Keywords Research for Different Search Engines

Every search engine has different requirements for what they want from your keywords. Here are a few basic pointers so that you know what your keyword research should target for each search engine:

Google

url.jpgGoogle has more than 55% of total search volume across the entire Internet and only continues to grow. To break into Google’s listings, you need many things, the most important of which is links. When choosing keywords for ranking within Google’s listings, remember to search for keywords that can be used organically within links and meta tags to boost your ranking. The more you can get keywords that can be linked to your page, the higher you will perform. A quick search for a website with”link:sitename.com” will show how many links it has and you can almost always guarantee that your top competitors will have dozens or even hundreds of links with their keywords in them.

yahoo_logo.jpgYahoo!

Yahoo! rewards well for keyword placement in links as well, making it vital that you choose the best keywords for your content meta tags are valuable, they are secondary and can be manipulated to match Yahoo!’s requirements fairly easily. If you select quality keywords and optimize them well, you can reach higher in Yahoo!’s listings in little to no time.

MSN/Live

livesearch.jpgMicrosoft’s search engine is hard to quantify because it is always going through revisions. With only 11% of the total search volume to date though, there is little need to worry about how you will rank in Live. If you choose keywords that optimize well in your links for Google, you can be sure that you will rank well for Live.

Thinking Organically

While search engines like Yahoo! and MSN/Live may be fairly easy to work your way into, Google requires careful consideration of how your keywords work. With its natural language filters and its emphasis on inbound links, you must seek out keywords that are generally grammatically correct and that work within the context of your content. Don’t choose jumbled messes of word fragments and use them 12 times per page. Also stay away from words that have nothing to do with your page’s overall content. If links, keywords, and content do not match up, you can be penalized for spamming. You want it to appear that everything you are doing is organic – that you are simply providing quality content and not trying to boost your search engine ranking.

May 9, 2008 | Filed Under Basic Keyword Research 

Comments

Leave a Reply