Search engines have taken over people’s lives. Although Bing is slowly catching up in popularity, Google remains king. Google has transformed the way people acquire their information especially when it comes to doing research on a new product or company. When a consumer is trying to find a specific product or service, they type in keywords so the search results they end up with have what they are looking for. The search results the consumer receives is based on the keywords they have entered and the keywords that are listed on the website as well. In order to find the right keywords for a website, keyword research is the first place to start.

Before even going on the computer, ask people how they would search for your products and services in Google. People will often give surprising answers on all the different ways they search. From there, develop a list of 15 – 20 keyword phrases that you feel are relevant if someone was to search for your website.

A keyword list is crucial because it will help with the Google’s keyword tool: www.adwords.google.com/adwords. Once you run those words into the keyword tool in AdWords, you will get similar phrases that users search on along with a popularity count on the terms. This will help guide you in later optimizing your website, so it can receive maximum exposure.

Another Google application that is essential in Search Engine Marketing is Google Analytics. Google Analytics does analyzed reports of your website traffic and see what keywords people are using to get to your website today. With information from Google AdWords and Google Analytics, you’ll be able to determine what keywords are right for you. Generally, it is recommended that you choose 15-20 keywords to start off with or 1 per page of your website.

Since you now have the terms you want your website to be found under when people are searching Google, you are ready to optimize your website to make it more search engine friendly.

For every website you can out the source code behind it. You cannot manipulate it but you can see what it is. Go to your website. If you are in I.E. go to View>Source Code and within that page you should see three things: Title, Keywords, and Description. These three things are your website ‘Meta Tags’. Meta Tags are special HTML tags that provide information about a website such as who created the page, how often it is updated, what the page is about, and which keywords represent the page’s content. These are one of the first things Google is seeing when they are viewing your website. It is also beneficial to look at your competition’s Meta Tags and see what types of keyword phrases they are trying to be found under.

The keyword list that you made earlier will come into play again because you want to incorporate your keyword phrases into each Title and Description of each page of your website. List out the keywords you want to be found under in each page of your website and make the order different for every page. Relevancy is crucial when it comes to keywords because the first three words found in keywords lists are considered the most important to Google. Google is trying to match keywords to a user’s search term, so choose your keywords wisely.

A Content Management System (CMS) is often the most popular format for updating websites. There is an area within it that you can incorporate the page Title, Keywords, and Descriptions. For example, WordPress offers an All-In-One SEO pack plugin you can install. However if you do not use CMS for your website, you may need a programmer to help you incorporate your Meta Tags into your website.

Remember that keyword research is an ongoing process, it is time consuming, but the awards are worth the hassle.

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