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28 Feb This post is from from my other blog here In a few recent conversations I’ve had with potential clients, I’ve discovered that a few of them have done quite a bit to optimize their ecommerce websites for search traffic, from creating relevant content in the form of informative articles, maximizing the number of indexable pages, and including keywords in appropriate ways. These clients have tried to learn the basics of SEO by researching it and have learned a lot. Still, there’s no way anyone can learn everything. The Long Tail Concept One topic that sometimes escapes people is the ‘Long Tail’ approach to SEO. It’s an important concept in search optimization and one that really forms the basis of a successful natural search optimization effort. Let’s look at what this means.
*Image source: Wikipedia, ‘Long Tail’ The above graph is an example of the concept, with the y-axis being revenue and the x-axis being keyword. The green part of the graph represents the majority of general search terms which comprise the bulk of your revenue. As you trail off into the yellow part of the graph, you see more narrow, focused and specific search terms which also relate to less revenue. In this yellow area, traffic starts to fall off but people are searching for specific items. Get those specific items in front of them, and they’re likely to buy. Long Tail SEO Example For example, a seller of backpacks might compose their top list of keywords thusly: backpacks, black backpacks, brown backpacks, rolling backpacks, kids backpacks, and leather backpacks. These are fine, sensible keywords and it makes sense that these might be the most popular search phrases related to backpacks. Optimizing your site for these terms is nothing but smart. Looking at that Long Tail graph, these would be the keywords in the green part, the ones which will probably make up the bulk of your site’s revenue and searches. But these are also going to be the most competitive words that you’ll have a harder time ranking organically for. A quick look at the free Google AdWords Tool reveals 140 more related keywords, revealing many more potential keywords to optimize for. These keywords would be in the yellow ‘tail’ of the graph, and while each keywords is associated with less revenue, there are many more search terms in the tail, so that revenue piles up. The Long Tail Keywords For backpacks, ‘black mesh and leather water bottle backpack’ is a less popular search term but at the same time is more specific. If someone searches for this term and finds it on your site, they will be much more likely to buy it than someone searching for simply ‘backpacks.’ Another example of a Long Tail search term might be something like ‘rolling camera backpack cell phone pocket.’ A customer searching for this knows what he wants! These are made-up terms, and nothing I made-up could substitute for actual keyword research, but you get the idea. Applying Long Tail to PPC Looking at that graph, keywords in the green part are more expensive because they have more search traffic associated with them. The yellow portion represents the numerous low-cost keywords that may actually equal the revenue potential of the expensive, popular keywords if taken together over time. You could spend the bulk of your PPC budget chasing after the expensive big-time words, or you could target the lower-cost words with less competition. Researching the Long Tail keywords Paying for top words can be quite costly, and if you’re budgeting for PPC naturally you want to maximize the positive impact on your revenue. A keyword research tool will be your best friend in this regard. MightyMerchant’s article, A Comparison of Keyword Research Tools, is just that, a look at a few top free and subscription keyword tools. In the absence of a subscription, utilize every free keyword tool you can find, as the data is bound to be different from each one. Keep note of every different permutation that comes up. Keep in mind that some search engines utilize word stemming when they return results and some don’t. So for instance, a search query such as ‘picture frame,’ might return results with the words ‘framer,’ or ‘framing’ in addition to ‘frame.’ One important strategy that people often overlook is to simply ask people what they would really search for. One of our clients, Bruce Berg, who is a wedding photographer here in Oregon, also receives a lot of business from ‘high school senior portrait photography.’ This was the actual search phrase that Bruce pursued for a while, until he met up with some real high school seniors and asked them how they looked for their senior class photographer. When he learned that the popular search phrase was ’senior pics,’ and not ‘high school senior portrait photography’ as he had assumed, it didn’t take him long to be on the first page for that term! Long Tail Bottom Line The take-home point is, neglecting less popular search terms=bad. Optimizing for the popular search terms and the less lucrative but less competitive search terms=very, very good. Your email: Subscribe Unsubscribe
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