Without doubt one of the more crucial things to get right when marketing online is the keywords you choose to promote your site on. I think this is up there with one of the most asked about topics, and also one of the most confusing for many people.
If your main goal is affiliate marketing, then you definitely need to read this post, as thanks to all the changes at Google over the past 18 months, we all need to pay close attention to the keywords we target.
Highly Targeted Buyer Keywords
I use to teach people to focus only on ranking for buyer keywords. The kind of keywords that are very specific in nature, as they convert well to sales. For example, “buy canon powershop g1x”. Someone typing that into Google is clearly looking to buy that camera, most likely got their credit card in hand looking for the checkout.
This leads to my point exactly, ‘they are looking for the checkout!’, they are not looking for a review of the camera, so the chances are if they land on a page that is a text article, then I doubt its a good match for what they want.
The result will probably be that they’ll either hit the back button or close your site, or maybe if you’re lucky they will click your really obvious affiliate link and head over to a shop to buy it. Either result of these three leads to a high bounce rate, which Google doesn’t like.
Matching Your Content to the User Intention
A much better way to choose keywords is to match your content to the user intention. In other words ‘give people what they want’. Although it is possible to rank for keywords that are not really a good match for what someone wants, like the Canon example I gave above, its still not a good idea. The reason being that Google will work out that your content is poor match and eventually ditch it, otherwise more well known as a Google Panda slap!
What Keywords Should I Choose Then?
The first port of call when doing any keyword research is to understand the niche market and what the major topics discussed in this niche are. This goes for ecommerce stores, affiliate sites, adsense, lead generation, anything, because remember your goal is to create high quality sites for the user experience.
Let me remind you of what Google themselves said only a few months ago here: Google take on high quality sites. The key line is this statement “…high quality sites that create a good user experience….” If this is Google’s goal, then they clearly plan their algorithm changes to meet this goal. So if you focus on this, you will naturally fall inline with what Google wants and be rewarded for it.
So when it comes to choosing your keywords, you need to look at what is necessary for you to create content around, in order to facilitate a good user experience. A website that is loaded with buyer keywords only, such as “buy XYZ” “XYZ review” “XZY model 123” is not going to cut it these days.
You can still target high converting keywords, but you need to do it in a less obvious way. For example, if this keywords phrase had decent search volume it would be a good one “what’s the best place to buy XYZ?” as the searcher is still showing intention to buy the product XYZ, but they actually don’t know what store to go to yet, so they are more inclined to want an article that will explain where to go and give a good reason to go there.
Related articles
Sounds like great advice Matt, Thanks for the Info! I just started your free video series and one of the webinars (five figure sites) that you promote in your 5th email suggests the very thing your warning us to stay away from; TARGETING BUY WORDS!
Since I’m new and nothing is dated on your blog its hard to tell whats good, relevant, and up-to-date information. Perhaps removing older articles that may include unsound advice would be helpful for those like me.
Thanks again for all your help!
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:30 pm
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Hi Tyler
Yeah that webinar does teach that, but I know Sara the owner has changed her approach a fair bit since that webinar, after all the Google updates so I need to update the webinar actually. You can still target some of these buyer type phrases, but like I mentioned in this post you need to careful and do not have a whole site full of only these.
Great advice as always Matt.
We need to adapt to the change if we want to succeed in SEO.
Yes Matt I agree with you, totally. I have read a topic in part of a broad topic by Dori Friend on this. But, this is the most specific topic in selecting keywords I have ever read so far.
Matt, again you never fail to amaze us the way you provide FREE reports and ideas that are sold by others. Keep it up mate. 🙂
Great Post, thanks for all the great info! My question is will you still be supporting rapid profit formula? I bought it a few months and want to know if I should still use it.
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:12 pm
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Hi Joe
I updated that course before closing it down, so I won’t be adding any new updates, but I made sure it was relevant before finishing it.
Matt
G’day Matt ,
Couldn’t agree more with you .
I think this may have just been a “Freudian slip” :
“nothing out of the ordering happening here”
Cheers ,
Norman Holden
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:11 pm
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Hi Norman
Thanks for spotting that…ha ha, I fixed it now.
Regards
Matt
Good stuff as usual Matt.
Keyword research is always a bit of a dart board shot to me. I know the theory, but as soon as I think I have it down, the theory goes from a flat world to one that they now say is round. Believe that? So one goes more or less back to square one, head scratching the whole way.
Then, there is search volume for a specific keyword, and that opens up another flat world, round world window. Had a guy tell me the other day that anything under 10,000 searches per month on Google, is just a Wild A** Guess by Google and should not be relied upon. REALLY?
All I can say is “Keep it up kid, you are the best.”
Paul W.
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:28 pm
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High Paul
Yeah keywords can be tricky. As for search volume, I am happy aiming for volumes as low as 100 exact match, BUT the key is to target more than one per page.
Aloha Matt, very nice post as usual and with changes online it sure makes it a challenge for most. But I see with persistence those who push themselves further usually stays on top or near what Google is expecting online.
I like your analogy with the pink spandex and gosh that would be a sight for soar eyes and hardly a way to be missed. Very cool! I appreciate all the value you give and share. Mahalo, Lani 🙂
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:26 pm
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Hi Lani
Nice to hear from you again!
yes it would be a site to see, and glad you liked this post.
Matt
Hi Matt,
What a good post! I’m working on my new site following your advise to the “t”. I’ve stopped chasing after quick bucks which didn’t work for me anyway but have told myself I need to build a strong relationship based list of prospective customers and then slowly convert them to buyers.
This takes a lot of perseverance as you say but will have a good ROI.
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 12:25 pm
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Hi John
Great stuff, sounds like you are on the right path.
Matt
Hi Matt,
I always click the link on your email to read your post. As always, your post loaded with current happening in IM scene and provide valuable insight and tips.
Oh, I love your letter to google ha ha
Cheers,
Sarah
Thanks again Matt for the great advice. I have actually found keyword research much easier since I got SECockpit at your webinar 🙂
Linda
Hi Matt,
I have been on your mailing list for some time now and greatly appreciate all the insightful information that you regularly post on your blog. Very interested in this post concerning the “new” way of doing KW research. Amazing how many “new” products being sold are still raving about the need to target only buyer keywords for your affiliate sites. Still lots of confusion in the market I guess over what works and what doesn’t.
I do have one area of concern though. Recently I purchased AfflioBlueprint 3.0 via your link and nearly 3 weeks later, I still have yet to receive my bonuses for buying through your link. I apologize for bringing this fact to your attention in this blog comment, however I have been trying to contact you through a variety of your e-mail address and never received any replies to my inquiries. I would really appreciate a reply from you on how to get my bonuses since the staff@mattsmarketingblog contact for the bonuses didn’t seem to have worked for me.
Thanks Matt! 🙂
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 2:04 pm
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Hi Barry
We have replied to all emails about the bonus, so I assume your email is bouncing back, as some of them did. I had one call me all sorts of name but the issue was his email was not working so we couldn’t reply to him although we tried three times. I suggest emailing us from a different email address and make sure you send to staff@mattsmarketingblog.com with your receipt.
Thank you for the info Matt and just as your previous articles have been, I am pretty sure you are on the money.
I am now currently in the process of untangling myself from the skin tight spandex tights and believe me it is not a pretty sight!
Eileen Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 3:39 pm
haha…I think there has been a spandex party happening so you’re not alone Nick. 🙂
Hi Matt, nice to hear some common sense for a change. There is so much conflicting advice out there.
I have recently read two other posts about Panda/Penguin, one said to interlink your pages, the other said to remove any interlinked pages. What’s a mere mortal to do?
Thanks
Wendy
Matt
As always this is great content, i believe that google is making it more and more difficult to be lazy and not provide useful, well thought out content.
The days of the 5 minute site making you millions are pretty much done with. Looks like we will have to get back to that little 4 letter word called work.
Once again thanks for your great blog.
Matt,
Can you just elaborate on “don’t just target one keyword per piece of content” ?
Matt Carter Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 3:14 pm
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Hi Latha
Sure thing, all I mean is try and rank a page for more than just one keyword.
Eg. If you want to rank for “dog training” then also backlink your page for “bog training books” “dog training advice”
Matt
To a buyer, getting directly to the Buy Cannon GX1 checkout has to be the ultimate experience, surely!
But Google are now forcing time-poor buyers to study the endless version of the encyclopedia of Canon Cameras before they are allowed to, if they get lucky at page 64, check out. BAD experience for the person who knows what they want.
So time-poor, focused buyers are going to become frustrated and annoyed at being led all over the intellectual landscape in the hopes of finding a buy button.
It’s horses for courses and I think Google have chosen to back the long-winded, waste your precious time here and click our Adwords ads route. May make cents, but it doesn’t make sense in the long term.
Google are just hogging their platform for themselves where making a $ happens and booting anyone else who earns a dollar there, even if they are not even remotely in competition.
Eileen Reply:
June 22nd, 2012 at 3:43 pm
Very good points Kerry. I agree. I have searched recently on Google only to find sites coming up in the search results that are totally unrelated.
Hello Matt,
Good Morning
I have been following you for years. I believe you are the only one who always come up first if there is anything new in IM world with the story behind the happening and above all most updated.
You are open and straightforward on the issues.
Your blog is very helpful to me.
Thanks Mark.
Great advice Matt.
Keyword stuffing, over optimizing your blog post can actually make more damage than benefit these days, so ranking high for a targeted keyword or phrase you’ll have to mix it up a bit, add variants of that keyword, include relevant keywords not necessarily repeat the same KW all over as we all once used to.
Tobi
I have chosen my keywords from the old method of high search volume, low competition and reasonable cpc as my sites only way of revenue is adsense at this stage. the only thing I see I need to be careful of is how I promote these words. In other words I am careful to use a big variety of anchors including “click here” etc… Otherwise I see no other big changes necessary. I use the main kw approx 15-25% of the time, 50% using 4-5 LSI words and the rest can be anything at all… and spread them all over the place but usually the target kws end up on the most niche relevant and higher pr sites. Seems to be working so far. Of course my actual site is not kw stuffed and looks natural as…although the old principles of target kws are still in the right places. plus I don’t even use meta kws or tags at all.
Hi Matt,
I always enjoy reading your work. It would have been good to get a couple more examples of the way we should be doing things now. Additionally, I was taught to only use one KW per article. Are you saying that we should not be doing this anymore?
I am struggling with the new changes and knowing what KWs to use.
Thanks, Eileen.
Hi Matt,
Once again, i learned so much from your post.
I have been one of your avid followers – from Rapid Profit Formula to SEO Experts Academy to Video Commission… I keep on learning from you and when you say something, i know that i do not have to verify it because i am confident that the information is correct. I really appreciate your help.
More power to you.
Cheers,
Zarah
Thanks Matt,
Really informative post. Really good advice.
I began to think the same way about email marketing and building a relationship with potentials customers. I was afraid of that before, but I’m now walking toward that path.
Thanks Matt for the reminder.
All we need to do is get tuned into the visitor’s mindset and we can then properly educate, help, and even sell to them with ease. This takes research and development right down to the psychological level that’s why it’s one of the most important parts of making money online or even off-line.
Thanks again.
.Andrew.
As always Matt thanks for the advice.
From my point of view I am finding it more necessary to find other methods to drive traffic to sites, as well as SEO.
The reason being, and I am sure that others will agree, it now seems to be a moving target, what with constant google updates.
So with my complementary therapy site, I mix it up with SEO and other methods.
Thanks
Peter
EFT Adv Practitioner/Trainer
Matt Carter Reply:
June 23rd, 2012 at 11:35 am
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Hi Peter
I think its only a moving target if you don’t build sites for the user experience, if you do you shouldn’t notice Google updates much.
Hi Matt, Great post you are totally right, Trying to make a quick buck is a dream for every one, Googles getting smarter,
The best way to build the site these days is the natural way. not over crowding keywords & getting greedy with anchor text.
I must admit there’s so much to learn…
Matt,
I totally agree with you on keywords such as “buy XYZ product”. However, targeting keywords such as “XYZ product review”, and then providing a good review, seems to be giving the user exactly what they are looking for. How could Google penalize you for that? Let me know your opinion on this.
I have been a long-time reader and fan.
Thanks for all you do!
Matt Carter Reply:
June 23rd, 2012 at 11:34 am
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Yeah sure that could still be fine but I don’t think an entire website full of these is great
interesting but how does it work with the idea of creating a page for just 1 key word or keyword phrase
Matt Carter Reply:
June 23rd, 2012 at 11:33 am
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Hi Dave
well as I mentioned in this post its not a good idea to target just one keyword per post.
What is the good of Keywords if a person cannot blog if his life depended on it. I truly think that making money online will fall into the pre-historic category as Google will have so many road blocks in the way of accomplishing such a task.
Kenneth
I Agree Matt!! Thanks for the info!!
Hello Matt,
thanks for your advice, picking the right keywords seems to be the most tricky part of all (but maybe just for me).
I run a couple of blogs and after I “really” understood how to use the KW in the posts they perform much better, and all the KW sum up.
Hey Matt,
This is another great post!
It’s a shame that Google is changing algorithms very quickly. However, it should not be a problem for those who provide quality content.
Rubel
It would be great if you could show/describe how to actually do the keyword research. I am too confused.
I ranked for a keyword in my niche that is very competitive with exactly 500,000 searches/month (according to free google keyword research tool). After several months and SEO work I ranked 3rd. I literally had 1 or 2 people visit my site per day. Thats it!
It just does not make sense…HELP! 🙂
There are a lot of so-called gurus out there who do nothing but push products.
Hands down, your advice is clear and concise and free of any fluff. The IM world needs more people like you.
Thank you for your advice.
To change the topic, here’s something that’s been bugging me for some time and I haven’t been able to find a good answer to this question.
So here it goes.
Is there a way to find out how much traffic a particular ‘web page’ receives?
I know there are some sites that show how much traffic a particular website receives. But, that doesn’t help me.
I would greatly appreciate it if you could address my question.
Leo
Matt Carter Reply:
June 24th, 2012 at 8:18 am
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Pretty sure Google Analytics does this.
Thanks for your kind words also.
Matt
Leo Reply:
June 25th, 2012 at 10:02 am
Matt,
Thank you for replying. What I forgot to mention is that I’m looking to see how much traffic my competition is getting on a particular page.
Are you aware of any tools that can do this?
Matt Carter Reply:
June 25th, 2012 at 7:10 pm
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No not sure about that
Matt
M. I’ve come to the conclusion that google sucks but they’re practically the only game in town. good times! jw
Matt Carter Reply:
June 24th, 2012 at 8:17 am
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Yeah they can suck, but they have made me a lot of money so I can’t bag them out too much. Although times are harder in SEO now, its a golden opportunity as lots of people will give up, which is what Google wants, so if you stick with it and do what Google wants you’ll do well.
Hi Matt, good keyword selection that is relevant to the topic is crucial, but something new marketers, and experienced marketers alike sometimes forget. If you use wrong keywords simply for the purpose of getting high ranking, eventually you will get the Google slap. So, use good variety of keywords for your article, and have some of the keyword links go to other related articles and not just the sales landing page. This will likely improve user experience and reward you with higher ranking in the SERPS. Ken
Hi Matt,
Good post here. It is important to change the tactics from time to time. I definitely agree that a site stuffed with buyers keywords is not going to work any longer. That simply means gathering more information and content for your website, and also giving some thought to how to go about with the back-linking.
BTW you are on Page 1 of Google at pos no. 9 for the phrase,
skin tight pink spandex.
Congrats, I would be interested to know how you did this. 🙂
Is there another course there?
I am always amazed when I come to your blog to read an article like this, the amount of response you get in your comments and deservedly so, as you are one of the few who really give of themselves to their subscribers.
As for the article I think it is an excellent article although I do wish you could give examples so we have an idea what the right way of doing things looks like. I read an article from Lisa Parmley who suggested the same thing in building sites as to keyword density and that you should rank for more than one keyword, but as I said, it would help if we had an example of what properly doing this is about. Still reminding us of changes taking place and what to do about it puts you notches above other marketers, such as yourself, who do not treat their subscribers nearly as good as you do. Thank you as always, Paul
Matt Carter Reply:
June 25th, 2012 at 7:11 pm
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Hi Paul
I teach my members in IM Super Elite more detail that I can do on this blog for free.
Matt
Hi Matt,
Your articles are always very useful. Thanks.
In fact I only follow your’s, Mark Ling and Sam Frost articles. You all rock!!!!
Cheers.
This is a very thoughtful post. I see what you mean about keyword stuffing. What are your thoughts about backlinks? How many of these can be a single keyword?
Matt Carter Reply:
June 28th, 2012 at 6:28 am
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Backlinks also need to look natural, so mix it up
Very helpful article, Matt. It’s nice to hear these things from time to time as it’s easy to fall into a rut with keyword research and implementation.
Common sense advice that I will be taking advantage of.
Thanks,
BigJim
hey matt what i learn in this days with all the updates seams like .. google look a lot on artificial back links not the keywords that you try to rank for … you have to mix them a lot..and i think even if you have only 3 keywords targeted but you will wise white hat techniques you will see that your site will still rank.. and if you will get your visitors engaged on the site …i got one site that have a low bounce rate
Keyword selection is SUPER important not only for organic traffic but for Google paid traffic. If you have unrelated keywords it can lower your quality score for your Adwords account and put the price up per advertisement costing you more money. Also if your using adwords you need to make sure every keyword is related to your goals for conversions. If you want longtail keywords for your site you should use some software to speed up the process.
Matt,
I believed is more difficult than ever to do seo or simple find right keywords for any website… What is next move after all that panda and pinguin google update?
thanks
Red King Reply:
July 6th, 2012 at 8:30 am
its only more difficult for those using spammy seo methods
The business model has changed dramatically over the year and building larger authority sites that are good for the user is the only way to get organic traffic anymore with getting any penalties from Google.
It takes longer and is more work but the long term benefits are worth it in the long run.
Thanks for sharing you experience with us once again.
Shafercd
Hey Matt,
Very good Tips about Keywords
Thanks
On a site that had great traffic for high ranking competitive keywords there was a drastic hit in traffic, about 50%. Now it is climbing again without any real effort and the keywords I see traffic coming in from are the kinds of keywords that you are talking about in this article. Right on.
Hey Matt,
This question belongs on your post about dropshipping but since I couldn’t ask my question there hopefully you don’t mind my asking here.
Your article on dropshipping was phenomenal. I recommend that everyone interested in ecommerce read it asap. It helped push me over the fence and I’m going to give it a try.
I’m signing up with a dropshipping company which will provide me with an ecommerce website (www.website.com/myname) and will track sales linked to my activity.
What I don’t want to do is SEO a website that I have no control over.
My thoughts were to register a domain and redirect traffic to the site they’re giving me.
Do you recommend that I SEO multiple pages for various keywords and redirect traffic to that site in light of Penguin/Panda updates?
My thinking is that if I part ways with this company my efforts don’t go to waste and I still have an optimized site.
I have to say that while many courses came out with the whole “optimize for buyer keywords mayhem!” I feel that you are suggestting people dont target these anymore.
i have to disagree, the point i think is spot on is ‘over optimization’ if you have all your titles on a page as well as the URL with ‘buy XYZ camera’ then it gives of clear signal that your only intention is to get that traffic and make money from it. As google has the end user in mind, it would be much smarter to go after keywords on the >downlow< and not just blatantly sticking your nose in the air for google to scratch 😉 I think LSI and long tails are the way to go, but using these as your anchors when backlinking. Instead of 80% of your backlink as 1 main keywords it only needs to be about 20-30% and then the rest is mixed up.
The nice thing about these google updates is that they are forcing you to target MORE keywords! (so we really shouldn't complain should we? they want us getting more traffic, just being cleaner about it 😉 )!!