Semalt Explains How To Choose Keywords For Your Website And Online Store



The right choice of keywords is fundamental to the success of all subsequent SEO efforts. And while one phrase from an SEO campaign is not enough, a properly performed content audit, phrase analysis, and keyword segmentation will lay the foundation for future ranking success. Check out in this article, how to choose the right keywords, what to pay attention to and what tools to use.

A quick overview of keyword types

At the very beginning, you should learn the basic types of keywords. These include short, long, unbranded, branded, general, local, or intentional phrases.

Key phrases like "short tail"

Short-tail keywords are typically general, highly competitive phrases consisting of one or two words. As a general rule, these phrases usually describe the topic at hand, do not indicate user intent, and can accumulate traffic at each stage of the sales funnel. This means that general short-tail phrases can be entered into the search engine by both people who are beginning to learn about a given topic and are looking for solutions, as well as customers who are motivated to purchase selected services or products.

Examples of short-tail phrases:

Key phrases like "long tail"

Long-tail keywords are usually 3 to 5 words and are much more specific. From "Long Tail" type key phrases, it is possible to define the intentions of people typing a given query into the search engine. Therefore, these types of phrases have a much greater commercial potential, allowing to direct traffic to the website with a good conversion.

At the same time, long-tail keywords are less competitive. This means that it will be easier for you to position your website for a specific "Long Tail" phrase, as fewer entities will position their websites, stores, or blogs for it.

This is because long-tail key phrases generate a much lower average monthly number of searches than short-tail phrases. Searches for a single long-tail phrase may be 5, 10, or 15 times lower than for the more general short-tail phrase that describes your business. Nevertheless, ranking a few long-tail phrases will allow you to significantly increase your website's visibility, effectively aggregating conversion traffic from various queries about your business.

To summarize: positioning for "Long Tail" phrases is a good strategy, thanks to which it is possible to generate significant traffic for phrases with little competition.

Examples of phrases with "Long Tail":

Non-branded key phrases

Non-branded phrases are general phrases in which the brand or product name is not mentioned. If your brand is not recognizable or if you offer services or products from companies that are not popular with consumers, you should position yourself primarily on non-branded phrases.

Examples of non-branded phrases:

Branded key phrases

Brand keywords are phrases that contain brand or product names. These phrases should be positioned mainly by entities operating in the e-commerce sector that offer products of well-known brands. Nonetheless, these phrases are also highly competitive, so the key phrase selection strategy must be carefully thought out and specified.

Examples of branded phrases:

Location key phrases

How to Rank for Location-based Keywords - Explainerd

Location (Regional) keywords are phrases containing the name of a region, city, or district. Such key phrases are perfect for positioning local businesses with a small territorial reach.

Examples of location phrases:

Search intent phrases

Intent phrases are specific types of keywords related to a problem or need of the user entering a query into a search engine. It's worth using these phrases to create useful content for the recipient. In this way, you can attract people to the website who are looking for specific information or who want to solve a defined problem.

Note that the intent sentences result from the so-called micro-moments, i.e. moments in which the user is guided by the current moments, emotions, and momentary needs. It is worth using these micro-moments, simply and specifically responding to users' needs, and thus meeting their spontaneous information, navigation, or transaction needs.

Examples of intent phrases:

How do you choose keywords?

If you're wondering how to choose keywords for positioning, this snippet should point you in the right direction.

Before even analyzing key phrase types, selecting tools, or checking out what competitors are doing, stop for a moment and think about your business. This is the starting point for all marketing activities (including SEO activities).

Consider what words describe your business, what information your customers are looking for, what problems, concerns, and expectations they have, or what services or products they are looking for. Don't just browse your website, blog, or online store. Take a broader look.

Such an overview of your company's stop and review will give you some perspective and help you identify how you can effectively reach potential customers. Remember that people are different and look for the same things differently.

Therefore, before selecting keywords and further defining your marketing strategies, first, audit your business with a good SEO tool such as the Dedicated SEO Dashboard, and try to put yourself in your customers' shoes.

Check the competitiveness of your keywords

The first technical step in keyword selection is to determine how competitive your keywords are. This is the most important parameter determining the ease of positioning for specific keywords.

Competitiveness determines the number of entities that compete for high positions on their subpages for specific keywords. The more competitive the key phrases are, the harder it will be for you to position your website in higher positions. In turn, the less competitive the words are, the easier it is to get good visibility of the site in search results.

You can determine the competitiveness of key phrases with the help of the Dedicated SEO Dashboard tool. But you can also check the competitiveness of a phrase by checking its CPC bid in Google Ads. CPC bids determine the cost per click of an ad and are mainly determined by the bidding of advertisers. The higher the CPC bid, the higher the number of advertisers and ads in the bidding auction. This, in turn, clearly shows the competitiveness of a given keyword.

Pay attention to keyword search frequency

The search frequency of key phrases is determined by the average monthly number of searches for a given phrase by search engine users. Based on the search frequency of a phrase, its potential is determined.

General phrases with a short tail are more frequently searched. Conversely, more specific long-tail keywords have a much lower search frequency.

Note: General and popular key phrases often have an artificially high number of searches. This is since once entities conducting SEO activities while monitoring key phrases have artificially made their impressions. Due to these activities, the current average monthly number of searches for the most "selling" phrases is overestimated by 1,500 to 2,000 searches per month.

Check and specify the seasonality of searches when choosing keywords

The number of searches for several key phrases varies by season. This is of fundamental importance, especially for businesses that operate only in winter or summer or in an even shorter window of time - for example, only during vacations or before selected vacations.

The seasonality of phrases is also of great importance for companies that sell goods or services with seasonal demand.

How do you choose keywords with the user's intent in mind?

The Definitive Guide on Keyword Intent (Free Template) ‐ sitecentre®

Look at key phrases through the lens of the people who type them into the search engine. Remember that there is a living person behind every keyword - and maybe even your potential customer. Search intent has a huge impact on both SEO and directly on sales.

Well-chosen keywords can drive traffic from the entire sales funnel. This means that the right positioning strategy will allow you to reach both users who are at the first stage of the funnel and don't yet have a defined problem and its solution (they don't know exactly what they need), and users who know very well what product or service they are looking for and are motivated to take advantage of your offer here and now.

Correctly interpreting and adapting to the intentions of potential customers at each stage of the funnel will not only provide you with the right amount of good quality organic traffic, but will also allow you to achieve much higher conversion rates.

Search engine user intent is becoming an increasingly important ranking factor for Google. Google tries to guess the intentions of the users by filtering and matching the search results.

Therefore, to ensure a better chance of higher rankings, try to answer questions asked by users in a substantive and specific way and try to tailor sub-pages' content to their intentions.

The 6 canonical consumers need include:
In turn, the micro-moments are classified as:
It will be easier for you to specify the users' intentions, micro-moments, and needs after creating their persona - a model avatar of the ideal customer or customer segment.

Which tool is best suited for keyword research?

SEO tools are the basis for website optimization and positioning. Check out how much opportunity there is in the market and what you can take advantage of. But the real question is which tool is best suited for keyword research.

We know that the market is full of SEO tools. However, the tool that currently receives more positive reviews from SEO Experts is the Dedicated SEO Dashboard. Thanks to its capacity and speed as well as its cost, the DSD has managed to impose itself over most of the current SEO tools on the market. 



The Dedicated SEO Dashboard is currently one of the most popular analytical tools used for position tracking, phrase selection, and competitive research. It would be difficult to describe all the features provided by this powerful SEO tool. 

Indeed, this tool allows you to select and analyze key phrases exhaustively according to their key parameters. In addition, this tool will allow you to learn about your future customers' biggest problems. Publish content that answers their questions and you will greatly increase your chances of ranking well in the search engine.