Two Keyword Strategies

As I’ve been fixing the broken images in my old posts (hit me if I ever threaten to migrate the site again, will you?), I’ve also been tweaking the accessibility and tags/metadata. I started with the oldest posts, and it became clear very quickly that I’ve come a long way in learning how to write for the internet. Which is why today’s blog is on keyword strategies.

Because my early posts, well, let’s just say they had a lot of keywords but not a lot of strategy. If you’re working in WordPress, however, there’s not one but two strategies I recommend you consider.

Two Very Different Keyword Strategies

1. SEO Strategy: Keyword Phrases

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is basically what you do to make your posts show in the results of a Google search. It’s incredibly competitive at this point because there are so many people out there posting and competing for the same or similar keyword phrases.

For those who aren’t familiar, the keywords or keyword phrases are the tags you enter in WordPress, and they play a large role in telling Google what you’re writing about. Google then compares that to the text on the page, the url, the title, the alt text, site views, etc. and decides if you’re really writing about that or not. And if you are writing about it, it decides if you a reliable resource for readers.

Long story short, it decides whether to list your article as a result if someone searches for that same keyword or keyword phrase.

That’s where this strategy comes in. You see, with all those articles using the same keywords, it’s incredibly difficult to win that competition over a single keyword. “Reading,” “writing,” “grammar” – there are probably millions of posts that use those tags. The odds of you convincing Google that your article is better? Well, they’re not good.

Instead, pick a phrase (“novel writing tips” or “grammar rules not to break”). Remember that we often search using entire phrases or even sentences. If your phrase is part of that search, you’re more likely to show up in the results because there’s less competition for longer phrases. It’s not a guarantee, but it certainly helps.

Especially if you’re not ready to pay for a service that lets you target keywords more specifically.

2. WordPress Reader Strategy

The first strategy is all about making your posts show up in Google. But if you’re using WordPress, you also want to take advantage of the WordPress Reader and try to reach people that way (especially as you start writing).

This is where the 1-word tags come in. I get the impression most people following a tag in the Reader are following a single word or shorter phrase, and while it may be a word that is out of your reach as far as Google, there is value in adding it so that you show up in that Reader view.

Don’t forget that categories also count, so they can be a good way to integrate the shorter keywords. Just be sure you don’t use more than 15 tags and categories total. If you do, WordPress won’t show your post in the Reader at all.

Summary

The first keyword strategy is most important long-term because it’s what will drive people to your site from search engines. And that’s essential for the type of traffic most bloggers want. The second keyword strategy is more of a short-term strategy. It helps get views on your blog at the beginning to (we hope) get some follows and start to build up an audience.

What other keyword strategies do you use? Have these worked for you?