7 Things You Need to Know about SEO Keywords

Creating a website is one feat and creating a search engine optimized (SEO) website that can be found by the search engines is a completely separate feat. To make sure your website is found by Internet users, you have to focus on keywords – the crux of SEO. Here are seven things you need to know when working with keywords:

  1. A professional can complete keyword research and provide you with a list of important SEO keywords to focus on, but you can do your own keyword research too.

  2. When deciding on which keywords to optimize your site for, it’s usually about keyword phrases and not a single keyword. For example, entering “Realtor” into Google returns 34.7 million results where “Denver Realtor” returns 1.4 million results. While the second phrase is the better option, it would pay to go even more specific with something like “Denver Capitol Hill Realtor,” which brings up 144,000 results. The third option is still competitive and much more manageable.

  3. When writing your copy, it’s not about keyword density. Yes, it helps to have the right terms in your copy more than once, but you don’t have to have 2-3% density to get results. Write naturally and use keywords where it makes sense.

  4. Use keywords in the right places on your site. For example, use your keyword phrases in headlines, subheads, hyperlinked text, alt tags, and page titles.

  5. Keywords alone will not get you the best ranking in a search engine. Don’t forget about adding content to your site frequently and link building (links from outside sources that lead back to your site).

  6. You may decide to focus on many different keywords and keyword phrases, but don’t try to use them all on one page. Instead, pick two or three keywords for each web page.

  7. After you assign certain keyword phrases to a particular page, link to those pages from other pages on your site using the appropriate keyword anchor text.

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Want know more about SEO keywords? Check out our other posts:

6 Things Google Analytics Says About Your Web Content

ABCs of Search Engine Optimization – A Dictionary

Everything You Need to Know About Keyword Research


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