SEO Keyword Organization

Foundational to good search engine optimization is the understanding that every search is someone asking a question.  Someone who searches for “George Washington’s birthday” is asking, “When was George Washington’s birthday?”  Someone who searches for “chicken soup recipes” is asking, “Where can I find chicken soup recipes?”  Every search is a question, and every searcher has a unique job to be done.

When we understand that every search is a specific question and every searcher has a unique job to be done, it should change the way we think about creating, organizing and optimizing our web pages.  Our pages can’t simply be a collection of facts on a page.  Our pages have to become answers to specific questions and solutions to unique jobs to be done.

If this is true, to excel at SEO, we have to understand that search engines are not in the business of showing results.  They are in the business of answering questions.  Because of this, SEO is more than just a getting the right keywords on a page and the getting best links to point to that page.  SEO is the organization of solutions around those jobs to be done and the mapping of relevant questions to that solution.

While I worked at Walt Disney Parks & Resorts Online, Disney Vacation Club was one of my clients.  Three years ago I spent a good amount of time optimizing this site for anything relevant to the business.  The queries of searchers ranged from specific property names like “Disney’s Boardwalk Villas” to “timeshares in Orlando”.

Because of the Disney content developers need to be extremely flexible in their wordsmithing, it became immediately clear that I couldn’t simply turn over the top searched phrases and ask them to force them into their “magical” content experience.  I had to develop a way to prioritize top searched words in a way that was flexible to integrate.

What came of this was a system that worked beautifully for Disney’s content developers and resulted in huge traffic increases in search engine traffic for both common and long-tail search queries.  This system has worked so well, I’ve used it ever since.

Keyword Research

The first step in search engine optimization is to discover what people are actually searching for.  Today I use Google AdWords Keyword Tool (back then I used Overture’s Keyword Suggestion Tool).  After compiling all related terms for the business into a spreadsheet, I’d organize those terms into groups of jobs to be done.

Note: It doesn’t matter if there is an existing page on a site.  We are not optimizing for pages, we are optimizing for searchers.  It’s our job to suggest new pages when necessary.

Using a simple example, the keyword group I put together for Disney’s Boardwalk Villas looked something like this (Overture search volume included):

For most SEOers, this is where we stop.  This, however, is not where we should stop if we want the ability to get the broadest range of search engine traffic and the ability to create natural content.

The Keyword Combination System

As you can see, many of these phrases include prepositions like at, the and in, which the search engines mostly ignore.  Even more important, however, you will notice that some words are used much more frequently than others.  What this means is that some words within these phrases are more valuable than others.

If a word is used frequently in the top searches, it will also be used frequently in long-tail searches.  If we prioritize by keyword combinations, rather than simply using the top search queries, we have the ability to rank well for a wider range of searches.

Where I go from here is to start pulling out specific words and looking at their usage.  Since all phrases use the word boardwalk, I don’t bother with that column.  Here’s a trimmed down version of what my spreadsheet looks like:

This gives us a clear picture of what words are more valuable than others, resulting in the following keyword combinations:

Prioritization

Since no single page will rank well for everything, we have to prioritize our list into a few keyword combinations that are most valuable to our business.  In addition we need to determine secondary keyword combinations in case we have additional opportunities to include them outside of the primary ranking factor locations.

In a spreadsheet I created where I specified the page, URL, Meta title, description, keywords, and content suggestions, I specified the following as the keyword target for the Disney Boardwalk Villas page:

Keyword Theme:
Disney Boardwalk Villas

Primary Word Combinations:
boardwalk, disney(s) [6,685] <– adjusted figures to project ALL search engine volume
boardwalk, disney(s), villa(s) [943]
boardwalk, disney(s), resort [868]

Secondary Word Combinations:
boardwalk, disney, world [700]
boardwalk, disney, world, villa(s) [108]

Meta Only:
boardwalk, disney(s), inn [1,058]  <– Not allowed to refer to the resort as an “Inn”
boardwalk, disney(s), hotel(s) [815]  <– or a “Hotel”

As you can see, this provides a clear game plan for this page.  We’ve boiled down our target from eighteen search phrase to three to five keyword combinations, greatly simplified the content creation process while meeting the same SEO goal.

We now have the ability to create a very SEO optimized page with flexible content options.  For example, the second keyword combination under my primary word combinations can be written “Disney Boardwalk Villas”, “Boardwalk Villas at Disney” or both.  Imagine the flexibly in writing copy for keywords that are not brand name related.

As I said earlier, I’ve been using this method for over three years and have seen a greater increase in search engine traffic using this method than I did targeting specific phrases.  Although my top phrases may rank a few spots lower than if I targeted a specific phrase, what I’ve gained from every other search phrase has offset that loss by leaps and bounds.  I have no reason to doubt that you will have the same experience.