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Keyword Analysis

When you are trying to decide how to promote your site, you should always start with a goals characterization of the site promoting process. The main question you should ask yourselves is "what keywords is my potential user likely to type in the Google search field?" This question is the basis of the first stage in site promoting - keywords research. The purpose of this stage is to build a detailed list of all keywords or key phrases that best apply to your site.

Expanding the Keywords List

The first step to building a keywords list is expending the existing list so it includes all main subjects to which your site relates. The expansion can be achieved by a thorough examination of your site's content, including listing all words, phrases and terms that characterize the various parts of your site.

One should always remember that when expanding the keywords list, you should avoid over-expanding. The more search terms you choose, the more complicated their promotion will be, since when a keyword is more general (e.g.: "marketing"), there will be more competition on this word. When you narrow the scope (e.g.: "internet marketing", or a narrower option: "internet marketing in Israel"), there will be fewer pages on the web regarding the subject (but, naturally, less people will search for that specific subject).

Consequently, keyword choosing requires several steps:

1. Choosing the Right Word
   You are interested that people who reach your site after searching for a certain word, would really find what they are looking for. Therefore, if your site is about marketing (keyword is "marketing"), focus your efforts on this word, and don't deal with additional
   ones (such as:"site building").
2. Choosing an Optimal spectrum
   If you try to cover a sunject that is too broad, you may find that the competition in this area is very hard, and despite all your efforts you will not receive good results. On the other hand, if you focus on an niche that is too narrow, you might end up with good search results on the search engines, but this would be on a subject that nobody is looking for… therefore, you should avoid polarity to both sides (choosing the phrase "internet marketing" and not "marketing" which is too wide or "internet marketing in Mazkeret Batya" which is too narrow).
3. Keywords Variations
   Every word can appear in its single and plural form, and in Hebrew also with preposition letters ("Le", "Me", "Ba", "Ha", "Ke"). write your keywords in English and Hebrew, including the English Word in Hebrew text ("marketing"="shivuk"). You should also think of synonyms (you can use the dictionary or the Thesaurus for that).
4. Locating a Good "Landing Site"
   Locating the place on your site to which you wish to direct searches regarding the subject of "internet marketing". This place should be a central location in your site (meaning: not hiding in some far corner which is hard to reach), and should contain quality information regarding internet marketing. This page should also undergo optimization for the suggested keyword.
5. Defining a hierarchy Between Keywords
   Defining which keywords are of first priority (will be promoted through the homepage), secondary priority (will be promoted in pages that are directly linked to the homepage) or low priority (will be promoted on farther pages on your site).

The result of these steps is a definition of several target keywords and "landing sites" for which we will try to optimize your site's location in search engines results.

Keywords Search System

There are many ways in which you can locate relevant keywords for your site. Following are a few:

1. Site Owner
   Usually the site's owner or its staff will know what the most appropriate keywords are.
2. Checking the Competition
   Checking additional related sites that are competing with you, and examining the keywords appearing on their sites. You should also perform a check in relevant competing English sites for additional translation ideas.
3. Checking Logs
   A thorough check of the site's logs will often result in finding search terms, which were used by web surfers who reached your site, that you didn't consider before. Checking your site's statistics is not enough, since these usually display only the most common search words.
4. Using the Dictionary
   Use the dictionary to find phrases in which your keywords appear, and the Thesaurus for synonyms.
5. Google AdWords
   As I mentioned in a previous article, you can advertise general words with the Google AdWords system and to see which searches were actually performed by users.
6. Assisting Tools for Choosing Keywords
   There are several tools available on the market that assist in choosing keywords and key phrases (see below).

Overture Keyword Research Tool: Overture Keywords

Tracking Results

Tracking the results is performed on two levels: the first level is checking your site's logs in order to look for the following:

1. Successful Keywords
   Which keywords generate the most traffic to your site and which don't? Which keywords bring users that go on to other pages within your site? Which keywords should be optimized? The work never ends.
2. Additional Keywords
   You may often find out that users who chose keywords that you didn't consider still reach your site. In this case you should check if you are well located for these new words, or whether the user found you on the second or third search results page. You should also consider an optimization of these new keywords.

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