What kind of keyword difficulty should I be aiming for when launching an new site?
-
I know that words in their 20's or 30's would be ideal, but it's proving hard for me to find relevant keywords with such scores (just a couple with scores in the 30's). Is going for words between 40-50 a waste of time?
Thanks.
-
I absolutely agree Marc. This is a HUGE Pro Tip that took me a while to fully appreciate.
By targeting the long tail version in the short run, you can build up some traffic, trust and other metrics. But you're also simultaneously targeting the head term so as time goes along you'll likely end up ranking for both (if you've followed a well devised strategy of course)
Thanks Marc, Cheers
-
I'd say 40-50 is moderate. 30 shouldn't be too much of a problem most of the time if you nail onpage optimization and can get some links. Of course, depending upon budget, time, experience and resources... 40-50 can sometimes be difficult to achieve.
Rather than looking too much at the difficulty score, I'd be looking at the metrics for the top ranking sites and gauging whether or not it's reasonable that I can beat those metrics. Keep in mind, you may not want to pay as much attention to the metrics of an exact match domain or international brand name because you can't duplicate either of them
Pull an advanced keyword report for your top phrases, download them into excel and then add some metrics to them. Once you're done, the big question will be "is it realistic that I can beat these metrics with the allocated (time and money) budget?".
If you can, then I'd pull a "Top Pages Report" with OSE for each ranking website and see what kinds of content and tactics they've employed to get those metrics that are helping them to rank.
Armed with this information, you should have a very clear picture of what needs to be done to win, where to start and if it's realistic or not.
Does this help Zachary?
-
I agree with Donnie regarding targeting local or long tail phrases when looking for keywords to optimize for.
For example, if your client is a plumber, you'll have a hard time optimizing his site for the keyword plumber which has a difficulty of 63% according to the SEOmoz Keyword Difficulty tool.
Since your client is a plumber, though, you could include a local word like the city or town where your client is located and get better results. So seattle plumber has a difficulty score of 41%.
You can often add qualifiers to get commonly searched for long tail phrases for even better results. So best seattle plumber service has a difficulty score of 37% which you could probably get ranked for if you include it in your SEOmoz campaign and focus on it.
While it's not a complete waste of time to go for words that have higher scores than 20s or 30s, you'll probably get better results faster if you go for words with lower scores.
I hope that helps!
-
It helps with the theory, but some more specificity would help Are you saying 40-50 would be considered high demand/difficulty phrases? The problem is that I'm not finding much in the niches I'm targeting at around keyword difficulty 30...
-
I love this question. Ultimately, it really depends on the budget (both time and money)...
In my experience, it's best to start out with either local or long tail type phrases when launching a new website on a shoe string budget (I'm assuming that's the case here?).
Think of it as a mind-map, or informational hieerarchy... write/ build really great content around a small niche-of-a-topic, and grow towards broader (and higher difficulty) phrases as you get links, PR, attention, etc.
I think Google builds some trust up with websites that are ranking for local/ long tail type phrases (and thus the ranking) and sometimes t's easier (cheaper) to build on that trust and expand rather than starting out too ambitious.
I'm not suggesting that you lose sight and give up on the higher demand/ difficulty phrases, I'm merely recommending that you create a content plan that will allow you to grow into them in a methodical way
Does this help?
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Unsolved Questions about travel industry keywords
My question is regarding my current learning of SEO and keyword research. I have been leaning towards Keyword Everywhere, SEMrush, and Google Keyword Planner for keyword research. What do you recommend? I know you might suggest Moz, but I'm looking for something that will enhance and help me find valuable keywords for the travel niche. If I sign up with Moz, will someone from the team help me with keyword research for the travel niche and my website? I haven't found any resources or lessons specifically focused on travel websites and their keywords.
Moz Pro | | RavenBhutan0 -
One of my sites fell off the earth
I manage a handful of sites and have ranked top 5 for a handful of keywords for a long time. I recently checked one of my clients websites and other tier 2 pages will come up but the home page is now not showing up for any listings on Google. Was there a recent update was I put in the mysterious sandbox? I have not modify anything or using any black hat seo tricks. Only thing that was done is the client installed demand force onto their website. Any feedback about an update or about demand force or issue would be helpful. The site is https://www.nwichiropractic.com/
Moz Pro | | Tylerr19850 -
Keyword Rankings Compare to X not working
Anyone else having trouble with the compare your keyword positions with competitors section of the analytics? The rankings for my site(s) are fine but whichever competitor I click on to compare rankings to just returns 'Not in Top 50' the competitor is ranking. I have just manually checked and they are very much listed in the engine. Is this tool broken?
Moz Pro | | GrumpyCarl0 -
Does SEOmoz have a tool to find mirror sites?
I heard from a company that is trying to get my clients SEO business that they discovered multiple sites mirroring our site's content. Does SEOmoz have a tool to find these websites? Or does Google?
Moz Pro | | thomas.wittine0 -
Open Site Explorer - Image Anchor Text
Hey there. I'm researching internal links and In my report I get alot of image links with the following text in the Link Anchor Text column: (img alt)(img)[No Anchor Text]. Is it because my images don't have alt-text or something else... How to optimize correctly? See attached screenshot. Best regards K87xLN8
Moz Pro | | nosuchagency0 -
How to find the authorities site to link from
Hi It seems getting quality authority backlinks is the main priority to success in your SEO which is also most difficult task as well . How do you find these authority sites that allows you to backlink from them? is there any tools to find good quality sites for backlinks? Thanks
Moz Pro | | Matt-kind0 -
How to track keyword performance over time?
The SEOMoz keyword reports show week-to-week changed in keyword positions, but what report can I run to see trends over time so that I can evaluate the effectiveness of our SEO efforts?
Moz Pro | | mhkatz0