Your most important and fundamental challenge is selecting appropriate keywords that are going to give your website that extra umph it needs to succeed over your competition. If you planned the construction of your website correctly you should have already given yourself appropriate time to think about a specific handful of keywords that you are going to build your website around. The question is: How did you come up with your shortlist of money-making, attention-grabbing, relevant keywords that are going to bring you, not only traffic, but quality traffic that is much more likely to purchase your product or services when they visit your website?

A keyword is a word or phrase that someone will type in to a search engine’s search window to find the information they need. A key “word” may contain more than one word but it’s still considered a keyword (singular) and NOT keywords (plural). A keyword that contains three or more words is considered a “long-tail keyword.”

When you start making your website keyword list you want to make your list entirely of long-tail keywords. Why? Because just about anything that is two words or less is to broad and you’re not really hitting the core of what your customers may be looking for. For instance, let’s say you are a small company that sells office furniture and you’re making your list of keywords; the words “office furniture” for a keyword is too broad and the chances of showing up on the first page in Google for “office furniture” is pretty much not going to happen unless you’re a huge retail chain such as Target or Office Max. Your goal is to be on nothing less than the first page of Google when it comes to capitalizing on the keywords you are building your website around. A better keyword than “office furniture” would be “Magellan black leather swivel chair”. The reason this is a better keyword is you don’t really have a keyword competitor for this word. It’s a keyword that is very specific to customers that like Magellan furniture and they’re looking for a specific color and style of chair to fit their needs. The potential customer that searches this long-tail keyword, or something very close to it, is likely to be making a purchase from you if they find you listed on the first page. So you’re not going to necessarily get gobs of traffic from such a specific keyword but you will bring in traffic that is going to do some business with you. So hone in on what your strongest and more popular products are and use those products to base your keywords around to draw in traffic that is likely to purchase from you then focus on other keywords on your list to bring in more traffic.

Here’s a great way to develop your ultimate long-tail keyword list. Just follow these simple steps to great success and watch your website ranking go up and get organic traffic to start knocking down your doors:

Step 1: Get your hands on a handy dandy notebook and call it “Web Stuff Notebook.” Nah, you don’t have to call it that but if you really want to that’s okay. It’s not crucial to keyword success. Grab a pen or pencil, too.

Step 2: Make a list of 250 to 500 long-tail keywords* that are relevant to your business. “What? 250? Are you crazy?” No, not really. If you want to get off to a decent start you need to start with this many. It’s better if you kick it up a notch and head toward 500 but, if you’re feeling lazy right now, 250 will suffice.

*VERY IMPORTANT: When making your list some of your keywords can include broad terms like “office furniture” but you need to add a word or two to it like “red leather office furniture.” By doing this you kill four birds with one stone: red leather office furniture, red leather, leather office furniture and office furniture. Even though you won’t find yourself on the first page for three out of the four at least you’re –somewhere- for the other three.

Step 3: Once you’re done making your list you need to pick your top 25 words from that list and circle them. These are the keywords you are going to write your first 25 blog articles around.

Step 4: Then out of those 25 you need to pick your Top 10 that you really feel are channeled in enough to capture some relevant traffic. Those are the 10 keywords that you’re going to try and mention in every blog your write. These are the 10 keywords that will determine your initial thrust into the market and get you started on the road to success when it comes to your website.

Step 5: Check your 10 keywords before moving forward. Go to Google’s Keyword Tool and type in the 10 keywords you have chosen to represent your website. When you do this you will find out what your competition is on these specific keywords and whether you stand a chance to show up on the first page.

When you check your keywords you want your competition on that word to be “low” and you want the monthly searches for that word to be 1000 or below. Anything higher is a long-term goal that you need to work towards in the near future. The great thing about Google’s Keyword Tool is that, if your keyword has a higher than low competition or more than 1000 keyword searches per month, it gives you alternatives with statistics that you can alter your keyword around. It will actually give you better keywords to work around so that you can you can save yourself a lot of time and misery.

It’s important to note that keyword dominance on your website is an ongoing process; it’s part of the ongoing process of promoting your website. Every week or so type your keywords into the Google search bar and see if you show up on the first, second or third page. If you show up on the first page, check that keyword off and move another keyword into your top 10 to focus on and start the process over BUT every now and then search that checked off word to make sure you’re still hanging in there.

Good luck and happy long-tail keywording!

*You got some basics here. TO LEARN MORE ABOUT KEYWORDS take the Blue Squid Media Keyword Class!