Why Keyword Research Should be the First Thing You Do When Creating Content

There’s a reason keyword research is the first step in any content marketing strategy.

It sets the stage for everything else you do.

If you start with the wrong keywords, or if you don’t put enough thought into your keywords, your content will suffer.

You won’t rank as well in search engines, and you won’t convert as many readers into customers.

In this blog post, we’ll discuss why keyword research should be your first step when crafting your content strategy!

What is keyword research and why is it important for content creation

Keyword research is the process of finding and analyzing words and phrases that people are searching for on the internet.

Why bother with keyword research?

Keyword research is important for content creation because it helps you understand what people are actually looking for, and how you can help them. Without it, you’re just writing in the dark.

If you want your content to be found by people who are actually interested in what you have to say, then you need to do your keyword research. Otherwise, you’re just writing content for content’s sake, and that’s a surefire way to get lost in the noise.

The best keyword research tool and it’s FREE

Why bother brainstorming content ideas when you can let Google do the work for you?

Head to the search bar on the Google search page and start typing in a keyword. The predictive search box will pop down with what it thinks you’re searching for, and all of those suggestions are based on actual search data. You can see what sorts of words and phrases come up. You might be surprised at what people are actually searching for. 

For example, when I type in “keyword research” some of the related searches that come up are “keyword research tool”, “keyword research tool free”, “keyword research google”. If I were looking for blog post ideas, those would be three great places to start (note my heading just above!).

If you’re looking for a fun way to content boost your content research, try this little trick. Add the letter “a” after your content keyword phrase. Now you get a whole new set of related content predictive content options. Type “b” and you get another set. Imagine the hours of content research fun as your work your way through the letters of the alphabet!

The list of possible topics is endless with this technique, and you’ll be sure to include words and phrases that people are searching for.

Tools to help with keyword research

You can take your keyword research from your Google predictive search and enter this into a tool such as Ubersuggests.

Ubersuggests is a FREE chrome extension and a powerful SEO tool that shows you keywords monthly search volume, CPC & competition data. One cool feature is content ideas. All you have to do is enter in a keyword or phrase, and it will show you all of the popular blog posts that contain that term. The blog posts are then sorted by social shares, backlinks, and search traffic.

Other tools include Google AdWords Keyword Planner and Moz Keyword Explorer.

How to capitalise on local SEO versus national/international SEO?

Think hard about how someone in your area would look for a business/service like yours and then make sure you are using plenty of those words within your website and within your blog posts. 

In this way, you will be able to capitalise on local SEO and be found more easily by people who are actually looking for businesses like yours in the first place.

Top tip for being more strategic with the content you create from your keyword research

If you have followed the tips above you now have content that your audience is searching for. Take that learning and focus on creating long form content around this.

This long form content could take the shape of a blog, a YouTube channel or a podcast series. It can serve as your cornerstone content from which all other content is produced. A blog post can easily become five to 10 social media posts, it could become a video, it could become an email newsletter. 

When you build your content, in this way your messaging is aligned. It saves you so much time and It drives your message home. 

No longer are you creating content for content’s sake, but everything that you’re putting out there is serving a very specific purpose.

By doing keyword research first, you can be sure that the content you produce is content that your audience actually wants to see. So next time you sit down to create a content strategy, make sure keyword research is priority before you put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard).

By doing keyword research first, you can be sure that the content you produce is content that your audience actually wants to see! #contentmarketing Click To Tweet

If you’re looking for more personalised advice or would like to discuss strategy, book a call today.

May 13, 2022