Looking At Keyword Stats Like An A-Lister
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As I was looking through some of the keywords searches that have been used to find CourtneyTuttle.com today, I realized that some people could really benefit by watching their stats more closely. Back in May I wrote a series about learning from statistics, and most of you have found my blog since then so if you missed the original lessons I would have a look at them.
Today I wanted to give some insights into what I think about when I view the keywords that people find my site with. Keyword analysis is a crucial step for anyone involved with internet marketing. Here are the last 10 searches that people have used to find CourtneyTuttle.com:
- how to see hidden link
- internet advertising terms explanations
- hidden link required to reply
- google pr update september 2007
- make money
- earn money online
- new advertising strategies
- make money with free subdomain
- invisible links consider for page rank
- make money internet
- halloween express
When I look through these keywords, I usually take a moment to evaluate each one, and in order to show you what I mean I’m going to tell you what I think about each of these.
how to see hidden link
Someone searching for this is probably trying to figure out how to find hidden links in web pages. Since I’m already ranked #2 in Google for this keyword, I probably won’t do anything differently. I also already have a good lesson on my site about this concept, so I won’t worry about writing anything else.
internet advertising terms explanations
This one came from Yahoo, where I’m ranked number six with my explanations of terms category page. This reminds me that I could do a lot better job explaining terms that people need to learn. I could probably create a paragraph at the top of the page to explain what the page is for - of course using keywords that I think people would search for - and I would be able to rank better in both Yahoo and Google for related searches.
hidden link required to reply
This one honestly doesn’t make much sense to me and I doubt that many people are going to search for it. When I see a keyword like this, I just move on to the next one on the list.
google pr update september 2007
This person is likely trying to find out if there was a PageRank update in September. This reminds me that there are probably a lot of people trying to find out if there’s going to be one in October or November. I seriously doubt that many people will do the search with September in it. I’m probably not going to do anything with this keyword because I’m tired of talking about PageRank for now. It’s been so long since the last update who knows when it’s going to happen. If someone wants to get some traffic, write about that subject. 
make money
Make money is a decently large keyword that I’ve been casually working on for a while. I’m currently on page 5 in Google for it. It’s not a huge priority right now because my home page is the best page to target the keyword, and there are bigger keywords I’m working on with my homepage.
earn money online
I’ve been in the top 5 in Google for a while for this term, and seeing some traffic from it reminds me that I need to work on it. I could probably get to number one if I focused on it for a month or so. It’s not a huge keyword, but is probably worthwhile.
new advertising strategies
This is one that I haven’t seen before, and so I’m pretty surprised that I have a #8 ranking in Google for it. I’m going to add ‘new advertising strategies’ to my list of possible topics, because I could probably get some decent traffic from a post on the topic.
make money with free subdomain
I can see this one being searched for occasionally, and I don’t really have a good lesson on this, so I’m going to add it to my list of possible topics to write about. Since I don’t think this post is worthy of being a post on my homepage, I will probably back-date it a few weeks.
invisible links consider for page rank
In case any of you are wondering, invisible links are not considered for PageRank. Well, that’s not one hundred percent true. If you’re sneaky enough you could make them pass PageRank, but then when you get caught you’ll be in trouble so what’s the point? Why not just get real links and then you don’t have to worry about it.
This person is obviously trying to figure that concept out. I haven’t written a lesson on this, so I’m going to add it to my list of possible topics for a post. I’m already #3 in Google for this search, but could move up to number one with a more exact title. The page that ranks doesn’t explain the concept, so I’ll probably write about it eventually.
make money internet
Since I target internet marketing and make money online, it makes sense that I’m on the map for this keyword. I’m #9 in Google right now, but I don’t know that it’s a big enough keyword to work on. I’m going to write a note to myself to find out how much it’s searched for.
halloween express
I get searches from this keyword because I did a review of the Halloween Express site a while back. Since it has nothing to do with the subject of my site, I’m going to forget about it.
Conclusion
There is a lot to be learned by looking through the keywords people are finding you with. Learning what to look for and taking advantage of it can really help you to take your blog traffic to the next level.
Update: If you found this post helpful, you're going to love our new ebook: The Keyword Crash Course...it's 100% free. Enter your email here to receive the series:
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October 23rd, 2007 at 5:40 pm
I went through your old posts on stats…very helpful! But I can’t seem to find a way in Stat Counter to see what link visitors are clicking on when they leave my site.
Would be helpful to have this info.
Thanks!
October 24th, 2007 at 5:34 am
Hi Kev!
Exit pages is the closet thing you have to that with StatCounter. You’re right, that would be very useful information. You should have a look at Google Analytics possibly. I’ve used both and really like each of them.
It would be nice of someone combined GA and StatCounter’s features into one service because neither one of them is a complete service in my opinion.
October 23rd, 2007 at 5:41 pm
This is the reason I love HitTail. It lists the searches people have done that brought them to your site. It has a few tools that really help when you’re looking at how people find you through search engines.
If you know how people are finding you, you can make it easier for more people to find you.
October 23rd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
You should have made a link from the text in this post to the posts you already have with those phrases.
It could make you #1 for how to see hidden link. Maybe not but internal linking does matter too.
October 23rd, 2007 at 7:51 pm
Great post BTW. Checking stats is something that I always forget to do.
October 23rd, 2007 at 11:23 pm
Not sure if that was in response to my question but to make it clearer…
Is there a way with Stat Counter to see what exact link a visitor is clicking on when they leave my site. I’d like to know if they are leaving by clicking a banner ad, text add, or just closing my site down. The closest thing is Exit Page but it doesn’t say how they are exiting the page.
October 23rd, 2007 at 9:05 pm
Im not a very good SEO person. So i target the little keywords. I have noticed that when i focus to much time on the big keywords i have limited success, in fact next to nothing.
October 23rd, 2007 at 10:19 pm
Hi Court,
How can you start dominating a specific keyword? Is it just through your articles? What are your tips???
Thanks in advance.
Cheers,
Carlo
October 24th, 2007 at 6:10 am
Hi Carlo!
That’s a very good question.
Dominating for a keyword is almost 100% about your site’s authority.
Over the last 8 months I have done a lot of different things to build the authority of my site, almost too many to mention here. Let me give you a few of the main ones here, so that you can get some ideas.
Since the main keyword I’m trying to target is ‘internet marketing’, I have tried to create the best internet marketing resource I could. I did this hoping that a lot of people would link to my site, which has happened more and more as time goes on. It all starts there. When I have the best internet marketing site in the world, I will probably rank first for internet marketing.
Link baiting has worked out really well for me. When writing a post you have to consider a lot of things, including whether you think people will link to it or not. If even 5 sites link to a post, it makes it about 100 times more likely that it will rank well for its topic. That will also build the authority of your entire site, making it easier to rank well for your main keywords.
Yes, writing articles has made a big difference for CourtneyTuttle.com. It has really helped me to get my name out there, and has also helped me to build the authority of my site.
October 23rd, 2007 at 11:19 pm
What’s the deal with that big video thing at the bottom of your blog?
October 24th, 2007 at 5:40 am
Hey Angel!
It’s actually a Google Video Adsense unit. I wrote about it a few weeks ago, and added it there to show people how it worked. It’s been up for a few weeks as a test, but didn’t pay out that well. That means…. it’s gone.
I think on some sites it would work out pretty well though. Here’s the original post about it:
http://courtneytuttle.com/2007/10/09/google-unveils-video-adsense-units/
October 24th, 2007 at 2:21 am
You didn’t state how many searches you got for these terms. My blog only has a tiny portion of it’s traffic from search engines and the vast majority of that is terms that were searched on only once - the good old long tail. I dont see a benefit in optimising for those as they are unlikely to be searched again.
Do you verify these terms against traffic estimation tools to decide whether or not to continue to work on those keywords?
October 24th, 2007 at 5:53 am
Hi Caroline!
Those are some very insightful questions! There are actually a few things that go into that. As the authority of your site goes up you will see more and more long tail searches.
You will start to notice patterns of related long tail searches that people find your site with. For example, one person may search for ‘how to make money with adsense’, another person might search for ‘make money internet adsense’, and another might search for ‘tips to make money with adsense’.
These types of long tail searches aren’t going to break the bank for anyone, but they are likely to happen again and again. I like to identify these patterns and will also ask myself whether my site is complete or not without lessons on that subject.
Since they are smaller keywords, it would be hard to verify them with a keyword tool, but that doesn’t mean that people won’t search for them. If a good post on the subject got me even 5 visitors per day, that would bring over 1,800 visitors in a year’s time.
A key factor here is your site’s authority because with long tail you usually need to be in the top 5 results to get any traffic. As you build the authority you will start to notice that you can get ranked first for many of your long tail keywords.
You already have a very useful site that happens to be really new. New usually equals little authority, but as you build that authority you will notice how much easier it gets to rank well for keywords.
I would work towards making your site a complete resource. Search traffic that you could never plan for will come out of the woodwork.
October 24th, 2007 at 6:29 am
Thanks for the clarification. So what it sounds like is that rather than try to optimise for the exact phrase, you are looking at it from a more general point of view to ask yourself what kind of information the surfer is actually looking for and then using that information to base future blog posts that provide that information?
That makes more sense
And yes right now the blog is very new, I think the only thing I actually rank for is my own name! To be honest I haven’t really thought much about SEO at all - I just write about whatever occurs to me at the time.
October 25th, 2007 at 9:36 pm
That’s exactly right.
Thinking too much about SEO in the beginning can be a waste of time, unless you know how to make some insane authority in a very short period of time.
October 24th, 2007 at 6:08 am
THis is a fresh idea for me. But something more interesting now is whether google is reliable or not in the future. Regarding the latest PR down grade on Problogger.net and copyblogger.com, it makes me think that Google is a silly machine.
October 24th, 2007 at 12:18 pm
Hi Court,
Keywords are definitely important for anyone paying attention to generating traffic from search engines – Google, Yahoo!, MSN, etc. I try to pay attention to keywords to determine if it matches with the topic of my sites. When I find keywords that are matches for the topics of my sites, I continue to concentrate on those keywords, but when I find keywords that are unrelated or otherwise not the focus of my site, I try to steer clear of those keywords. Relevant traffic is more important/valuable than general traffic.
Regards,
Jonathan Frye
Blog: Entrepreneurship
October 25th, 2007 at 9:15 pm
would you mind sharing what your daily average traffic is from google searches? I’m not sure if mine is low or average or what. thanks.
October 25th, 2007 at 9:32 pm
I get about 400-500 or so people from Google everyday. It’s a fairly decent chunk of my daily traffic, but I have other sources that I would say are more important.
Google will become more and more important as I get higher and higher for my main keyword though.
October 29th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
thats really cool , but i was wondering more on numbers. i also have a website with about 200 ish ppl per day, unique. after 7 months..
i was wondering how much you got after 7 months ? per day
November 1st, 2007 at 9:31 pm
That’s good for you mate
August 25th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
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