Thread by @darth_na

1/🧵
🚨::: Keywords, and Beyond! :::🚨

It’s a standard industry term.
Almost everyone that has heard of SEO knows of “keywords”.

The problem is, the general perception of keywords is out of date!

Worse - there’s no alternative, and few additional terms!

#SEO #DarthAutocrat

2/*

Originally, Keywords were THE thing.
Meta Keywords and string matching.

Other SEs came along, things evolved, Meta-Keywords basically died.

Yet the term remained.
Though how they are used has evolved,
the way they are used for research hasn’t really.

3/*

As competition for “keywords” got harder,
new terms came to the fore:
* Head term
* Longtail
* And then Mid-tail joined in
As more businesses went online, and more sites, pages and content appeared - it became harder to rank for the shorter “keywords”.

4/*

Which brings us “up to date”.

Which, in my opinion - is still limited, sucky and ineffective!

But, before we go further,
let’s make sure everyone is reading off the same page,
and understands “where we are now” :D

(Note the measurements in the pictures!)

5/*

Based on data from @Moz (rounded off),
* Head terms = 20%
* Mid terms = 10%
* Longtail terms = 70%

Head terms are often the most costly, competed, with the greatest volume of matches and ambiguity.
Longtail are the most specific and greater converting

6/*

Head terms.

Primary terms tend to be 1 or 2 words,
often Nouns or Verbs.
These may be ambiguous, and have “mixed SERPs”.
Includes many Navigational/Brand queries,
and may also cover certain Entity Informational queries
Shoes, Pizza, Running, Twitter etc.

7/*

Primary with Secondary terms tend to be 2 to 5 words,
Nouns/Verbs with Prepositions
or Nouns/Verbs with Adjectives/Adverbs.

Often more Informational and/or Commercial
queries, with less ambiguity (fewer mixed SERPs).
Shoe shops near me, Best LED TV etc.

8/*

Primary, Secondary and Tertiary terms tend to be 4+
words, Nouns & Verbs, Prepositions &
Adjectives/Adverbs (even full sentences).

Many Informational and some Commercial intent queries are of this type.
Why are Oxford shoes called Oxfords?

9/*

The longer the term you target,
the more distinctive, specific and unambiguous it is,
the fewer pages you should need to produce to be relevant for it,
and less internal/inbound links.

10/*

The shorter, less detailed the term you want to rank for, the more pages you will need,
with more internal links and inbound links pointing to it.
(Head/Hub pages)

11/*

Each page is meant to target a main term, or set of terms (see "group")

If you produce “topic expanding” content,
you will naturally have pages that include the same “root” term.
(Not really cannibalising!)

12/*

Each page is meant to target a specific thing.
This can be by Variant, Target or Intent.
Variants differentiate by features.
Targets differentiate by audience attributes.
Intents by nature/purpose.

13/*
Consider the following queries:

* get ink out
* get pen ink out
* how to get pen ink out
* how to get pen ink out of shirt
* how to get red pen ink out of a shirt

Are the SERPs different for each?
(Note really!)

14/*

As you can see, the number of words may change - the nature and topic do not.
The order of results may shuffle, but the majority of results are the same pages.

Note the SERP changes, which version triggers ads and where ... and the Featured Snippets.

15/*

Also notice that we didn’t really need “how to” in the query?
We can imply it by removing it - quite safely, as there’s very little chance for ambiguity.
(There isn’t a lot of content about “why to remove ink” etc. :D)

Shows how/why researching competition is important!

16/*

Ambiguous Queries may mean mixed-intent SERPs
(so you may see Commercial and Informational etc.)

Targeting longer queries may mean lower volumes,
but also means less competition,
including advertisers!

17/*

Query: womens eco friendly red clutch handbag london

google.com/search?q=women…

Keyword : handbag
Keyword phrase : clutch handbag
Target terms : Women(s) and London
Variants : eco friendly and red
Intent : Implied (product, so it’s primarily commercial)

18/*

[Womens eco friendly red clutch handbag london]

This could be shifted from implied-commercial,
towards informational (com+info),
by including “which” or “best”

Or the results could be refined by adding Season, Brand, Material, Size, differentiators (sequins?) etc.

19/*

Next up is "nature" (classification).

We know that Google classifies queries.
We don’t know if that includes types/specifics of Intent,
but we do know it covers Adult and YMYL!

Certain words/phrases will trigger different behaviour (poss. inc. anti-spam algos)

20/*

Then we have “groups”.

Some words have abbreviations and/or variant spellings etc.
There’s also synonyms, similar terms and descriptors.

So any “keyword” may actually cover a range of variant phrases.

(And a page may show for several "phrases", and their variants!)

21/*

[womens eco friendly red clutch handbag london]

eco friendly ?= sustainable | recycled | green

red ?= ‘’ | scarlet | burgundy | strawberry

22/*

There’s more to keywords!

Keywords are a bridge -
between the User and the Search Engine!

You need to understand Nature, Intent, Parts of Speech, and how they pertain to Journey Stage, SERP Features etc.

You need to see ways to utilise that information in your content

23/*

Change your research, the docs and reports you make.
Do NOT just include Term, Volume & CPC!

Include:
Primary term(s)
Term group
Intent of each term
Intent triggers (or if implied)
Journey stage
Synonymous words/phrases
Terms that make a difference (or not)
Terms to avoid

24/*

You will find SEO life gets much (much!) easier when you capture/attach the additional information.

From prioritising targets through to ideation, identifying internal link targets etc.

So, give it a go…

Go Beyond “Keywords”.