Hopefully, by now you understand just how important search engine optimization (SEO) is in your online marketing campaigns. To help others find you, optimizing your website as well as your social media posts to include specific keywords that users are searching for when looking for your products or services adds a boost to getting found online. But how do you know what keywords to target? First off, you need to do your research and find out HOW people are looking for you. What specific words or phrases are they searching for, how popular are those keywords, and what is the competition like for each of them?

Keyword research

The real goal for SEO is not just getting visitors to your website; it’s about getting the right visitors to your site. To do that, it’s important to know what words your target audience is using when searching for your services. In layman’s terms, for example, when an adult child of an elderly person goes online to search for home care for her mother, what words does she type into Google? Those words are the ones that your agency needs to target. Those words may NOT be the same words that you use when describing your service. For instance, an adult child may search for a nurse, when, in fact, her mother needs only a companion or a home health aide.

How “valuable” are your keywords?

When doing keyword research, what you’re trying to figure out is how much a keyword is worth to your website. If you own a home care agency in Dallas, do you get more website hits from people searching for “elder care DFW” or “home care Dallas?” Keyword research tools like Google AdWords allow users to find this information, but they aren’t to be relied on solely. The true value of a keyword can only be found by knowing your website – what information is most important to your business and your customers, making some hypotheses about which keywords will work best, testing those keywords, evaluating, making adjustments where needed, and repeating – the classic web marketing formula, known to those who play in this field.

Before plugging in keywords willy-nilly, ask yourself:

• Is the keyword relevant to your website’s content?
• Will searchers find what they are looking on your site when they search using these keywords?
• Will they be happy with what they find?
• Will this traffic result in financial rewards or other organizational goals?

Put yourself in your customer’s shoes.
How would you perform a web search for in-home care for a parent? What words would you type into Google if you were looking for home care that was supervised by a geriatric care manager? And keep in mind that your clients may not know certain industry terms that you do, like “private duty” or the subtle differences between “home care” and “home health care” or “care management” and “case management”.

Search first!
Do your own search for keywords and phrases in the major engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing) and see what comes up. You might be surprised.
Knowing which websites already rank for certain keywords gives you insight into your competition and how hard it will be for your website to rank for the given term.

Helpful resources
So, where should you dive in to start researching keywords? These online keyword-specific resources can help get you started.

• Google Adwords’ Keyword Tool
• Google Trends Keyword Demand Prediction 

We know that keyword research and search engine optimization in general can be pretty overwhelming. Our team is expert at digital marketing and always here to help you find the right words and get your site optimized when you need an expert’s touch. As the SEO and marketing worlds change, so do the tactics surrounding results. There is a rapidly growing value to off-site SEO, but the on-page SEO is still important, and should be considered as a baseline for any other work done to drive traffic to a website. Give us a call today to get started!