Keyword Tips | Increase Traffic | Forum

Mike, you know everything! Big thanks!

A question: Does it vary from country to country? E.g. if I google "Skopje things to do", a post I wrote shows up at towards the bottom of the first page. But is that true only for Google in Norway? And if so, how can one know how a post does in the UK, USA, etc?

Amanda, Mike has given me tons of tips recently, and the best one has been to sign up for the free 12 day trial of Market Samurai.  It is a software program that allows you to research keyword terms.  THere is a ton that goes along with it, but they have a bunch of tutorials that explain the entire program well, very well in fact.  I caught on immediately.  It's an awesome program that I'm considering buying before the trial is up, especially since I'm really wanting to get into the niche sites.  Keywords and keyword phrases are something I've never considered, and now I'm really kicking myself for not learning more about them earlier.  There's a lot that goes into them.  I would highly recommend at least checking out the free trial.  It really is an awesome program, and watch as many of the tutorial videos as you can.  I learned a ton by just spending several hours watching them and taking notes.

Mike, it seems like you sometimes figure out what keywords to go after before actually writing a post. How do you do this? For example, what kind of research did you do to figure out you could go after the "boat making" keyword instead of "boat building"?

And how do you find out the clicks-per-link on those keywords? I'm very curious to learn your secrets! I just tend to write my posts without worrying about keywords and the like, but I know I should start paying more attention.

I have been getting a lot of emails and PMs from people that are having a hard time with finding keywords they can compete with.  People often make the mistake of putting a lot of time and effort into optimizing, building backlinks and SEO for the wrong keywords.

There are some keywords that no matter how hard you try you will never rank for. I see a ton of travel bloggers going for the word Travel..Really? Expedia, Orbitz, Travelocity etc…. Don't waste your time and efforts.

It goes a little further also. My travel blog is certainly not a site dedicated to building boats, but I want my posts to rank well to get traffic.  I wrote a post about building my first wooden boat. My first thought would be to go after the keyword Boat Building. The problem is that it is very hard to rank for. If I were able to get it I would get 2,433 hits per day in position one. (42% CTR on searches) Not something I expect a travel blog would rank well for.

Using a little research I found that I could get the keyword Boat Making. Not my first choice by any means. However the number one position gets 243 hits per day. I am currently number 3. For a travel blog that is pretty good. I plan on getting position 1 soon.

By using a keyword that I would never of come up with off the top of my head I have a single post that will bring in 243 hits per day all year long with no promotion at all. Social media is great for the initial post boost but long term continuous traffic will come with getting the SERPS.

You can do that with every one of your posts and reach your 1000-1000 challenge