A Slice of Orange

We’ve all heard these statements: Use keywords in your blog posts. Up your SEO game with the right keywords. Keywords are the key. Keywords matter. So what is all the hype over keywords?

Here’s a simple definition:

Keywords are used in digital marketing to describe a word or group of words someone types in a search engine/search bar to perform a search.

As writers we use that search bar all the time for our research.

And that’s how our readers use the search bar too.

So when we write a blog post – think what your reader would possibly type in their search bar to find what you are writing. And use your search bar to test the keywords you are selecting.

Have you ever searched for something and had to change the wording several times to finally get to what you were looking for? That’s the keyword organization going on. The search engines have specific formulas to organize and index everything on the internet. When someone performs a search, they want to find relevant content.  And why businesses in the SEO and search engine business hype the use of keywords all the time. And teach what they can on the subject. The better everyone uses keywords, the more organized internet content will be.

Keywords are tricky. You can’t use the same ones twice. If you do, they sort of cancel each other out when being indexed. So, when you use only one word, it limits using that word ever again. So using two words and varying one of them for different scenarios would be a good strategy.

Another strategy is to not use words too broad or too narrow. Again, think about the terms you use when searching for similar topics. You want to land on the first page of the search. The more you research, you’ll start to see how to tweak and tailor your keywords to better fit.

• Make sure posts and pages are focused and related to only ONE main idea. When you figure out your keyword FIRST, you write your blog post differently.
• Include your keywords in your title, first paragraph, a subhead or two, and the body text
• Use other relatable words that support the main topic through the post/page
• Include pictures that represent your keywords and add your keywords into the alt text
• Keywords can be tied into your Category and Tag strategy as well, especially if it’s a topic you cover frequently
• You could use your keyword phrase as your slug to keep things simple

Interested in learning more about SEO? Check out my Using a Blog SEO Checklist to Streamline Your Blog Post and/or sign up for my Marketing for Authors newsletter on my website.