How to Find SEO Keywords + Our Favorite Tools
Solid SEO (search engine optimization) keywords are the foundation of your SEO strategy.
If you’ve read our Ultimate Guide to Squarespace SEO, you know the importance of investing energy in your SEO and how it can transform your marketing strategy – because what’s the point of having a beautiful website if no one can find it?
We get that most small business owners know SEO is something they need, but it usually seems overwhelming and complex leaving them feeling unsure where to start. That’s why we’re taking it back to basics today and breaking down all things SEO keywords – what they are, how to find them, and how to use them.
What are SEO keywords?
SEO keywords are the words or phrases that people type into the search engine bar.
For instance, let’s say you want to make some banana bread, but you’re not sure how. You’ll probably turn to Google and type in “banana bread recipe” (that’s your keyword), and Google will bring up a bunch of website pages with the phrase “banana bread recipe” included in the content.
Shorttail vs. Longtail Keywords
There are two types of keywords: shorttail and longtail.
A shorttail keyword is one or two words, like “banana bread”. Because they’re less specific, they’re often much harder to rank for because there are so many pages on the internet competing to rank for that keyword.
A longtail keyword consists of three or more words that come together to form a phrase. Think: “healthy banana bread recipe with nuts”, “website designer in Oceanside CA” or “how tall is Tom Cruise?”
Longtail keywords have lower traffic volumes, but yield higher conversion rates because they’re so specific. This makes them easier to rank for on Google – so when you’re searching for keywords, you’ll want to focus on longtail keywords.
Got it? Let’s move on!
Where do I find SEO keywords?
Start by brainstorming a few longtail keywords for your business. Think about all the different services or products you offer. If you’re a location-based business, this makes it a lot easier to rank for those specific longtail keywords, like “massage therapist in Atlanta GA”.
Using that example, your keyword brainstorm list might look something like:
Massage therapist Atlanta
Message therapist in Atlanta Georgia
Massage therapy Atlanta GA
Massage therapy in Atlanta GA
Swedish massage Atlanta GA
Prenatal massage in Atlanta GA
…and so on. Try to come up with 10-20 longtail keywords that are relevant to your business. If you need help finding more, head to Google or Pinterest (yep, Pinterest is a search engine – just like Google!) and type in a few of the keywords you’ve already come up with to find more related keywords.
How do I know which SEO keywords are the best?
Now, we’re going to take your SEO keyword brainstorm list and evaluate it to determine which of those keywords are going to be the most effective on your website.
To evaluate the quality of your keywords, we’re going to use two metrics:
Search Volume - the number of searches for this keyword per month
SEO Difficulty - a number from 1-100 that tells you how competitive the keyword is to rank for
You don’t want to just say, “I want to rank #1 for ‘massage therapist in Atlanta’” and leave it at that. You need to be strategic and find keywords with the right balance of high search volume (meaning enough people are searching for this keyword) and low SEO difficulty (meaning you have a better chance of ranking for it).
Our Favorite Keyword Research Tool: Ubersuggest
Now that you know what you’re looking for, let’s open up our keyword research tool.
There are several different tools out there to perform keyword research, but our favorite is Ubersuggest. It’s free to get started, and it gives you all the information you need (and none that you don’t).
The free version of Ubersuggest allows you to perform three keyword searches per day, so if you hop in every day for a work week, you can evaluate fifteen of your keywords from your brainstorm list.
How to Evaluate the Keywords From Your List
Head over to Ubersuggest and type in 1-3 of the keywords on your brainstorm list.
Hit search, and a results page that looks like this will come up:
It shows the keywords you’ve typed in, plus more keyword ideas related to your keywords so you can compare.
Let’s evaluate what we’ve got here, remember – we’re looking for the right balance of high search volume and low SEO difficulty.
Let’s start by looking at the SEO difficulty (the “SD” column in the screenshot above). Ideally, you’re looking for a number in green, but low numbers in yellow are okay, too.
In this example, we have “massage therapist in atlanta georgia” and “couples massage in atlanta georgia” in green. Unfortunately, no one is searching for “massage therapist in atlanta georgia” because it has a search volume of 0. This is why it’s so important to do your research and not just slap your keywords on your website without evaluating them first!
But “couples massage in atlanta ga” has a very low SEO difficulty of 13 PLUS a search volume of 320. That’s a great balance, and this keyword phrase wasn’t even on the initial brainstorming list!
*PRO TIP: Keep track of these keywords in a spreadsheet or note. Jot down the keyword, the search volume, and the SEO difficulty so you can compare all your best keywords to decide which ones to use.
The keywords with the next lowest SEO difficulty numbers are “massage therapist atlanta ga” and “massage therapist atlanta”. Both have an SEO difficulty number of 38, but one has 210 monthly searches and the other has 720. This makes “massage therapist atlanta” the better keyword. Add it to the list!
Starting to get the hang of it? It’s actually pretty fun, especially if you’re a numbers person!
Bonus Tip: How to Creep on Your Competitors
Another way to find great SEO keywords is to peek at what your competitors are doing.
Plug their website URL into Ubersuggest
Scroll down to the “Top SEO Pages” section
Click “View All” under “Estimated Visits”
Then you can see the keywords they’re ranking for along with the volume and SEO difficulty – These are more keywords to add to your list!
Once you’ve searched all the keywords from your brainstorming list in UberSuggest, it’s time to pull up your spreadsheet or notepad and choose which ones will make the cut on your website.
How many keywords do I need on my website?
We recommend having one keyword for each page on your website.
If your website has five pages, you’ll need five keywords – one for each page.
The more pages you have on your site, the more opportunities you have to rank for certain keywords. That’s why having a blog that you keep updated and post to regularly is so integral to your SEO strategy – learn more about why your website needs a blog here.
Using the evaluation techniques you learned above, compare what you’ve got and select a keyword for each page of your website.
And there you go! You’ve successfully performed keyword research for your website.
Now what?
What do I do with my SEO keywords on my website?
Now it’s time to plug those carefully-researched longtail keywords into your website so Google can see them.
You’re going to take your keyword for each page and put it in the following places on that page:
Your H1 (heading 1)
This is the first heading on each page. For SEO purposes, you should only have one H1 tag on each page.
Sometimes, it doesn’t make sense to have your focus keyword in your H1 tag, and that’s okay – if you need to prioritize good copy over SEO, do it. You can still gain your SEO keyword benefit elsewhere on the page.
At least one H2 (heading 2)
In the first 100 words of your copy
Wherever else it makes sense in your copy
Remember that Google is smart and can tell when it’s being tricked. Avoid “keyword stuffing” (using your keyword too many times on your page) as this can actually negatively impact your ranking. Not to mention, keyword stuffing can also make your website copy uninteresting and uninviting to actually read.
Image file names
Image alt text
Here, you’ll want to describe each image (while adding in your focus keywords).
For example, if you have an image of a bride holding a bouquet of flowers on your website, your alt text might be “bride holding bouquet of peonies and greenery”, but then you also want to add your focus keyword (only once) to the end of that sentence: “bride holding bouquet of peonies and greenery - florist charleston sc”.
Page SEO title
This is the title of the page that people see in the Google search results. Make sure you incorporate your focus keyword here, as well as your business name.
For example, your homepage SEO title might be “Massage Therapist Atlanta - Lotus Massage Co”.
To update this in Squarespace, hover over the page name in the sidebar and click the gear icon. Then, navigate to the SEO tab and find the spot for your SEO title.
And there you go – you’re on your way to optimizing your website for the search engines, showing up on Google, and driving more traffic to your website. Good for you! 👏🏼
Ready for more? Check out our Ultimate Guide to Squarespace SEO for more ways you can get Google to love your website.
PS: If you really want to get serious about this SEO thing, Schedule a Call with us to learn more about our options for helping you with ongoing SEO management.
More soon,
Mara
WEB DESIGNER + SEO SPECIALIST
P.S.
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