Wednesday, October 29, 2008

How to select good keywords

By Brian Basch

Just as a clever tagline can clinch the deal for a TV advertisement, the same way the right keywords are crucial for a good PPC campaign. The keywords can act as the foundation of your entire campaign. Strong keywords will help make your campaign a success but weak ones can lead to disastrous results.

In order to make a good keyword list you will need to make sure you do your research. Drill down and look into every likely keyword carefully. You can then choose the very best keywords for your campaign.

To give you a clear idea on how to expand your list, we will provide you with an example. In this example, the base keyword "real estate" has been taken as the base keyword.

"Real Estate" is a highly competitive keyword due to high commissions.

The first thing to do is create your first list. Think of all the alternatives that your prospective clients could use to interpret the base word. Now for the word real estate, people can use words like real property, investment property etc. these words are still very similar to the base keyword therefore you should continue the search.

After this you will dig down into the different specialty markets of real estate. For example; commercial real estate and boarding houses etc. Then you will mix these sets of keywords and generate new ones.

You can also create an ad group that will focus entirely on real estate company names. You can also add a .com to the name or your own country extension. It would not matter if such a domain does not exist, sometimes people type similar things into the search engine giving you an opportunity to get your product some low cost clients.

Try not to use general keywords; a better idea is to use keywords that specifically target your own niche market. Put yourself in your potential buyer's shoes to discover the keywords that they use.

Here are some points to note:

- .com, .net etc. can be added to your keyword.

- Domain names and company names can also draw customers.

- Enhancing keywords with words like; best and cheap can be added to your keywords.

- Check your web logs to find out the keywords your visitors used to find you.

- Your competitors sales copy is worth checking out.

A good tactic is to make different lists for different categories of keywords, plurals in one, typos in another. If you do this you will be able to pinpoint your potential customers better.

You can make considerable lists of keywords from the information you have found in this article. When you choose winning keywords nothing will impede your progress. When you arm yourself with effective keywords you will make an outstanding campaign. Good luck! - 15634

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