Getting listed for keyword searches

It is the goal of many webmasters to get listed for various keyword searches. Before you decide on specific keywords you would like your website to list for, make sure you take into consideration what the competition is, as well as how much work you are able to do to make it happen.

What are keywords? 

Keywords are relevant words used by someone when they are searching for information on the web. Keywords describe what is being searched for and this allows the search engine to check its database and return results matching the words submitted. If a site does not include keywords, it decreases its chance of being found via a keyword search.

Adding keywords to your site also describes your business and website to your customers and search engines. Using relevant keywords (that match what people would be searching for) improves your chances of coming up in related searches.

There are millions of websites on the Internet which makes some keyword phrases more competitive than others. There is a huge amount of competition for the keyword "cars", whereas the keyword phrase "used Saturn car sales Austin Texas" carries far less competition. Many companies will enlist the services of specialists to help them in the pursuit of more competitive keywords and search engine optimization in general.

One thing you can do is use a free keyword research tool such as Keyword Tool. Enter your keyword into the search box and hit your enter key. You will see a number of keyword phrase ideas which include your main keyword. You can build your page's metadata based on these suggestions and what you feel your customers are searching for.

If you do some research and find keywords or phrases you would like to try to list for in the search engines, here are a few strategies to get started:

• Only focus on one or two keywords on each page of your website.
• Write keyword rich title, description, and keywords tags for each page of your site. If you click on Page > Page Properties > Metadata you will find fields to add unique tags to each page of your site. Please see the related links for more information on this topic.
• Write good content and make sure the keyword/s are in the visible text on the page. Don't stuff the keywords into the page, blend them in so your page reads comfortably.
• If your business is local to a geographic area, make sure to mention your location in various places throughout your website.

As always, there is never any guarantee that a website will list for specific keyword searches; but these suggestions will give you a place to start.