It all begins with words typed into a search box.

Without keywords, there would be no such thing as SEO. Keyword research is a crucial part to any firm’s success when competing in the digital world. This strategy ultimately helps businesses predict shifts in demand, respond to changing market conditions, and produce the products, services, and content that web searchers are already actively seeking. This is extremely helpful for companies because it increases search engine traffic, and allows you to get to know your customers better than your competition.

Ranking for the right keywords can make or break your website. By researching your market’s keyword demand, you can not only learn which terms and phrases to target with SEO, but also learn more about your customers as a whole.

How to do Keyword Research

Before a company begins designing their website, they must first look at the few steps that goes into creating a website that will rank them higher than their competitors.

1. What is your mission?

Before you do anything, take a step back and think about the mission and goals of your company. Who are you? What is your website about? Who is your target audience? What makes your site more credible? How are you going to stand out from the other competitors? Setting out a strong vision and a plan is the first important step in keyword research.

2. Make a list of keywords

The right type of keywords will get your site in front of the right customers and so you need to brainstorm some of the terms you want to be found for. A good way to help begin this process is trying to get into the mind of your potential buyers. Think of the type of words these consumers would be looking up when they are trying to find your product or service. Some other great tips that have helped me to understand the process of beginning a list of keywords is in this article about keyword research for SEO.

3. Look at search intent

Consumers intention are varied and there is no concrete answers on why they are visiting your site. They may just be trying to find more information on a specific topic. They could be trying to navigate to a specific site by entering that term into a search engine. There is a product the consumer is interested in buying soon, so they are doing their research on it before they buy. Which ultimately brings you to the customers that have done their research and are ready to buy something. Doing your research on the consumer’s intent will help you build a site that will bring the people you want to come to your website.

The Value of the Keyword

When you think about it, the importance of choosing the right keywords for your site should be your top priority. Heavy amounts of research should be done because the difference between a site that gets a heavy amount of organic searches and one that doesn’t is all based on the keywords you use.

When you use effective keyword research tools you will notice that your site will gain more traffic because you are capturing the audience you are targeting. When you begin to understand what your target is searching for, you will able to put yourself in a strong position to direct these people to your page. This in return will help you reach your goals as well those who are searching for your product or service.

More on the importance of why keyword research is one the most valuable strategies in SEO can be found here.

That’s all for now folks.

Jordan Anderson