- May 2, 2010
- 7,560
- 11,884
There are a few methods of keyword targeting.
These include random target, hope and pray, general good feeling, or scientist approach.
Personally, I like the scientist approach, so here is my method.
Write or outsource your article.
When it comes back there are 3 types of keyword/s you will be aiming to rank for.
Due to the slightly random nature of serps, you obviously will rank for different keywords etc,
but this is meant as a way to learn and gauge your own ability in terms of writing for seo, and off page seo.
So pick whatever keywords you think are most suited to your article. Choose any or all of the 3.
Setup a spreadsheet with the following columns:
A. Place your keyword in the box. "Best stun gun reviews", "BMH-4567 Drone", etc.
Whatever you want, but just pick 3-4 if your starting. If your feeling doom hardcore mode, then go up to 10-20.
B. This is the link to the finished article.
C. Search volume of keyword
D. Search location (worldwide, usa, etc)
E. Estimation. This is how hard you estimate the keyword to be when you manually have a look at the serps for that keyword.
There is no exact right answer here. If your new, you'll learn when you come back to review this weeks/months down the line.
The values hard,medium,easy go in here.
F. Why? examples: "there is no page targetting reviews" "the top 3 results are dominated by amazon" "there is only youtube videos"
Whatever you see about the serps put in here.
G. Take a moment to review the top 3. You can have a look at their backlinks, their keyword density for the keyword. Just spend a couple of minutes
extra looking at these to learn what it's taking for those to get to the top
H. Plan to beat. "Build 10 backlinks" "create huge list of LSI variations" "Write 2k words article" Put what your going to say your going to do, or already done.
I. This is where you come back in few weeks/months down the line, and say the reality. Was it hard medium or easy. This will give you a collection of
real life examples, once you build this up with enough keywords.
J. SEO Anchor Text. This is the amount of anchor texts that you have used in your seo for that keyword.
K. Article Phrase Match. This is applying the keyword to your article exactly in its original form. Yes or no in here.
L. This is the amount of times you put the phrase match in there. If you want you can also put keyword density into another column, or override that one.
Up To you which you feel is most important.
M. LSI variations. When you look at your keyword, you might have "best saxophone discount". LSI variations would include "cheapest" "budget" "coupon" words.
Put a yes to say you done this. There is no reason to ever put a no here.
Final Steps.
Put these keywords into your serp tracker and publish your article. Now when you see the keywords show up, they have more meaning and reference for you.
Be sure to build this up on all your sites, and after a few months, you will have a collection of data and assumptions that you can go back through, and like
a scientist, test the evidence against your assumptions.
These include random target, hope and pray, general good feeling, or scientist approach.
Personally, I like the scientist approach, so here is my method.
Write or outsource your article.
When it comes back there are 3 types of keyword/s you will be aiming to rank for.
- Main site keywords
- Article specific main keywords
- Article specific longtails
Due to the slightly random nature of serps, you obviously will rank for different keywords etc,
but this is meant as a way to learn and gauge your own ability in terms of writing for seo, and off page seo.
So pick whatever keywords you think are most suited to your article. Choose any or all of the 3.
Setup a spreadsheet with the following columns:
A. Place your keyword in the box. "Best stun gun reviews", "BMH-4567 Drone", etc.
Whatever you want, but just pick 3-4 if your starting. If your feeling doom hardcore mode, then go up to 10-20.
B. This is the link to the finished article.
C. Search volume of keyword
D. Search location (worldwide, usa, etc)
E. Estimation. This is how hard you estimate the keyword to be when you manually have a look at the serps for that keyword.
There is no exact right answer here. If your new, you'll learn when you come back to review this weeks/months down the line.
The values hard,medium,easy go in here.
F. Why? examples: "there is no page targetting reviews" "the top 3 results are dominated by amazon" "there is only youtube videos"
Whatever you see about the serps put in here.
G. Take a moment to review the top 3. You can have a look at their backlinks, their keyword density for the keyword. Just spend a couple of minutes
extra looking at these to learn what it's taking for those to get to the top
H. Plan to beat. "Build 10 backlinks" "create huge list of LSI variations" "Write 2k words article" Put what your going to say your going to do, or already done.
I. This is where you come back in few weeks/months down the line, and say the reality. Was it hard medium or easy. This will give you a collection of
real life examples, once you build this up with enough keywords.
J. SEO Anchor Text. This is the amount of anchor texts that you have used in your seo for that keyword.
K. Article Phrase Match. This is applying the keyword to your article exactly in its original form. Yes or no in here.
L. This is the amount of times you put the phrase match in there. If you want you can also put keyword density into another column, or override that one.
Up To you which you feel is most important.
M. LSI variations. When you look at your keyword, you might have "best saxophone discount". LSI variations would include "cheapest" "budget" "coupon" words.
Put a yes to say you done this. There is no reason to ever put a no here.
Final Steps.
Put these keywords into your serp tracker and publish your article. Now when you see the keywords show up, they have more meaning and reference for you.
Be sure to build this up on all your sites, and after a few months, you will have a collection of data and assumptions that you can go back through, and like
a scientist, test the evidence against your assumptions.
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