Choosing Keywords Wisely - Brainstorm a Big List
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Initially, you need to give yourself some time to construct a list of every word or phrase that you can think of that describes what you sell or do or provide to your customers or clients. You should include your company name of course and anything that is related to you in some way. Every word that you think of may not actually be used in your final list of keywords but don’t worry, this is just a chance for you to let your mind roam free. If you’re not sure whether to include a word at this stage, include it anyway as it may spark off something more closely related later on.
When your initial list is complete, look at common spelling mistakes for these words and add them to the list. Many words are spelled incorrectly by many people; in some searches, incorrect spellings are searched more often than their correct counterparts. If phrases of more than one word are a feature of your list, think about any variations between hyphenated and non-hyphenated versions of the phrase and whether the words can be used with or without spaces. You need to take a step back from being an expert to your product or service and think about how your target customers will think about you. As an expert on your own product you can think of exactly what you would search of were you looking for such a thing; in fact, you should already have searched for similar products or services offered by your competitors.
General members of the public, however, may not think about your product in the same way that you do, and will therefore use completely different search words from the ones you would use. Choosing effective keywords is about putting yourself in your customer’s shoes. An exercise in thinking about how you would describe your product or service to someone that has no former experience in it may help you here.
Your list may be fairly long at this point, but don’t worry, you’ll thin it down as your list progresses to remove any words that, while they may describe your services or product perfectly, simply aren’t searched for very often. The keywords you end up with will be the closest matching words that describe you that are also highly searched for.
The size of your organization or the scope of your site if you are operating alone will have a big effect on keyword choice. The more you can simultaneously invest in offline media advertising, such as newspaper, radio or television, the wider range you will have when choosing keywords. There have been cases in the past where a search term was virtually unused until a company advertised it offline; then the number of searches the phrases appeared in exploded. This is especially true for catch phrases, slogans or company mottos.
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