Using Keywords to Increase Your Search Engine Optimization for Google Search
By: Kimberly Grant
Keywords are powerful and can make or break a company. After all, it’s more than just a word. In marketing, these words have the potential to become conversions and impressions and brand awareness. All fancy words that mean the difference between justifying spending thousands of dollars to reap revenue or close your business in failure.
The Truth is Key
Okay. That’s a bit dramatic, but there is truth to it. There’s also truth to the amount of work, expertise, algorithms, and money that goes into generating keywords for multiple ad campaigns using Google Search Advertising (formerly Google AdWords). These campaigns are especially designed to get the attention of Google Search users and entice them to do something called a conversion. There’s even a four-hour Google Ad course to learn about keyword advertising and get certified.
For the uninitiated, a conversion is basically getting a consumer to do what you want them to do. In most cases for Google Search campaigns, the conversion is either making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter. Either way, there are a lot of research, analytics, bids, campaigns, and money that go into getting to that golden conversion.
The Novelty of Google Search Ads
For example, if I were to sell my novels strictly on KAGrant.com (instead of exclusively on Amazon.com), I could run a Google Search campaign with keywords that bring potential buyers/novel readers to my website’s landing page. A landing page is the page that catapults Google Search users into the desire phase of their buying journey. Once the desire is present, there’s a great chance of my novel being purchased by the user.
For my keyword strategy, I would probably use a phrase match campaign with one of the phrases being: “fantasy novels by women of color”. Anyone Google searching for “fantasy novels”, “women of color”, and any similar words would have a good chance of seeing my Google Ads generated advertisement. To make sure people who see my ad aren’t people interested in science fiction books, I would use the negative keyword phrase “science fiction”.
There are other types of keyword strategies:
- Broad match – any word or phrase that relates to your keyword,
- Broad match modifier – the keyword is actually a part of the search terms,
- Exact match – the person must be searching for the exact keywords, and
- Negative keywords – words you don’t want associated with your ad campaign.
Having a keyword strategy is important, especially when you’re paying Google each time someone clicks on your advertisement. It would not be beneficial to me for a user to quickly click away from my website because it’s not what they are expecting. In fact, I would still have to pay for that click and it wouldn’t lead to a conversion. That, in itself, would put a frown on any marketer’s face.
Practice is Key
Based on Google Search’s practices, it is keywords that hold quite a bit of power when it comes to ad campaigns. Those keywords should be generated after a lot of thought, collaboration, a test or two, and an analysis. This way, you’re getting the most bang for your buck. Otherwise, you lose your power and break your company. No pressure.
Release the pressure of anticipating Kimberly Grant’s next post, by reading the previous post.
