How to rank a keyword in Google ?

[payoneer]

How to rank a keyword in Google after humming bird update ?

[Dan-Lawrence]

I would still optimise the target landing page as per tradtional on page techniques and guidelines for the keyphrase, just in conjunction with my, and the other contributors to this threads, comments too

[WhiteboardCreations]

In my opinion, keywords will forever be able to be ranked as not everyone asks Google specific questions. Someone may just enter "general dentist in City"  to find out where a dentist is to make an appointment. That would be a keyword and not so much a topic.

In terms of potentially getting more exposure for what people are searching, you could adopt the strategy of quality topical content as well, so you are working to target both individual keywords and topics together.

[payoneer]

Means i cant rank the exact keywords any more ?

[WhiteboardCreations]

We are getting more and more of this same question from marketers and consultants who "heard" about Hummingbird a couple weeks ago and I agree 100% with Dan and Kevin. I may add...

As we are learning to adapt as well, since we work with smaller businesses focusing on typically 1 location in 1 major city or a couple towns, our conversations are a bit different than most larger SEO companies. We still do talk about keywords, however, we are now including more information about content. For example, instead of just talking about "cosmetic dentists City A" as the keyword which is very broad, we may look at more of what people are "asking" Google , like "how to fix a broken tooth" or "getting teeth whitening" or "benefits of dental veneers" and so much more. They may not be exact questions, but they are proving they are wanting a more specific answer. In comes content served up on a web page and blog articles. The more topical content you can push out there addressing these questions from searchers, the more chance you have in the future to be found.

• Patrick

[KevinBudzynski]

Along w/Dan's answer take a look at this article at searchengineland: 2014 SEO Playbook: Google Hummingbird, Content & Authority.

[Dan-Lawrence]

in short - dont focus on the keyword anymore, focus on user/searcher intent so provide high quality content that answers queries relating to the topic in question and include the various synonyms as well as plural and singular versions of the related keywords if can be done in a manner thats makes sense and provides value