You’re stumped! You just created the BEST content to add to your blog but you are now stuck. What are the MOST effective SEO keywords to use on your site? Where do you start? What tools do you use?

Keyword research is THE most important part of effective SEO. If you pick the wrong keywords, you will waste both a lot of time and money. You also won’t get the search engine rankings you want.

There are some basic criteria you need to keep in mind when searching for keywords:

•    Relevancy – What keywords are relevant to your market/niche?

•    Search volume – There are many users searching for that keyword/term

•    Current ranking – What is the keyword ranking? If it’s a high volume keyword such as “marketing” (ranked #10) compared to “retail marketing” (ranked #600)– go with the former because you’ll get better results faster (more qualified traffic)

How to Avoid Bad Keywords
•    Keywords should be relevant with a high traffic volume

•    People aren’t always going to search for difficult terms. Don’t use complicated terms such as “freestyle snowboarding champion in Lake Tahoe, California”  It’s very unlikely that a person is going to search for that specific term – keep it simple!

•    Sometimes keywords with high search volumes may be more difficult – you may have to work a little harder! Check out the following tools to analyze keyword difficulty: SEOmoz Keyword Difficulty Tool and SEOlogs Keyword Difficulty Check Tool.

How to Choose Effective Keywords
The first step in choosing keywords is brainstorming. You also need powerful tracking tools that will lead you in the right direction.  Learn about the buying process and how consumers research and buy online.

•    First, ask yourself this question: “How would my customers/clients search for my products and services online?”

•    Brainstorm a seed list (it helps to brainstorm with other colleagues) – choose a list of terms that would answer the above question.

•    Use the following keyword tools to expand your list: Google Keyword Tool, WordTracker and WebCEO.  This is how you optimize keywords/terms that people search for the most.
•    Place keywords you find underneath your seed list. The goal is to grow your list with well-optimized keywords/phrases. You need to figure out which keywords have the most relevancy, search volume and current tracking.

•    You could spend up to hours looking for optimized keywords – that may sound long and boring but you could end up with the wrong keywords and mess up your SEO. It’s better to take the time to research keywords NOW then to regret it later!

•    Pay attention to keyword discovery – broad keywords (broad terms with a high search volume) versus long-tail keywords (less searches but more specific/relevant terms related to your products and services)

•    Figure out the search volume for each keyword. You need a relevancy value for each keyword and then calculate the score of each keyword.

•    Choose 5-10 primary keywords (keywords that have high relevancy and search volumes), 20-60 secondary words (lower search volume but very relevant) and keyword modifiers (words that go before, after or in the middle of primary or secondary words – i.e. “free”)
When choosing keywords keep the following criteria in mind:
•    Brand names (i.e. Target)

•    Generic product names (i.e. laptops)

•    Product attributes (i.e. affordable laptops)

•    Brands (i.e. Dell laptops)

•    Models (i.e. Dell Inspiron E1705 laptops)

•    Action keywords (i.e. buy laptops)

•    Problem-related keywords (i.e. how to fix laptops)

•    Specials (i.e. laptops free shipping)

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When creating SEO content, stuffing your content with keywords won’t work (keyword stuffing is also an unethical SEO tactic). Not only does your content have to sound unique and exceptional, keywords need to be placed strategically within your content.

When you write articles, keep your keyword list handy and insert keywords as you write. Your goal is to create quality content that adds value to your readers.  If your article sounds like nonsense with strings of keywords crammed into paragraphs, you’re not utilizing correct SEO practices. It’s fairly simple to add a few primary and secondary words within articles without jeopardizing your entire content quality.

How to Optimize Your Blog
There are three main reasons WHY you want to create QUALITY content on your blogs:

•    MORE pages indexed – Search engine spiders crawl content (quality content equals more page indexing!)

•    Provide visitors with GREAT information – When visitors find you on Google, the rapport with your readers begin right there! When you provide valuable, quality content you engage your readers. Great content gives you a competitive edge over every other business floating around on cyberspace.

•    Links – When visitors read an informative, helpful article, they write about it on their blogs/sites and link to it. They also share with their friends and they tell their friends, etc.

Calls to Action
Visitors read your blog posts because they want to learn more information or are interested in what you have to say/share.

At the end of each blog post, you need to add a call to action. A call to action is a specific task that you ask your visitor to do. You can’t just “assume” that after reading your great post that your visitor will know what to do. You need to push them in the right direction.

•    Subscribe - Visitors can subscribe to your blog by RSS feeds and email. WordPress provides a useful plug-in, Subscribe2

•    Tell a Friend – You’ll receive a better response if you remind people to spread the word about your blog. Tell a Friend is an effective WordPress plugin that makes it easy to remind/email people about your blog post

•    ShareThis – Allows visitors to share content with friends through social bookmarking platforms such as Facebook, Digg, Twitter, etc.
•    TweetMeMe – Invites readers to “re-tweet” your posts (i.e. share your article on Twitter)

How to Write Great Content – Best Practices

•    Brand your own writing style – Stand out amongst other bloggers by creating your own unique voice and style. Don’t try to copy other writer’s styles.

•    Write in a conversational style – Keep language simple and easy to understand. You don’t have to be a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist to create winning content.

•    Write UNIQUE content – Do not copy content from other sites and create content that solves a person’s problem or makes life/business easier.

•    Plan posts strategically and add “teasers” about upcoming posts/content – keep readers engaged so they’ll come back and read more!

•    Always encourage comments from readers and answer comments quickly. Include related posts at the end of each post.

•    Include guest bloggers on your site – You’ll add free content to your site and create new relationships within your industry/niche.

Content Examples
•    “How To” articles –  How To Lose Weight on The Flat Belly Diet

•    Lists – Top Ten Family Vacation Spots

•    Demonstrations – A video demonstrating yoga poses

•    Case Studies – How I Built a Worm Farm from Scratch

•    News – Write about late-breaking news that affects your business/industry

•    Humor – Add a personal touch and humor to your content. People love it when you share practical advice.

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