Step 1: study your niche
- Talk to clients Find out which terms they use to describe your brand, your company or your product.
- Change perspective If you recommended your offer to a friend, how would you talk about it?
- Join in Take part in the online communities of your niche.
Step 2: set your goals
First clarify what your brand and your website are about, what makes your company special and what you promise on the website. The goal follows from that. Do you want to gain more subscribers, or do you have a sales target by a certain date?
The goal sets the direction for your SEO strategy.
The keywords you use later follow this goal. Ideally you divide them across the stages of your content marketing funnel.
Step 3: list your topics
Break the main category of your brand and your goals down into smaller topics. Write down every topic you want to be found for on Google.
A provider of personal care products for men might come up with these topics:
- Facial care for men
- Antiperspirant deodorant
- Eye care
- Shaving
For each topic, ask yourself what your audience will search for on Google.
Step 4: use good tools
Keywords can be researched by hand or with tools. These help:
- Search engines Enter a topic on Google, Bing or DuckDuckGo. The suggestions show related terms, including ones with prepositions and in question form.
- Google Keyword Planner You find it in your Google Ads account.
- Ahrefs Keywords Explorer ahrefs.com/keywords-explorer
- Keyword Tool and Ubersuggest keywordtool.io and neilpatel.com/ubersuggest
Step 5: find long-tail keywords
A keyword that is searched a lot may bring better results. But your competitors are going after the same word.
Seed keyword
A short term close to the main topic of your brand, such as «tennis club». It brings more visitors but less often matches exactly what they are looking for.
Long-tail keyword
A longer, more precise search, such as «What is the best tennis racket for beginners?». It brings fewer visitors, but the right ones, and therefore often reaches a higher conversion rate.
If your website publishes reviews of tennis equipment, for example, a long-tail keyword like this attracts a far more relevant audience than «tennis club».
Step 6: know your competitors
The better you know what your competitors are doing, the better your SEO becomes. You recognise keywords where a good ranking is hardly achievable.
Above all you find gaps, meaning related terms for your brand or industry with low to medium competition.
Professional SEO tools such as XOVI or Sistrix track your Google ranking over time, find your main competitors on their own and compare their ranking with yours.
