Using Keywords: Effective Writing

One of the most basic but difficult writing tasks isnecessary. Because keyword choice can affect
writing with keywords in mind. The writer will bethe cost of advertising, sites must choose wisely.
using these keywords over and over again, so hisRather than limiting keyword options to only
or her first task becomes to pick the keywords.popular or “hot” keywords, sites should
There are several criteria which websites can useresearch an array of keywords to find which
to pick keywords.ones draw the most customers.
- First, what is the general subject of the site?The keywords a site eventually chooses will
What words best describe what the site is tryingbecome the concentration of the page. After all, a
to accomplish? Make a list of all possiblesite needs to have a rich concentration of these
keywords, and don’t limit the list based onwords in its contents, while keeping the text
how specific or broad the potential keywords are.natural enough so that no search engine would
Words like “car” are just as valid as moremisinterpret the page as spam.
specific terms like “sedan,”Keyword Density
“Toyota,” or “Toyota Camry.”Keyword density is a number that search engine
Since websites can fit multiple keywords onto aspiders notice when indexing a page, and an easily
site, they should find the ones that best describechanged element of a page that can affect SEO
their site and their site’s contents.and page rankings. Keyword density is the
- Next, research the keywords online to find outnumber of keywords within a page compared
what the competition is. Type all possiblewith all the words. So, for example, if a site had a
keywords into several different search engines.200 word article on a page, and the article
Start with the big ones, like Google, Yahoo!, andcontained 10 keywords, the density would be
Windows Live, and Ask. Find the competition andabout 5%.
see what they have to offer.There is some disagreement about exactly how
- Now identify how the new site is going to dodense keywords should be, but the general
things better. Are there more specific keywordsconsensus is that a density somewhere between
that other sites don’t have? Is there a niche3 and 6% is preferred. These keywords should
market that isn’t yet being catered to? Sincebe written in natural speech and sprinkled
competition is a large part of increasing page rank,throughout the text, rather than sitting in a list or
a lot of research into other sites is generallyin a bullet point. Using these keywords throughout
required.the text will ensure that the entire text is taken
- If paid advertising of any kind is going to beas relevant to the keyword. Basically, the text
utilized, even more research into the keywords isshould be human as well as search engine friendly.