As part of our SEJ interview series, Stoney deGeyter of Pole Position Marketing shares some tips for advanced keyword research tactics that will help you outrank your competitors.
I began the interview by asking Stoney how to research what keywords a competitor is targeting in order to position yourself to rank for those keywords better than they have.
Hear Stoney’s advice in the video below:
Here are some key takeaways from the video:
- Stoney warns us not to just blindly follow competitors when it comes to SEO. They might not be doing the right things, which means you will be repeating their mistakes.
- Start with what you know, Stoney says, such as the terms you use every day in your field.
- Stoney uses keyword research tools, like Wordtracker, which you can use to learn how people are searching for what you offer. Learn what terms your audience uses when talking about what you do.
- A lot of businesses get stuck on looking at their industry from an insider’s perspective, whereas the users searching for information about your industry may look at it in a completely different way.
- Stoney gives the example that people looking for used cars will type “used cars” into the search box. But people within the auto industry would rather use the term “pre-owned.” So if you were to optimize a site for “pre-owned vehicles” you would be completely missing the mark.
- The top 3 tools Stoney uses are Wordtracker, Google Keyword Planner, and Visual Thesaurus (to find related keywords).
If you have any questions after watching the video, for either myself or Stoney, ask them in the comments section and we will do our best to respond to everyone! Please visit SEJ’s YouTube page for more video interviews from Pubcon 2013.
Category
SEO
