Keyword Research
Keyword research and analysis are two things many clients think are unnecessary. After all, they know the products and services they sell, and surely this represents a keyword. In a sense, there is a lot of truth to this.
Keyword research and analysis are two things many clients think are unnecessary. After all, they know the products and services they sell, and surely this represents a keyword. In a sense, there is a lot of truth to this.
You have to match keywords to search intent to use the data correctly.
The best way to describe why keyword research is both extremely important and an ongoing process is that the only real data you can trust around keywords is your own.
So, we identify the keywords we believe are most important to users when they purchase. The truth of whether or not we were right is in the Google Analytics conversion data.
Search intent is exactly the information that a user or potential customer is after.
If the user is searching for a “solicitor”, what are they looking for? To employ a solicitor or get a job?
If they search for “how to get a divorce”, this sounds more like a user who may need a solicitor in the future, and it is worth perhaps writing a blog about. This is called informational search intent.
What about a solicitor near me, or the costs of local solicitors, or better still, a divorce solicitor + Guildford? These are the closest to the money and are called transactional search intent.
You need informational searches, too. That is your chance to get in there first and introduce your brand to the potential customer. This is the main purpose of blogs!
Local keywords also take some thought. What is the maximum drive you are prepared to do to visit a customer?
How far will a customer travel to visit your shop, offices or practice? (It is about a thirty-minute drive.) So you can include all keywords and locations in a 15-mile radius (this drops to 3 miles in cities like London.
A search intent is the purpose of the Google query. Google groups these into four different types. More.
Core keywords represent exactly what your business sells. For example, solicitor, electrician etc, all represent core keywords. They are also referred to as short tail keywords and represent keywords with the most traffic, but not necessarily one is the result in the most sales to your business. For example, people searching for solicitor could be searching for a job. If I search for an electrician I could be searching for the average salary of electricians in London. So core keywords are only so useful.
Commercial keywords represent the next stage in matching keywords to sales. Commercial keywords can include brands, i.e. iPhone 15, or services like cheap accountant near me. Commercial keywords can be seen as that gentle nudge between being interested in a product and actually buying the product. It is also a reason to use sales terminology within your content. For example, "Affordable SEO services for small businesses" - you can see how using words like 'affordable' actually represent commercial keyword queries.
Aside from using the data from tools like Ahrefs, a great way of creating new keywords is to brainstorm. Keywords that may have low traction i.e. a low monthly volume may, of course, result in the sale. For example, 'cosmetic dentistry with finance', 'divorce solicitor free first hour'. Both types of keyword do not appear in any data you can download from Google or with a piece of software. However, both of them could easily result in new business.
Vanilla Local has over 18 years of experience identifying additional keyword opportunities and incorporating them into our content.
As the entire team has a degree of traditional marketing experience, creating new offers and exploring new ways to sell your products and services, we do very well.
As Google technology leans more to semantics, where it no longer looks at exact match keywords and tries to ascertain the reason and purpose behind a search query, there is no reason why you can’t take the keyword data and elaborate and improve on it.
In our experience, if we use the right research and analysis, we can increase the traffic to your website by over 400% annual enquiries or sales by 200%.
Chasing all keywords is often unrealistic and can just result in wasted copy and pages.
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Which local keywords should we target first for our main services? Local keywords are your services and products + location. Location is defined as within 15 miles of your location (outside of cities).
Should we focus on “near me” keywords, “service + town”, or “service + postcode”? Near me searches are dynamic. This means you will get a different answer depending on your location. Yes, you should focus on keywords + town, then country, people don’t really use postcodes outside of London.
What locations should we include, and which nearby areas are worth targeting? Within a 30 minute drive of your premises or further if you think poeple will travel further to visit you.
How many local keywords can one page realistically rank for? Depends on factors like the level of competition. With low competition, a single page can rank for many keywords + location.
Do we need separate pages for each service and each location? Yes and no, you need a separate page for each location, but not the service. If the town has no competition, then one page could suffice for all your services. The advantage of one page per location is that you can scale it to include more services + same location. In local SEO, your site is more of a geography website than a business site.
How do you avoid keyword stuffing while still targeting towns and areas? We do this by focusing on location pages that include services. It is about the location, not the services.
How do you decide the best primary keyword for each page? Because we are focusing on location pages, the single main keyword is the town, then we add service and products, etc.
What supporting keywords and FAQs should be included on each local landing page? FAQs like this one are now needed for every page, thanks to AI optimisation. Keywords can all be added to one location page, and the results will tell you if you need more keywords or additional same-location pages.
How do you research local keyword search volume and intent accurately? We use a number of tools, from Google to Ahrefs. Whilst the traffic is always to be taken with a pinch of salt, the ratios of traffic between keywords are usually correct.
Which keywords are most likely to drive calls and bookings, not just traffic? Go back up the page and read about transaction search intent.
How do we target multiple neighbourhoods without creating thin or duplicate content? Easy, we create many location pages, introducing your products and services to each local audience. The content is a little duplicated, but not thin.
What’s the best way to target local keywords on Google Business Profile vs the website? Google Business Profile and, hence, Google Maps are limited to a single location because you have to enter an address manually. You can link to nearby locations, but the options are limited. Your website can rank for any location.
Should we target different keywords for Maps versus organic results? Yes, read the point above.
How do competitor keywords influence the strategy, and can we see a gap analysis? A content gap analysis is a useful tool, but do not assume your competition knows what they are doing!
How will we track local keyword rankings by town and postcode over time? Using a simple SERP checker, we can code this for you.