The document discusses best practices for keyword research and mapping. It recommends brainstorming keywords related to products and services to understand searcher intent. Keywords should be analyzed for search volume, related terms, and mapped to relevant landing pages on a site. Prioritization of keywords helps focus search marketing efforts on high opportunity terms. Regular research is needed to maximize coverage of related keyword opportunities.

1. Keyword Research & Mapping

2. Keyword Research
• Keywords are the lifeblood of any search
marketing program. It is essential that you
understand the universe of keywords related
to your products and services.
• From this understanding you can understand
the needs, wants and intent of the searcher to
more effectively map your content with their
query.

3. Generate Keyword Review Matrix
Number of How is are the Research? Good word? Bad?
Research gives
Initial Keyword searches last words performing Purchase? Issues? Landing page URL
you related words
month. elsewhere Service? Recommend
Rank Site
Keyword Related Keyword Demand CPC Type Comments PLP
Data Search
diabetes 375,567
diabetes supply 58,731
Diabetes symptoms 48,148
Diabetes diet 22,133
Type 2 diabetes 21,393
Diabetes mellitus 21,038
Gestational
diabetes 19,755
Diabetes treatment 18.999
Diabetes
information 17,345
Juvenile diabetes 17,125
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4. Keyword Research Worksheet
Open Excel and create a worksheet with the following headings
• Brainstorm Words – Starter phrases derived from your brainstorm session, from
reviewing the site content, and/or by reviewing competitors’ Web sites
• Related – Variations of the keyword phrases from the brainstorming sessions that
contain the Brainstorm Word and gives us an understanding of the searchers’
language
• Searches – The relative search volume for each phrase over the past month (from
one of the keyword research tools)
• Priority Keywords -- phrases for which you feel your site can and should achieve a
top placement in the search engine results pages or be a focus of search marketing
• Preferred Landing Pages (PLPs) – the URLs from your site in which the
Recommended Keywords match the content and those pages for which we can begin
to develop optimized HTML coding recommendations

5. Brainstorming Keywords
 Brainstorming words are our starting point. We take these top-
level, general keyword phrases and use them as the basis of the
next set of actions.
 Start the process by answering the following questions:
1. Make a list of your products, services and categories of each
2. What do your potential visitors search for when trying to find your
product/services/information?
3. When you search for your own site, what do you search for
4. What do you want to be #1 in the search results for?
5. What terms are currently driving visits to your site (analytics)
6. What are people searching for currently on your site? (site search)

6. Related Keywords
• The related keywords show us additional phrases to consider for
researching and give us an insight into which phrases searchers are
using.
• Sometimes a Brainstorm word does not have any related phrases. This
simply means that this term is either very targeted and no one is
searching for it yet, or we have not targeted the searchers’ language.
• This process is valuable in showing you if you are on target or have
missed the targeted keyword market.
• You an leverage keyword research tools to add additional variations
and for the next step of understanding searcher demand for each
phrase.

7. Research Demand & Opportunity
• Leverage one of the keyword research tools to
understand variations of keywords and
relative search volume for each phrase.
• Use “exact” or “phrase” match to get a closer
representation to a natural search query
• Results are “averages” and not exact numbers
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal 7

8. WordTracker
Subscription-based keyword research tool that offers a wide selection
of keyword variations and relevance weightings for keywords.
- www.wordtracker.com
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9. Keyword Discovery
Subscription-based keyword research tool that offers a wide selection
of keyword variations and relevance weightings for keywords.
Can save and recall keyword research projects
- www.keyworddiscovery.com
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10. Google Keyword Suggestion
Free keyword research tool that offers a wide selection of keyword
variations with local and global search volume.
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
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11. Google Keyword Results
Select what you want and “download” to Excel or CSV
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12. Mine your Pages for Keywords - Manually
• Review your site content for targeted keyword phrases.
• Start with general words and dig deeper to get more specific phrases that are
exact matches.

13. Mine your Pages for Keywords - Automated
Google Keyword Suggestion tool can “review” your pages and suggest phrases
based on what they detect on the page and site.

14. Keyword Prioritization
Prioritization buckets words into
High, Medium and Low categories
Awareness
•Categories used to: High Priority
“Must Have” Keywords
•Control SOV levels on specific
segments in paid search
•Identify priority words for SEO Medium Priority
Keywords that are important but expensive or
work not targeted enough
• Advise content developers on
best words to include in new
content Low Priority
“Nice to haves”
• High Priority keywords get 60% of budget & effort
• Medium Priority keywords get 30% of budget & effort
• Low Priority keywords get 10% of budget & effort
•Ensures important words get most exposure
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15. Keyword Selection & Prioritization
• Keyword phrases are assigned a priority. This is a relative
priority and should match your business goals, opportunity
and available content.
• These priorities can change many times during the process
but it helps to focus effort and alignment of resources.

16. Map to Specific Relevant Pages
• Preferred Landing Pages (PLP’s) are used to match
keywords to the best page for that word or phrase.
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17. Map Keywords to Predefined Actions Segments
• Use a brainstorming session to discuss and segment words into appropriate
purchase lifecycle segments to understand how to better align messages.
• This will be very helpful later when creating ad groups and messages for
PPC

18. Current State Performance
• Once you have your list of keyword phrases, a
Keyword Ranking Report can be run to
benchmark a site’s current position in the
search results for these phrases.
• Knowing how well Preferred Landing Pages are
ranking for associated keyword phrases puts a
priority on which pages need to be audited for
optimization or added to your PPC campaign.

19. Additional Research Tools

20. Google Trends
• Provides a graphical,
relative search
volume comparison.
• Enter in up to 5
search terms.
• Shows related news.
• Free but not
necessarily current
www.google.com/trends

21. Google Insights for Search
• Similar to Google Trends
• Additional unique features
– Compare against a category
– Geographic search volume
maps
– Provides a relative index
measure against all searches
performed on Google over
time.
– Great for identifying local
campaign opportunities
www.google.com/insights/search/

22. Keyword Spy
• Wide selection of keywords
• Additional unique features
– See paid and organic data
– Export master list of words
– Great for competitive
analysis and budget planning
• Free and Subscription
versions
www.keywordspy.com

23. Best Practices
• Brainstorm your keywords with a wide team to
understand your base universe.
• Look at your content, site search data and
external tools for variations
• Work to understand the intent of a searcher for
each phrase and map to the appropriate page
on your site.
• Repeat the process often to maximize your
keyword universe.