Pick Good Keywords and Increase Website Traffic

To get good traffic from the search engines, your website needs to focus on the right keywords. To do it well is not difficult but you'll need to invest some time. No wait - not just "some" time but lots of time!

Here are the steps to SEO using keywords:

1. Research your market.
   1. Who is your target audience? Not who do you think they are, who are they really? You may have several target audiences. Give them names and characterize them.
   2. What is the primary focus of your target audience?
2. Choose keywords.
   1. What phrases do you think people will use?
   2. What phrases will people actually use?
   3. What keywords are searched on but have low competition?
3. Create keyword-optimized content.
   1. Match up your best keywords with pages on your site. Focus on 3-4 keywords / keyphrases per page.
   2. Adjust the content on those pages.
4. Get links to your content from relevant pages.
   1. Get links from web directories.
   2. Get links from the content area of other, related websites.
   3. Do cross linking within your own site (do not link the words "click here" ever!!)

This list is not the details but the basic recipe for SEO and picking keywords. It's no secret and it makes sense. You want to stick with "white hat" (honest) tactics which are long-term. Don't expect results the next day or next week. It'll take time, so be patient - but do it now - that's the main thing. Plant those seeds now instead of waiting until "tomorrow."

-Tony