|
|
How To Choose Keywords Before they Skyrocket in Popularity
Long before the days of researching phrases with the helpful online resources of today, the art of keyword/phrase selection was often left just to guesswork. However, guesswork by today's highly competitive standards is just not good enough. So how is it possible to select a powerful traffic-pulling phrase in this fashion without researching it in real time? Better yet, is it possible to choose such a phrase and get positioned before it becomes popular?
Well of course it requires some research, but in a slightly different way. Every single day, we have a world of information that happens all around us. With all of the focus on the Internet these days, we need to also consider giving our attention to other medias as well. We have television programs, we have the news and the radio which all bring us current and upcoming events. With the news itself, there are often many ideas that can help the SEO to really think and plan ahead for some truly unique optimization strategies. I am talking about the potential of developing part of your client strategy around an upcoming newsworthy event. Of course it needs to be relevant and useful to the target audience. It also needs to genuinely "relate".
If at first, it does not sound that exciting, let's think about it and give you an example.
Here is a simple example.
If I were promoting a video store online right now, one of the things that I might be doing would, would be to optimize a page for the single search phrase "Johnny Eck." Perhaps an information or a tribute page would work.
But wait....Who was Johnny Eck, you ask?
A way back in 1932, there was a movie by Todd Browning called "Freaks" starring a man named Johnny Eck. The film "Freaks" was about the fictionalized lives of physically and mentally challenged people who, in them days, were exploited in what were commonly called "freak shows". Johnny Eck just so happen to be born into this world without the lower half of his body and was just one of the "main actors" exploited in this rather unusual film which marked the end of Todd Browning's career as a Director.
Although you may have never heard of Johnny Eck, in over 60 years you can count on the fact that everyone will soon know who he is. The film "Freaks" (1932) already has a tremendous cult film following around the world.
So why optimize a page for a film which is over 70 years old?
What many people may not be aware of, is that a brand new movie based on the lives of Johnny Eckhardt is currently being produced. The new movie has a big budget, good script, and you can be certain that many, many people are going to plan to see this film on it's release. There's no way to predict for certain, but it'll probably be quite a blockbuster.
Simple Strategy: Optimize well and relate to the audience
As part of the strategy, you could prepare this optimized page offering to sell the old movie, which is now available on video. On the same page, I would talk about the film. I would write about my remembrances of seeing it for the very first time. As strange as the film is, it makes quite a statement about the how so called "normal looking" people can be very cruel.
You could talk about the film, review it. Talk about how it made you feel. Really try to relate to the audience. In creating the content, you would write for voice, just like you were talking to an old friend. At the same time, offer some trivia or anecdotes about how the film was made. I would prepare the page and get it ranked firstly for the phrase "Johnny Eck" and perhaps secondly around the name of the old film.
The Traffic Payoff:
Usually when a new "big name" movie is released, there is always a tremendous flurry of activity on the Internet by movie goers who enjoy looking up information about it. When they start searching for info on the new film and your pages come up in the top ten, they'll also be reminded about the old film and quite possibly want to purchase it. In this type of promotion, don't take the page down after the movie comes out because you may get double waves of heavy traffic. Actually, if you're lucky the whole routine is going to happen all over again when it's released on video usually six to eight months later. Might there be a third wave when it finally makes it to DVD?
Fine Tune Your Thinking:
Think along these lines, now ask yourself if there may be value to optimizing a page around other big events that are definitely scheduled to happen. The use of a new movie release is only one idea, amongst hundreds of others. If you practice thinking this way, you can develop strategies for retail, professional clients or even business-to-business Web sites. Newsworthy events happen all the time.
- Do you think "the Olympics" might benefit a sporting goods store which offers an overview of the various participants.
- Do you think that a scheduled tour of a famous rock group might influence traffic to a music site offering a contest for free tickets?
- How might that upcoming children's film influence traffic to a toy store?
These are only a few quick examples but learn to think laterally about news events. Take full advantage of the media in its entirety to bring maximum benefit to your clients. It's just a matter of paying close attention to those big scheduled events and creatively examining how these might benefit a your strategy.
In the scenario I explained above, it would be ideal for a video store who is selling old classic films to (if they have any films available starring Johnny Eck) to take advantage of the public interest that might be generated by a new movie.
By the time the film is released, (assuming it is created at all) I expect there will be a flurry of interest about this actor's life and any old films he may have appeared in.
About The Author
John Alexander is the Co-Director of Training of Search Engine Workshops with Robin Nobles. Together, they teach 2-day beginner, 3-day advanced, and 5-day all-inclusive "hands on" search engine marketing workshops in locations across the globe. John also teaches online search engine marketing courses through http://www.onlinewebtraining.com, and he's a member of Wordtracker's official question support team.
john@searchengineworkshops.com
7 Search Engine Optimization Strategy
Search engine optimization refers to the technique of making your web pages search engine friendly so that search engines are more easy to understand and analyze your website. Consequently, your site has a better chance to gain high search engine ranking.
Google WebSearch? & Google Adsense - Yahoo!
The makers of the world renowned search engine, Google, have taken things a step further to increase their user loyalty, grow their user base and at the same time reward websites for helping them promote their search engine. What a beautiful deal.
The Disease of Google Banning: Are You At Risk?
Definition:
Search Engines: Tips and Strategies on Getting Listed and Ranking High for Newbies
You've got a website. You've put countless hours into it, tweaking the look and feel and making sure all the links work. The bad news is there are a gazillion other websites out there. The good news is there are many things you can control to make sure your site isn't lost in the morass of dot coms.
Should You Be Linking for Traffic or Rankings?
Just for a change, rather than a technical article, I would like to tell you a story. To begin, imagine your website is a little country bar, now let's go back to when the internet began, and reciprocal linking was being done properly. Now just sit back and picture the following.....
Search Engine FAQ
Why shouldn't I use a submission service that submits my site to 5000+ search engines?
Torpedo and Sink the Ship SS Search Engine Ranking
I was recently contacted by one of my best clients who asked me what I thought of his decision to make a major change to one of his highly ranked pages. His initial concern was that visitor sales conversion ratio was low. At almost one percent, it was just below normal, but I'm always happy when a client wants to improve. Conversion and rankings though, are very different beasts and his concern was overly focused on the former to the total exclusion of the latter.
Learn about the Google Search Engine Tools
Think you know everything about searching with Google? Think again. Believe it or not, there are many tools and features available on Google that can be useful for marketing research as well as wasting time. Learn more below about Google's coolest features.
Speed Indexing - 3 Steps to Getting Your Website Listed in Google Quickly
Getting your website listed in Google quickly simply requires that you know what Google is looking for and how to apply that to your site. Fortunately, what Google is looking for is pretty easy to understand and use in your marketing plan. Start with these suggestions as soon as possible so you will increase your traffic. Consider the following suggestions to get your website listed with Google, and listed as well and quickly as possible.
Content Management Systems Eyeball SEOs
Content Management Systems and search engine optimization (SEO) used to be mutually exclusive terms. But the SEO community has been driving the developers of Content Management Systems to integrate more SEO-friendly methodology within their systems.
Google, Yahoo!, Pandoras Box And The Lottery
In the fall of 1990, the musical group Snap had a monster number one hit record called, "I've Got The Power."
Cracking the Google Code: Under the GoogleScope
Google's sweeping changes confirm the search giant has launched a full out assault against artificial link inflation & declared war against search engine spam in a continuing effort to provide the best search service in the world? and if you thought you cracked the Google Code and had Google all figured out ? guess again.
Rock Your Rank With a Dynamite Text Link - Yahoo Directory Explodes Rankings
Last week a client called me excitedly exclaiming that their Google PageRank had jumped a notch and their targeted keyword term now ranked #23 (up from #45) for their competitive search phrase. I asked the client if he'd been notified by Yahoo that his site was now included in the index after we had submitted it three weeks ago. "Yes," he said, "but why are you changing the subject?"
World of Website Promotion
Website promotion is a big and ongoing process. Every person who has website should have little knowledge about various elements involved in website promotion even if he had hired a SEO. In this series of articles I had tried to give an overview of all the entities of search engine promotion.
Recommended Tools When You Put On The SEO Cap For Your Web Site
The name of the game is search engine optimization and there are 20 winners and a million losers. It is a massive game that is conducted each and every minute by the top search engines. The fun is the referee of the game tries to modify the format each minute, to make the game useful for the spectators, in this case the folks who search. This is a high stakes game with billions of dollars at stake and the rules change daily. The playing field changes daily and the folks who compete constantly change. Wow what a fun filled game this is. This game has consistently shown that the folks with the right tools win consistently and the ones' who don't but with good ideas win at random and like shooting stars fade out real quick.
SEO Expert Guide - Search Engines Explained (part 1/10)
Before we explore the world of search engine optimization, it is vital that you know a little about how search engines work and their relative market shares. It will help you to prioritize your activities later!
Easy Web Tips
How can you be found on the web?
Do Not Ever Link to a Site Without Doing This First!
Links are a crucial part of attaining high search rankings, but you must be very careful about to whom you link. I'm going to help you develop a simple link strategy for your website that will help you decide which sites to link to so you're making your way up the search engine rankings and not accidentally hurling yourself backwards.
SEO For Ecommerce
Ranking well under the free listings in the major search engines basically mean one thing ? Lots of free, recurring, and targeted traffic. Major search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN can be very powerful weapons in your internet marketing, if you know how to optimize your website to rank highly for your keywords. This article will focus on how you can optimize your website to rank on the top positions in search engines.
SEO Blues
SEO, not again!, you may groan. The webmaster world is inundated by articles and "how to's" with regard to SEO (Search Engine Optimization). If you are a rookie webmaster, chances are, like me, you may have embarked on a merry-go-round on the SEO circuit, depending on which article and opinion you were first exposed to.