SEO keyword research and content marketing go hand-in-hand. Discover the best types of keywords for high-converting content strategies.

Keyword research is a critical step in your content marketing strategy.

An effective keyword strategy is vital if you want your customers to discover you among the billions of websites found online today. Without targeting the appropriate keywords, search engines will have a much harder time indexing your content. You want search engines to easily understand what your website is about so you have the best possible chance of matching your site to any online search queries.

Here are the six main types of keywords you should consider while working on a keyword research strategy for driving traffic to your website.

1. Targeting Keywords

These types of keywords are those that fit with your audience, industry, and products or services. There are six main types of targeting keywords you need to know about:

Market Segment Keywords

Market segment keywords are pretty generic terms that are often associated with your industry. Customers may use them to search for information regardless of which stage of the buyer journey they’re in.

An example of a market segment keyword is “clothing”. Niche keywords like “winter clothing” also fall into this category

Customer-Defining Keywords

Customer-defining keywords are those search terms used by customers who are looking for more specific items. They include things like, ”women’s winter jackets”.

Branded Keywords

Branded keywords refer to a particular brand of jackets, like ‘Neiman Marcus women’s jackets. These types of keywords imply a little more buyer intent.

Product Keywords

As the name suggests, product keywords refer to a specific product within a brand. An example of this would be, ‘Neiman Marcus blazer jacket’. The best way to use these keywords is to cut straight to the chase by using them on your product pages, where the buy now button can do the rest of the work for you.

Competitor Keywords

It makes sense to go with what’s working in your industry. A little research can reveal which keywords and keyword combinations work for your competition.

It’s easy enough to switch out your brand’s name with your competitors so you can take advantage of all their keyword research for your own means. e.g. ‘Neimann Marcus winter jackets’ vs ‘your brand designer winter jackets’.

Geo-Targeted Keywords

These are location-based keywords that drag your town or city into the fray. ‘winter jackets in Houston’, or ‘New York clothing store’ are examples of geo-targeted keywords.

With Google’s current emphasis on local search, geo-targeted keywords are an effective way to reach your customers easily, especially if you have a brick-and-mortar store.

2. Keyword Research According to Length

These are perhaps the best-known of all keywords. There are three types that get progressively longer as you go along.

Short-tail keywords containing one or two words like, ‘dog food’ have very high search volumes but they’re difficult to rank for since there are a lot of companies advertising these products.

Medium-tail keywords are a little easier to rank for and a bit more specific. Things like ‘dog food for large dogs are medium tail keywords.

Long-tail keywords are the easiest to rank for and contain very specific terms, like ‘high protein dog food for overweight dogs. Unfortunately, these specific keywords have fewer people searching for them, and while they have disproportionately high conversion rates, the search volume is low.

3. On-Site Keywords

On-site SEO is right up there among the top SEO Strategies for attracting more visitors to your website. On-site keywords usually consist of one primary keyword and several related secondary keywords.

These types of keywords are specifically selected for a specific page or blog on your website. Each page on your site needs to focus on a unique primary keyword placed in prominent positions, as well as the secondary keywords sprinkled throughout the text.

If you choose a primary keyword like, ‘premium coffee maker’, the secondary terms could be things like, ‘premium coffee maker reviews’ or ‘best coffee maker’.

4. Types of Keywords for Google Ads in Your Keyword Research

Paid advertising in the form of Google Ads brings a whole new strategy into play. When you make use of search engine marketing (SEM), you’ll have to bid on certain keywords according to specific criteria such as the following:

Broad Match Keywords

When you choose the broad match keyword option, Google will display your ad when a user types in that keyword as well as any others that are close to it. This includes synonyms, singular or plural forms, misspellings, and related terms.

Phrase Match Keywords

When you target a specific phrase, like ‘women’s jackets’, Google will display your ad for any search containing that exact phrase. For example, ‘women’s jackets for winter’, ‘women’s jackets plus-size’, or ‘designer women’s jackets.

Exact Match Keywords

In these cases, Google displays your ads only for very similar phrases or keywords. These would include paraphrases, closely related word combinations, and misspellings as long as they have the same search intent.

The keyword ‘women’s jackets’ would also count for terms like ‘jackets women’, or ‘jackets for women’.

Negative Keywords

Negative keywords include terms with a similar meaning but different user intent. Negative keywords for ‘women’s winter jackets’ would be ‘men’s jackets, or ‘summer jackets’.

When you include negative keywords in your Google ads criteria, your page won’t appear for these fruitless search terms.

5. Buyer Keywords in Your Keyword Research

People who intend to use products or services use buyer keywords to search for what they want. These keywords fall into three broad categories, each representing a different search intent.

Informational keywords that fit in with the discovery phase of the buyer journey. These usually include terms like ‘why’ or ‘how’.

Navigational keywords apply to buyers who are actively searching for more detailed information on products, they often include the term ‘best’ as well as specific brand names.

Transactional keywords are doing keywords used by customers who are ready to buy something. Terms like ‘best deals’ and ‘free delivery’ feature in these kinds of searches.

6. Short-Term Fresh Keywords

Did anyone say ‘coronavirus’? This is the all-time most searched term in the history of the internet. It shows how choosing something topical in your SEO practices could potentially increase your rankings.

Be warned though, Google is onto tactics like this, so if the top topic of the hour doesn’t match well with your actual product, you won’t benefit from these types of SEO keywords. Rather stick to more appropriate terms like ‘Easter sale’ (when you’re actually having an Easter sale).

What’s more, these kinds of keywords are only ever suitable for timely blog content. Rather stick to more evergreen terms for your web pages.

Partner with WriteForMe to Get on Top of Keyword Research

Keyword research is a vital step in all content creation. It pays to spend the extra time finding the best ones for your products and services.

Contact us today and we’ll do all the hard work finding the perfect types of keywords for your content.