Everything we do in SEO starts with smart keyword selection.
Everything comes down to the words buyers use in Google whether typed into the browser, using voice dictation, spoken into devices like Amazon Echo, Google Home or in Apple’s Siri.

What we’re up against…

Over one billion websites. 60 trillion pages. And growing every day.

There are more than 10 million Google search results for the phrase “keyword research“. Our goal with search engine optimization is to influence the position and engagement that a web page receives for a keyword search (AKA “search query”).

3 Factors Impacting Search Engine Visibility
Three factors have a dynamic relationship on page ranking and it varies depending on the keyword phrase

1. Competitiveness of the keyword: Ranking competition varies depending on the popularity of the keyword phrase. The more competitive a keyword, the more difficult it will be to rank.
2. On-Page Factors: Page content and topic, link text, site structure and user engagement from Google. Think of user engagement this way: If a search visitor clicks on your link and immediately bounces back to Google, they’ve sent a strong signal to Google that your page wasn’t a good result.
3. Off-Page Factors: Quantity of inbound links pointing to the web page and social signals such as authorship & viewership. Think of Off-Page factors as “TRUST”, “AUTHORITY”, relevancy and credibility.

It’s Much Harder to Rank in 2018 with Semantic Search
For years now, Google has been able to understand what a web page is about so that it can map search results to user intent. We call this approach “semantic search”. Here’s how it works.
BEFORE: How do I rank for this keyword?
NOW: How best do I answer my prospect’s question?

Google aims to offer the most relevant results for a search query. It determines ranking position by evaluating how well your content answers the searcher’s question. Google is looking for signals that suggest the author is an AUTHORITY on the topic.

Semantic Search Example
Try this example to see how semantic search works.

STEP #1)
• Google the phrase: Who is the wealthiest person in the world?
STEP #2)
• Review the search results. The top results indicate that Google understood that by searching for “wealthiest person” in the world, you were looking for current data or a list indicating the wealthiest people in the world. Google returned the result you wanted, even though your exact phrase may not have appeared on the top search results.
• Who Was Ranked in Position One and Why? The pages returned are from sites that are deemed to be an authority on the topic. For example, Time.com produces this same list every year and they are a ‘trusted source’.

Keyword Selection: How Do You Find the Right …