“Scalable Keyword Research”“How to Quickly Uncover How People Search in Your Niche”

Richard Baxter, Founder, SEOgadget

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WE’RE GOING TO BUILD THIS:

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cooter

baby s

wings

kids s

cooter

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boys bike

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child

rens s

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"wen

dy houses

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graco

baby s

wing

kids s

lides

baby t

rampolin

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kids g

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child

rens o

utdoor t

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baby s

wing sea

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kids o

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Today’s lesson: construct a beautiful chart just like this one using VLOOKUP and Pivot charts

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THE BEAUTY OF UNCATEGORISED DATA

Using your newly acquired uncategorised data to inspire you to define categories and group keywords is incredibly powerful. Don’t be scared of big data!

...............................................................................................................................................................................................WHAT IF YOU COULD GROUP THOSE KEYWORDS TOGETHER SO THEY MADE SOME ACTIONABLE

SENSE?

Action Condition Colour Brand Model Location

If you can group keywords together, you can spot priorities in search behaviour that might allow you to confidently construct a site architecture

Buy

used

LondonRed

S3

Audi

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IF YOU UNDERSTAND TOP SEARCH TERMS BY CATEGORY, YOU CAN MAKE DECISIONS ABOUT

YOUR WEBSITE

Action Condition Brand Model Colour Location

If you can group keywords together, you can spot priorities in search behaviour that might allow you to confidently construct a site architecture

buy

find

search

compare

locate

review

rate

used

new

second hand

London

Nottingham

Peterborough

S3

A3

X5

911

Audi

BMW

Porsche

Black

Green

White

Yellow

Blue

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NOW, YOU CAN DEFINE YOUR KEYWORD STRATEGY BY CREATING NEW PAGE TYPES

Understanding the make up of your user’s search behaviour is an important step to defining longer tail dynamic site templates

Home Page

Manufacturer pages

Location pages

Product pages

“Audi”

“BMW”

“Porsche”

“used cars in [location]”

“[location] used cars”

“BMW Z3 Blue Seattle”

“[MANUFACTURER] [MARQUE] [COLOUR]”

“cars”

“used cars”

“cars for sale”

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LET’S DO SOME

Time to do a live demonstration – take a look at these two posts for further info:

http://seogadget.co.uk/how-to-make-a-pivot-table-and-chart-in-excel/ and http://www.seomoz.org/blog/keyword-research-using-categories

Tools for keyword researchMy favourite tools for the keyword research process

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GOOGLE ADWORDS API PLUGIN FOR EXCEL

1) You’ll need an API Key: http://code.google.com/apis/adwords/

2) Download: http://seogadget.co.uk/google-adwords-plugin-excel/

3) Sit back and generate your keyword volumes

Capture search volumes and seasonality data straight into Excel http://seogadget.co.uk/google-adwords-plugin-excel/

=getAdWordStats()

=getAdWordIdeas()

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USE GOOGLE CHROME FOR MANUAL KEYWORD RESEARCH

It doesn’t take long to build a data set of ~5000 keywords even with the Google keyword tool.

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AWESOME: SEO TOOLS FOR EXCEL

Check out Neils Bosma’s awesome SEOtools for Excel. AWESOME. http://nielsbosma.se/projects/seotools/

=HtmlH1() =HtmlH2() =HtmlTitle() =HtmlMetaDescription() =HtmlMetaKeywords()

=FacebookLikes() =httpStatus() =XPathOnUrl()

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ALCHEMY

Download this tool: http://bit.ly/alchemyexcel and get an Alchemy API key here: http://www.alchemyapi.com/api/register.html

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As you identify new categories and areas you’d like to explore, try generating a list of very specific terms using mergewords.com

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GOOGLE SUGGEST

Ubersuggest. THE Google suggest scraper tool. Also scrapes Google News!

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GOOGLE SUGGEST SCRAPING

http://suggest.thinkpragmatic.net/?

source=web&query=seo&language=English%2FUK&format=html

//span[@class='keyword web ']

Use this xPath in Google Docs to generate a related keywords list, fast!

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MOST LIKED URLS = CONTENT IDEAS

Import XML Sitemap > Fetch FaceBook Likes > Get post titles

Using =FacebookLikes() can rapidly increase your understanding of what visitors to competitor sites will like

(http://nielsbosma.se/projects/seotools/ )

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WHERE DO I RANK FOR THESE KEYWORDS?

Rank checking is never perfect, but If you’re using a decent proxy service located in the correct host location, the data is useful – especially for measuring visibility by keyword

group / content type

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YOU CAN GET RANKINGS VIA GDOCS

Check out the point made by Tom Critchlow about the use of the &time query for larger scrapes here: http://seogadget.co.uk/playing-around-with-importxml-in-google-spreadsheets/

...............................................................................................................................................................................................QA FORUMS ARE AWESOME FOR BLOG POST IDEAS

View this Gdocs spreadsheet: http://bit.ly/9Fs7aF via: http://seogadget.co.uk/playing-around-with-importxml-in-google-spreadsheets/

http://www.seomoz.org/q/browse?utf8=%

E2%9C%93&visibility=0&time_range=0&sort=0&x=54&y=9&limit=10

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SUGGEST SCRAPING

Separate into columns using the “;” delimiter. In theory this would work with any XML style search suggest output...

Use concatenate to form query URL then:

=XPathOnUrl([URL],"//li")

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GENERATE CONTENT IDEAS

Using Google Docs to generate awesome content ideas: http://seogadget.co.uk/using-google-docs-to-generate-hot-content-strategies/

1. Google Discussions

2. Google News

3. Bing News (best match)

4. Bing News (most recent)

5. Digg (most dugg)

6. Digg (most recent)

7. Reddit (Top)

8. YouTube Top Rated

9. Topsy Latest Tweets

10. Topsy Latest Top Trending Tweets

11. Blog Catalog

12. Yahoo Answers (most answered)

13. Twittorati Search

14. AllThingsNow (Most popular FB

shares)

15. Fark (latest)

16. Fark (most popular)

17. How Stuff Works

18. Redux

19. Helium

20. Cracked

21. Wiki Answers

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GOOGLE INSIGHTS CSV

http://www.google.com/insights/search/overviewReport?q=snowboards&cmpt=q&content=1&export=1

Inspired by Wil at Seer: http://www.youtube.com/user/wilreynolds#p/u/7/KCKHJADqDRk

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EXTRACT INSIGHTS RISING AND TOP SEARCHES

=importXML("http://www.google.com/insights/search/overviewReport?q=burton%20snowboards&cmpt=q&content=1", "//div[@class='elementInCompositeTall']")

And that is how we do that: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Aj4U6wmYE1X6dGdhZ2VxUGFmc2hBVFBNa0R2WTh1M0E&hl=en_US

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LEARN HOW PEOPLE ARE ASKING QUESTIONS

I like this! https://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/keyword-questions

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KEYWORD RESEARCH HOW TO IDEAS

You can use this process for blog content ideas – at least it’s a start! Use markers that indicate a research intent such as “guide”, “how to” etc. Don’t forget that surveys, your own

long tail, Google suggest and QA are great sources of inspiration, too.

Examples of actionableNow you’ve seen the process, and the tools, let’s turn the data into

actionable insight…

...............................................................................................................................................................................................WHAT LINKS SHOULD I FEATURE ON MY HOMEPAGE?

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Sum of Average Monthly

Sum of Ranking

How to choose your homepage links: http://seogadget.co.uk/choosing-your-home-page-links-homepage-seo/

- Which internal pages receive traffic from organic search

- Can we validate search volumes by combining search data?

- Which of those pages are not featured on the homepage?

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HOW TO DECIDE ON YOUR NAVIGATIONSuggested Navigational Structure

Category: Outdoor toys

• Children’s Bikes

• Girls Bikes

• Boys Bikes

• Paddling Pools

• Scooters

• Kids Scooters

• 3-Wheel Scooters

• Mini Micro Scoters

• Wendy Houses

• Play Houses

• Play Tents

• Toy Castles

• Kids Motorbikes

• Go Karts

• Pedal Go Karts

• Pedal Cars

• Kids Quad Bikes

• Swings

• Baby Swings

• Garden Games

• Climbing Frames

• See Saws

• Slides

• Toddler Scooters

outdoor t

oys

"mini m

icro" s

cooter

baby s

wings

kids s

cooter

s

boys bike

s

child

rens s

cooter

s

3-whee

l scooter

"wen

dy houses

"

graco

baby s

wing

kids s

lides

baby t

rampolin

e

kids g

o karts

child

rens o

utdoor t

oys

baby s

wing sea

t

kids o

utdoor t

oys

trike

s for t

oddlers

baby s

wings an

d bouncers

kids o

utdoor p

lay eq

uipment

child

rens r

ide on to

ys

child

rens t

ents

outdoor t

oys dire

ct

child

rens g

o karts

gard

en to

ys for k

ids

baby s

wing chair

pop up play te

nt

kids g

o kart

3 whee

l scooter

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toy c

astles

for b

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oddlers

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Category name

Subcategory name

Sub-Sub Category name

If you’ve built bullet proof categorisation in your keyword research, you can start thinking about putting your navigational structure together

Low hanging fruit

My favourite filter: Keywords that rank around the bottom of page 1

or around the top of page that that are receiving organic search

traffic could be extremely valuable

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Row Labels Sum of SEARCH VOLUME Sum of GOOGLE RANK Sum of VISITS

fathers day gifts 9900 9 12

fire pit 5400 8 14

door stops 4400 12 127

big boys toys 4400 14 29

birthday gifts for men 2400 9 16

candle making kits 1600 10 167

folding shoes 1000 11 9

bar accessories 1000 10 31

black and blum 880 10 14

cyber clean 880 13 11

aroma home 880 9 56

dad gifts 720 11 8

fire pits uk 720 13 7

boys gifts 590 11 83

experience days uk 590 10 7

digital keyring 480 14 23

addict-a-ball 480 13 18

RANK >15th <5th

HAS ADWORDS SEARCH VOLUME

HAS ANALYTICS ENTRIES

HAS COMMERCIAL VALUE?

For extra points, run your low hanging fruit terms through Google Suggest, fetch the rankings and search volumes for your site and re-apply the low hanging

fruit filter!

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MY OLDEST MOST FAVOURITE TRICK IN THE BOOK.

I love this trick. Look down the tail of referring keywords to your pages and rewrite the content to include those terms. It’s old-school but it works!

Richard Baxter, Founder, SEOgadget

Twitter: @richardbaxter

Blog: seogadget.co.uk

Email me: richard@seogadget.co.uk

Come and see us at SearchLove London.

24th and 25th October 2011

Thanks for listening!