Tag Archive for ‘keyword research’ at Amplify

Let’s throw some numbers out there:

91% of journalists use search engines to research stories (Pew Internet & American Life Project, March 2007)
98% of analysts use search to research and find news (Forrester Research, 2006)
Seven out of 10 people initiate their Internet experience with a search, and 49% of people use search daily to find information online (Pew Internet, August 2008)

Search engines are part of everyday life. While most PR specialists have heard of SEO, for them it’s just a way to get media releases ranking well on search engines. But it can be so much more than that.

Harnessing the power of Search

Search engine optimisation can help you gain quick wins by increasing positive brand visibility - if you do it right. As brand reputations are increasingly shaped by search engines, communications executives must look further than just optimizing media releases. There are also blog posts, corporate websites, social media sites and other online assets. Incorporating a holistic search optimisation strategy for the aforementioned can:

Increase the exposure of assets
Connect clients to key stakeholders
Increase brand awareness
Drive more traffic to corporate websites
Generate sales leads.

And the best thing about SEO? All PR specialists need to do is what they do best: words.

Well, not simply words… But keywords

Keywords are what search engine crawlers look for when someone types a query into a search engine. Optimizing PR material for words that people are searching for is paramount, and this starts with keyword research.

Keyword Research

The first step begins with the discovery phase – what are the objectives of this PR exercise? Who are you speaking to? What are their preferences? Recognizing these factors will put you in the right state of mind when you next start identifying possible phrases that consumers use when searching for particular products or services.

During this phase, think of both broad and specific words that are relevant to the brand in mind. There are a number of keyword research tools out there to help you, though none are perfect just yet. So it’s always good to use multiple tools to compare different keywords that are generated. Here are some free tools that are out there:

It’s easy to drown in hundreds, even thousands of keywords at this point. To counter this, moderate your list only include the ones that are highly relevant. You won’t be able to include every last keyword in your PR communications anyway.

Optimising your PR content for Search

Integrating keywords into your PR material is more than just sprinkling them in your content after writing a press release. SEO should be considered from the start. Here are some rules of thumb:

Ensure keywords are strategically placed in your headlines, sub headings, and body text
Avoid keyword stuffing. Search engines are good at detecting poorly optimized content, and may sometimes regard this as spam
Add relevant, keyword optimised tags. Tags are a great way to organise and classify your PR releases or blog posts whilst creating an extra layer of context for both search engines and consumers
Where possible, add keyword rich links within your articles
Give each article, blog post, media release its own unique page with a keyword optimised URL – just like this blog post. This is not only beneficial to SEO, but lets you track the exact amount of traffic or sales gained from each PR effort

Sound easy? Keywords are just the beginning. It gets more complicated when you’re trying to manage a crisis, which will be covered in the near future. In the meantime, I’d love for you to share any ideas relevant to this topic.

So your Google PPC campaigns are under-performing… Or your SEM client now wants you to do sort out their SEO… This is where running a Google AdWords Search Query Performance Report could come in real handy!

Search Query Reports – Where the magic happens

So what’s a search query report? It’s a report containing nearly every searched term that triggered a Google PPC ad. You find it under the AdWord’s Reports tab and it comes loaded with heaps of information on user search queries.

Which keywords are converting? Which ads are performing?

Say you want to know which search query is your highest performer and which of your ads gives you the best return from that query… Search Query Reports deliver. You can drilldown to average position, clicks, impressions, CTR, etc, and at a glance identify the winners and losers among your ads and your keywords.

Spot negative keywords. Spot new ones too!

If you find your ads are being shown through irrelevant search terms, add these to your list of negative keywords. And should you happen to come across new keywords which led to conversions (if conversion tracking is on) you know what to do.

Give your CTR a boost!

The proof is in the pudding! When we tweaked the performance of a new account following our analysis of a Search Query Report, we noticed an immediate performance lift; a 20% sales rise coupled with a drop in our CPA!

You might not get this result every time, but with new accounts when you’re unsure about where you’re at, a Search Query Report can point you in the right direction.

A perfect SEM tool? Well… almost!

One thing you’ll notice when you run a Search Query Report is that Google spits out results in that show up as ‘## other unique queries. And no (before you ask), you cannot see what those ‘unique queries’ are… So what’s up with that?

Firstly, it’s labeled as a ‘unique query’ because that’s exactly what it is: ‘unique’. It may be a sentence long and could turn up once a year at best, so you’re not missing out! Google lumps these ‘one of a kind’ queries with the other one timers to save you the bother of sifting through the clutter.

Secondly there’s a server issue. Listing all one off queries would require heaps of memory – and even Google can’t carry that load!

That said… Give Search Query Reports a try and see how you go! It could make a big difference to your accounts.

Amplify