Is Seo A Winner Take All Game?

admin    Website Traffic     alpharetta seo, Keyword Research, number 1 listing, organic rankings

What a number 1 listing for your keyword can mean for traffic.

I am sure you have seen the advertisements for seo companies that claim to get on the first page for you keyword. Getting on the first page for your keyword term is a great outcome but there can be a huge difference between being in the number 1 postion and being in the number 10 postion. In terms of traffic to your site and sales or leads increasing your ranking several postions can have a huge impact on the overall visitors to your site.

How much difference does it make to have the number 1 postion versus the number 10 postion? Lets take a look at what you can expect from click through rates from being on the first page.

- Listing #1 : 42% CTR

- Listing #2 : 12% CTR

- Listing #3 : 8.5% CTR

- Listing #4 : 6% CTR

- Listing #5 : 5% CTR

- Listing #6 : 4% CTR

- Listing #7 : 3.5% CTR

- Listing #8 : 3% CTR

- Listing #9 : 3% CTR

- Listing #10 : 3% CTR

The numbers above only take a look at the organic clicks and do not factor in Pay Per Click. So as you can see having a number 1 listing can have a massive effect on the traffic to your site. You also have to keep in mind that there are other factors when it comes to click through rates such as the title and description that is shown in the listings. If you have a compelling title and meta description than your click through rate can go up but as you can see most of the eyeballs go straight to the top listing.

When you are deciding on an seo program and your keywords than you can see that sometimes keywords that receive less traffic but are less competitive might be the way to go initially. If we use the numbers above we see that if you have a keyword that receives 1,000 searches per month and you have a top ranking than you should see about 420 visits per month for that keyword. If a keyword gets 5,000 visits per month and you are in the number 8 postion you should see about 150 visits per month for the keyword. Typically, keywords that have more traffic are tougher to rank for because other websites are gunning for them.

Sometimes less is more and in the instance of gaining a top ranking this really is the case. So when you are doing your keyword research do not discount the keywords that do not get a massive amount of traffic because you could be losing out on easily attainable keywords.

Chase The Longtail When Doing Keyword Searching

admin    Keyword Research     alpharetta seo, Keyword Research, long tail keywords, Website Traffic

When doing keyword research for your website you can be overwhelmed with the amount of different keywords that you could choose to optimize your website. The question becomes, focus your website on head terms or will you go after long tail keywords.

Depending on the competition in you industry or niche with the right amount of leg work rankings for certain head keyword terms can be attained, it will typically take more time to see your website rise up through the rankings. If you have never ventured into the wonderful world of search engine optimization and want to see quicker results than focusing on the long tail is probably your best bet.

Terms that are more heavily searched are the head and an example of a this would be a term such as golf balls. People typically use the head term when they are in the research phase of their search and are less likely to purchase. Optimizing your website for the head could be a strategy for the long haul and can bring you a ton of traffic if are able to reach the first page for the term.

Terms that are less heavily searched are the long tail, this would be a term such as golf balls for high handicappers. These terms tend to lead to less traffic but will bring in more sales because during this phase of search people have figured out pretty much what they are looking for.

The long tail of keyword research is important to your success. Long tail keywords have less competition from other websites, you have a much better chance of ranking highly in the search engines and will give your website much more visibility. It really is basic math the more terms you rank for the more traffic you get and the path to more rankings is to go after many long tail terms.

Here is a nugget to get you thinking about focusing on long tail keywords, In a 2008 report, that was published by Hitwise, they stated that for any given topic, the top 100 keywords account for just 5.7% of all website traffic while long tail keywords account for the remaining 94.3%.

So are you going to focus on the head term or the long tail?