyword list already. By entering the keywords, the software will tell you if they are likely to be good enough to reach your prospects.

4. Now analyze your data

Take your list and condense it, so that you are left with just the keywords most likely to succeed. Rank these keywords, first to last.

5. Try them out

Don’t use all of them at one time, but keep track of which ones you use and for how long. Using website management tools you can find out how much traffic and conversion (how many people used your keyword content as a means to do something – click, sign up, or buy) rates changed.

You obviously already use content on your site, but maybe it isn’t working well enough. The good news is that there are ways to make it better and using the proper keywords and keyword phrases is one of them.

Traffic Travis

Search engine optimization can be a very complicated process. With all the competition on the web for traffic through search engines it is nearly impossible to have a high search engine rating without immense knowledge in SEO techniques. For people who know very little about SEO, allow me to recommend a piece of software called Traffic Travis.

This is excellent SEO software. I’ve been using Traffic Travis on my websites with great results. Many of my blog posts have made it to number one on Google because of it.

Traffic Travis is SEO software designed to make ranking in the search engines achievable and easy for website owners of all levels and experience, without the need for a big marketing budget. And the newly-released 3.0 version includes even more features to streamline the SEO process.

Simple to use and with a very intuitive interface, I highly recommend Traffic Travis to anyone involved with the SEO on their website(s).

The SEO tips in this post were contributed by Michelle Dale. Michelle is the Managing Director of Virtual Miss Friday, a cutting-edge Executive Virtual Assistant Service which assists organizations and enterprising individuals with every detail of their entrepreneurial aspirations.

If you would like to peruse further information on her successful online business building strategies, Contact VMF.