While on-page optimization has less of a ranking impact than it use to, it is still wise to get your main phrases into the page. Google themselves state this in their webmaster guidelines:
"Think about the words users would type to find your pages, and make sure that your site actually includes those words within it."
This is exactly why we work so hard to theme our pages (see "Creating Fat Affiliate Sites"). Make it clear to Google and the other search engines exactly what our pages are about.
When writing naturally, we tend to theme the pages well without even trying (and this is why the VEO strategy works so well - see last weeks newsletter for info on VEO).
The real problem is that we don't always have the knowledge required to write about certain topics naturally. We rely on research and keyword lists to help mould our copy into an article.
The big problem is that working to a keyword list can make your article look unnatural, and even forced. Keywords seem to be stuffed into the article, just to make sure that all of our phrases have been covered.
Let's look at an example. You can follow along with this if you have the demo version of Keyword Results Analyzer (KRA). Get it here:
http://keywordresearchlab.com
If you own KRA, you should have the BBQ database pre-installed.
When running the Niche within a Niche feature (to help find sub-niches within our keyword research), one possible topic KRA found was "pit smokers". Here is a report produced by KRA:
Main Keyword: pit smoker
Related Phrases:
===============
build bbq pit smoker
bbq pit smokers
bbq pit smoker plans
portable bbq pit smokers
Unique Keywords:
===============
bbq
build
pit
plans
portable
smoker
smokers
There are 4 phrases there that could be used to write an article on this topic.
My advice is usually to use the main keyword in the title, filename, an H1 header, and in the opening paragraph, and then concentrate more on getting the unique keywords into the article. That way you don't have to try to force a main phrase plus four related phrases into an article.
However, let's look at the related phrases.
All of them contain the main phrase - "pit smoker".
That helps us a lot. If we want to get the main phrase into our article 4 times, we could just use each of the related phrases once each. That would ensure that all of our related phrases were included in the article.
I would look at which phrase was potentially the most profitable by looking at supply and demand (you can use KEI, but also use common sense):
Count 24 Hours Competing Keyword Phrase
=========================================================
20 7 5 build bbq pit smoker
21 7 171 bbq pit smokers
5 2 1 bbq pit smoker plans
4 1 0 portable bbq pit smokers
From this list, the first phrase looks to be the best of the bunch. 7 searches a day, and only 5 competing pages (note this data is a couple of years old now, so competition data is out of date).
This is the phrase I would use in my filename, title, H1 header and opening paragraph. Obviously the choice of this word as the main phrase means the article subject has written itself - it has to be about building a pit smoker. You just need to write the article now ;o)
OK, so what do you do with the other related phrases? You still want theme the page about pit smokers, so include the related phrases once each if possible. If you cannot include them naturally, don't. Instead, just make sure all of the "unique words" are included on the page at least once, twice if possible (and if it reads naturally).
The important thing in this example is that my original main phrase "pit smoker" is not one we try to get into the article. That phrase is included in all of the related phrases, so we don't need to. Include all of the related phrases once each, and you have "pit smoker" included 4 times in your article already.
If you followed my suggestion of using "build bbq pit smoker" once in title, filename, H1 and opening paragraph, plus each of the other related phrases once each, you'll have a themed page that includes "pit smoker"5 times on the web page, plus in title and filename.
I like to create articles around slightly larger groups of related phrases, but this example was chosen to simplify the point I am trying to get across. With your KRA/KRA demo, have a look at some of these sub-niches that KRA found, and see if you can work out a similar strategy outlined above for them.
"smokers"
"homemade"
"pork"
"charcoal grill" (with this one, filter only the phrases that have 4 or more daily searches *).
"recipe" (with this one, filter only the phrases that have 10 or more daily searches *).
"outdoor grill" (with this one, filter only the phrases that have 5 or more daily searches *).
* Extra filtering used to reduce the number of phrases you have to deal with, while still including all of the most important phrases in that topic.
I hope I have given you some ideas. There is no need to count keywords, just mark them off the list as you include them in your article, and you'll have a well themed article.
Happy writing!
About The Author:
Keyword phrases in this article were manipulated using
Keyword Results Analyzer.
