How is the keyword difficulty score calculated in SEOMoz?
-
The SEOMoz PRO tools provide a keyword difficulty score. How is this calculated? And is it a score for organic search competition or for PPC competition?
-
I'd like to chime in and request a formula too. maybe it's a secret because moz doesn't want competitors using this number... but then, it wouldn't take much (i assume) for someone to reverse engineer the score based on data inputs from moz.... so maybe it's not secret? if not, i'd reallllllllyyyy like to know.
interesting sidenote: i've noticed a range of about +/- 10 points on the difficulty score from a given domain authority with a domain's ability to rank for that keyword
-
Greetings Doug, I echo Mike's request. It would be wonderfully supportive of you or another staff member to give one (or more) examples on how "Domain Authority and Page Authority for the top 20 search results on Google".
I cannot simply present to my boss and say, "SEOMoz shows this keyword as 62% highly competitive." My boss is wise enough to ask, "Explain what 62% means. Show me how this applies."
Fair question.
One example from you in layperson terms would be highly appreciated. Then, I may replicate myself and thereby explain the value and origin of the measure.
Please "teach a person to fish ..."
Cheers, Loren
-
Thanks Joel, that helped
-
Hi Doug,
Is there any deeper information available other than "based on Domain and Page Authority"? How is it calculated? You may not know but how about any Mozzers?
Thanks
Mike
-
Ben, it's search competition based on the Domain Authority and Page Authority for the top 20 search results on Google. The score doesn't come from adwords, that's used for the search volumes.
The links on this page explain how Domain and Page authority is defined:
http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo
Joel's link provides a full run-down of the keyword analysis tool.
-
Straight from SEOMOZ
Where does your tool get its search volume data from?
For this tool, we get our search volume data from Google's AdWords API.http://www.seomoz.org/help/keyword-analysis
I hope this helps.
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
-
Focus Keyword
Hi everyone! I am pretty new to SEO so all the help would be great. Does every webpage on our website need a focus keyword for example like the about us page. We have webpages for every location in the UK - Would it be helpful if the location webpages had a focus keyword also? Just to note that I am using Yoast on Wordpress. Many thanks,
Keyword Research | | SMCCoachHire
Aqib0 -
Keyword Ranking Research Question
Hi Mozzers,This is probably a nooby question, but I was wondering how you guys end up deciding if a Keyword is too hard to rank for? Also vice versa, when do you decide that a keyword is too low volume to rank for so you try to rank for a harder keyword? Eg.
Keyword Research | | steve45058
Deciding that ranking for "Dell Computers" is too hard and then deciding to rank for "Dell Small Business Computers" Post-question: Do indirectly rank for Dell Computers if you try to rank for Dell Small Business Computers? If so, how much? Also, how many words inbetween Dell & Computers would there have to be to stop indirectly ranking for Dell Computers?1 -
Tag usage based on Google keywords
We are making a site that will be a database of publicity stunts. We used the Google Keyword tool to find a bunch of words related to this. The term itself has similar keywords such as [pr campaigns]. And also there are some derivative keywords as [bad publicity stunts], [famous publicity stunts], [celebrity publicity stunts]. Each bringing in 20-50 monthly searches for the exact term. Some concepts appear slightly differently such as [famous pr stunts] and [famous pr campaigns]. We'd love our pages to appear on as much of these keyword searches as possible (overall we expect about 3k-4k searches /month on exact matching). And we're planning to use these keywords as a our taxonomy for our post tags. That way the keyword appears in each stunt page AND there is a page for each type of publicity stunt. As a general policy, what would be the best way to write our tags?
Keyword Research | | davhad
1. 'crazy', 'famous', 'bad'.
2. 'crazy publicity stunt', 'famous publicity stunt', 'bad publicity stunt'
3. 'crazy publicity stunt', 'famous pr campaign', 'bad marketing stunt' Thanks for sharing your expertise.0 -
How many times to use a keyword on a page?
Okay, so i have read around, and watched Matt Cutts' video on this and read rand's post about this. But, I still have questions; how many times should I use a keyword on a page? I have read for shorter pages 2-3X and 4-6X for longer pages. I know to put it in the url title h1, the first paragraph and sprinkle it around the page. Is it all realtive to how long the content is? or should I just be following the 2-3X and 4-6X rule? Thanks for your help. Peter
Keyword Research | | PeterRota0 -
Keyword tool
Does anyone know of any good keyword tools that will help me find and then maintain a list of keywords? I currently use Google adwords and now the keyword tool from Moz but I am looking for something that will help me find and generate keywords not just get statistics about them. Thank you.
Keyword Research | | shiftins1 -
A question about local longtail keywords
Hello all. This is my first interaction with SEOmoz, and I am still in my learning phases. I currently own a lawn fertilization company near Allentown, PA. I do the site for myself, and I am ranked number one for organic lawn care for my cities. My question may seem kind of elementary, but I just want to clear this up for myself. I want to start a side business doing SEO, and from what I gather step one is keyword research. I plan on building new sites to start as opposed to going in and fixing existing ones. So, I've been reading a lot on how to do keyword research and so forth. I will use my current business as a reference for my question. Should my main keywords be along the lines of "lawn care" and "lawn services", and then the location specific stuff be seperate? Or should my main keywords be "lawn care allentown, pa"? I plan on running my business solely for local businesses, so I am not to interested in competing with the entire world for keywords. I just wasn't sure how to differentiate my keyword research for local business. I hope that question made some sense. I am really starting to grasp the elements of SEO, but for some reason the keyword part of things perplexes me. Thanks for any responses!
Keyword Research | | GroundFloorSEO0 -
Is it normal for the keyword difficulty tool to be moderate one month and highly competitive another?
I designed a website a month ago and found moderate keywords to use through the SEOmoz tool. Now when I search them again, they are all highly competitive. Is it seasonal? Should I redo the keywords?
Keyword Research | | lwilkins0 -
Question about keyword
I had read a post in SEOmoz about keywords. According to it, The best keywords are 1. High Volume (many searches/month) 2. Low Competition 3. High Value (large % of visitors convert) My question is how can i find about 2nd and 3rd point. High search volume is shown in many Tools including Google adwords, but how can we be sure to find keywords that are low in competition and at the same time high value.
Keyword Research | | seoug_20050