Same Competitiveness, But Different Ranking Difficulty? I had a client ask me an interesting question today and decided to share the answer with all of Digitalpoint. The question was "Why are certain keywords harder to rank than others with the same amount of search results?". This is actually a great question to ask, you'll see a lot of SEO consultants trying to sell their service based on the amount of search results the keyword has; making this informational vital to not getting duped or taken. You should always remember that just because two keywords have the same amount of search results doesn't mean they are equally hard to rank. Many SEO consultants will use this type of factor to rate how much they charge. Below are two different factors that came make keywords with the same search results amount have different difficulties. Competitors - Now, you can have a keyword with 500,000 search results and 1,000,000 search results; the real difficulty factor lies in how competitive they really are. The keyword with only 500,000 search results might have more SEO knowledge webmasters who put forth more effort in consolidating their rankings, verses the 1,000,000 search results competitors might not be as knowledgable with SEO and lack any actual optimization. Remember, review the first 3-5 pages of competitors to see where they stand SEO wise. Search Volume - Remember, just because a keyword phrase has 1,000,000+ search results doesn't mean it gets tons of daily searches. Using tools like Google Adwords External Keyword Tool and Google Trends is a great way to compare keywords and view what type of search volume they get on a day to day to month by month basis. Why would you pay top dollar for a so called competitive keyword if it only gets 5,000 searchs a month? These two factors alone aren't the only reason why search results can be more difficult than an other with the same amount of results, but they are they key 2 factors you can use when choosing a keyword to work with and also when choosing to pay a so called SEOs rates.
Just as i thought, i must spread some rep before giving it to ssandecki again. *kicks rep system* A really good example of this is the term "Randy Pausch" which is currently on Google's homepage. It's only got 758,000 results, under a million should be a piece of cake but nope not this one. If you have a look at the front page, it's owned solely by PR6 and PR5 pages including 4 .Edu's, Wiki, Time.com and YouTube. You're going to have a fun time breaking in to a top 10 spot on that term, there's 20+ Million result terms that would be easier. The top 10 is your competition, that's who you really need to beat not the XX Million behind them.
Very true, I love when you see the SEO's charging by the amount of results; I get a good laugh every single time
which SEO estimates the ranking difficulty just based on the results? whoever does this must really learn the basics. I mean, that is what even I know, and I wouldn't describe myself as an expert! lol, probably there aren't so many gurus here like I thought before.
Good post ssandecki, but you left out one of the more specific factors in determining the actual competition for a search term. #1 position can be acieved easily for a search term with 1,000,000 "competitors" if you search the term in qoutes as a Google query and find out that there are only a few exact matches to your target keyword. Peace.
Well, we all know that quality and highly targeted keywords are the main source of sales in the SEO world. People are constantly bidding and optimizing for one or two word keywords that are only going to lose their time and money. So the question is, how do you know which keywords are driving your sales? I use the following meathod with free SEO tactics, but I will use PPC as an example. Start with a large number of keyphrases targeted to your website. Use a stat counter with detailed statistics on all of your pages. Promote all keywords at the same time. Track the visitors that clicked through to the sales/conversion page. Make a list of the keywords that were typed in right from the search engine through to the sales/conversion page. Further filter the keyword list to the keywords that brought the customer from the search engine to purchase. Create the list of the quality keywords that are proven sales catchers. Promote those keywords in PPC because you will get more traffic that way. You can even go as far as Miva and still be profitable.
ok, yes this is the general and most effective way to discover the best converting keywords. however, if you want to test so many keywords/-phrases then it wont be cheap . but no pain, no gain
very good post. its the competition which plays a vital part for sure. level of competition depends on how profitable the KW is. for a highly profitable niche, even a long long long tail KW with only 300,000 search result is harder than hell to get ranked on the top than a less profitable KW with over million search results.