Back to the tricky topic of keywords?
These pesky buggers can be a real challenge for those who aren’t familiar with SEO. At Rank Fuse, we get many clients that are unsure of just how many keywords they should be trying to target on a single page of their website. Fortunately, we have some advice.
The quick answer: you should target more than one keyword (or keyword phrase). A single keyword isn’t going to cover everything that you do or sell, and only using one keyword is a huge disservice to your website and business.
Choosing only one keyword is never going to help you get noticed on search engines. If you choose only one keyword, it is probably the most highly searched keyword you COULD be targeting. However, if it is a highly searched keyword, then you are bound to have a lot of competition when it comes to ranking for this term. For obvious reasons, it isn’t likely that you will rank on the first page with just this single keyword. Using this strategy, you aren’t likely to get many visitors to your website.
Diversification is an important part of SEO. Choosing a few different keywords to target is going to be much more beneficial; however, adding too many keywords can also work against you. If you have too many keywords, you have fewer resources you can assign to each of them. Additionally, it becomes more difficult to rank for each of them if you have too many crammed onto a single page. For this reason, it is important that you focus on a few core keywords.
This is pretty confusing, right? While the exact number of keywords you should target on each page depends on a lot of factors, including your budget, you can start by aiming for about five keywords, especially if you are a small business.
Does five not seem like enough?
It is! Here’s why.
Google does something smart with keyword phrases. Two keyword phrases containing the same words but in a different order or with stop words count as one keyword. For example, “ice cream shop in San Antonio” and “San Antonio ice cream shop” are so similar that Google recognizes them both as the same “keyword.” While your ranking may vary slightly between these two pages, it is highly likely that if you are ranking well for one, you will rank well for the other.
If your website contains quality content containing keywords pertaining to “ice cream shop in San Antonio,” you are also likely to show up in searches for long-tail keywords. For example, you are likely to rank on the SERP for “best ice cream shop in San Antonio.”
How to Get Started
Keyword research is the best place to start when you are trying to narrow it down to your five or so keywords. During this process, you can see what the most valuable keywords for your website are.
If you aren’t comfortable executing keyword research yourself, you can reach out to SEO experts. At Rank Fuse, our team of SEO experts has helped clients determine the best way to approach website copy and potential blog content. To speak to one of our experts, contact us today at 917-703-7265.
