Some of my recent clients require me to use long tail keywords (i.e. instead of just "health," they give me long tail keywords/keyphrases like "specialized health provider greater UK." While there are some that I find easy to use/incorporate in the articles, there also are those that are just too darn difficult to use. To make matters worse, the client would require me not to rearrange the words. How do you deal with long tail keywords? Have there been instances when you just simply found it difficult to write? Were you left with no choice but to rearrange the words somehow or perhaps insert a word or two in order for the sentence to sound better?
I use dots, commas, parenthesis, or quotes as a way to cope with those long tail keywords but you need creativity gluing such sentences. Let's try your example, "blah, blah, blah, in which we are specialized. Health provider (Greater UK) other than this, blah, blah, blah" I know, there is not such thing as Greater UK, but Greater London, however query Google and look what you get, Results 1 - 10 of about 15,000,000 for greater uk. <<< typed lowercase on purpose. Keyword-oriented clients don't mind that much if an article makes sense and don't care about these little tricks as most search engines ignore punctuation, lowercase, or uppercase words.
When I'm writing these rather peculiar long tail phrases, I just totally restructure the sentence(s). Sometimes, you have to completely change the shape of the thought you wanted to convey in order for the key phrase to be used. Sometimes doing this somewhat alters the flow of the article you had envisioned. But usually, you can resume the flow in the next paragraph.
I've used these on rare occasions, but normally I just tell clients I only use phrases that flow naturally in the text - otherwise what's the point of paying me big bucks to write it? When I am forced to use them, I usually just mesh the words in the best I can - most of the time it's like jamming a square peg in a round hole, but it works, I guess. Rebecca
If it is SEO work they need done, I do what the client wants. However, if I know my client has an established base, I'll let them know that this just isn't what you need. Providing your guests and customers with relevant and comprehensible information will help you out so much more. If they disagree, I'll go ahead with the job and work around those long-tail phrases until I can make it stick. A job needs to get done no matter how difficult the task.
Thank you for the replies everyone! I do what you do as well, Trusted Writer. The dots and commas do help! Justin --- I want to do what you do --- let your clients know that that just isn't what they need. Sometimes there's always hesitation on my part (I wouldn't want to tick the client off) but then again I feel that it also is my responsibility to enlighten the clients. Bottom line is --- do whatever it takes to make the clients happy!