keyword research on ‘roids! advanced workarounds for vanishing keyword data by christine chruchill

@ChrisChurchill

Keyword

Research

On Roids

Copyright 2014 KeyRelevance LLC 1

Christine Churchill

President, KeyRelevance @KeyRelevance

@ChrisChurchill

@ChrisChurchill

• President of KeyRelevance, LLC

• Member of Founding Board of Directors of Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO)

• Member of the Board of Directors of the Dallas/Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Organization (DFWSEM)

• Columnist at Search Engine Land & Web Marketing Today

• Longtime Speaker & Instructor, Search Engine Strategies, PubCon, and Search Marketing Expo Conferences

• Masters Degree and over 15 years online marketing experience

Speaker: Christine Churchill

Copyright 2014 KeyRelevance LLC

@ChrisChurchill

Once Upon a Time…

….When visitors landed on your

site from search results

pages, Google would report all

the referring keywords in

Analytics

Site owners used the keyword

data to improve the user

experience on their site and to

provide visitors with pages for

which they were searching


@ChrisChurchill

Traditional Keyword Sources

• Site analytics for converting keywords 85%

• Site analytics for frequent words 54%

• Internal site search 46%

• Competitors’ sites 36%

• Competitive intelligence tools 34%

• Exploring long search phrases 31%

• Social semantic mining 15%

• Keyword suggestion tools 15%

Copyright 2014 KeyRelevance LLC

Source: MarketingSherpa Survey 2009

@ChrisChurchill

Then Darkness Descended….

On 18 Oct 2011, Google stopped providing

keyword data for logged in organic visitors

Then on 23 Sept 2013, Google stopped

providing keyword data for ALL organic

visitors

Then in April 2014, Google stopped providing

keyword data for PAID visitors in Analytics

(can still get kwd data in adwords)


@ChrisChurchill

Why Losing Keyword Info Matters

• Google Webmaster Tools keyword data partially makes up

for the loss, but Google has severed the information

flow between the search/click and later actions so

tracking keywords that perform is much harder now.

• Google AdWords still reports clicks and conversions (e.g.

the first and last step), but page flow (all those steps in

between) and other analytics data can no longer be

analyzed at the keyword level.

Losing keyword information is a major loss in

understanding visitor behavior from a keyword

perspective.


@ChrisChurchill

Alternative Sources for Keywords

• Pull keyword data from Google & Bing Webmaster Tools

(and store it)

• Use PPC for conversion tracking of keywords

• Review Paid-Organic report in PPC for keyword overlap

• Review Landing pages in Analytics

• Use site search as input

• Use keyword tools like Keyword Planner, Google Trends,

Google Suggests, & others

• Use competitive intelligence tools that have other sources

of keyword data than Google like Searchmetrics,

SEMRUSH, Hitwise, and others.


@ChrisChurchill

Searchmetrics It’s a suite of tools, not just one


Provides overview of: -Traffic, -Organic rankings, -Keywords, -PPC activity, -Links, -Universal search & -Social media activity

Tabs allow you to go in depth on rankings, competitors, universal search, etc.

Visibility timeline shows historical estimated traffic

@ChrisChurchill

Searchmetrics Keyword Data


Shows what keywords are bringing traffic and keyword metrics Keyword groupings are quick way to identify categories of keywords. For example, Potential are keywords not on first page but close and have traffic potential

@ChrisChurchill

Keyword Rankings Potential Phrases – not in top 10


Filter Capability allows easy sorting through large keyword lists

@ChrisChurchill

SEO Visibility Calculation that uses keyword search volume and ranking


Can compare visibility of multiple domains

@ChrisChurchill

Competitor Landscape


These numbers are hot links to keyword lists

Shows relative size of competitors

@ChrisChurchill

Head-to-Head Keyword Comparison


@ChrisChurchill

Universal Search Insights


Shows what universal search elements site is using to get traffic Shows keywords targeted in videos and images

@ChrisChurchill

PPC Insights


Provides insights into competitors online strategies, their budgets, ads, & keywords Paid Visibility score is a measure of how frequently and prominently a domain appears in paid search results based on weekly data

@ChrisChurchill

Link Insights


Gives comprehensive link data on sites Can see most common anchor text, types of links, domains linking, etc

@ChrisChurchill

Social Insights


Shows activity on different social channels Can see where they are most active Can see the links that are being shared & liked

@ChrisChurchill

Keyword Research Insights


Shows keyword lists of similar and related keywords (note the link to long tail list of additional phrases) Shows keyword popularity & other metrics Also shows which sites are ranking for each term and if their position has moved

@ChrisChurchill

Searchmetrics Suite


Can set up “Projects” to monitor closely Can connect Analytics and GWT for deeper keyword information

@ChrisChurchill

Keyword Traffic Potentials


Identifies low-hanging keyword fruit. Reveals keywords that attract traffic and are ranking, but outside the top ten.

@ChrisChurchill

Content Optimization By Providing Site Optimization Tips & Identifying Co-Occurrence Terms


@ChrisChurchill

Searchmetrics Traffic Insights Tool - helps fill in “not provided” keyword data


Correlates traffic to keyword data so you can see which pages are attracting significant traffic or conversions. Makes it easy to analyze the performance of keywords which are ranking for those URLs. Helps you make better business decisions.

Insights fills in some of the missing Not Provided keyword data because it maps keywords bringing traffic to performance.

@ChrisChurchill

Searchmetrics Summary


@ChrisChurchill

Summary

• Yes, we lost the ability to track user

performance with the keyword but there are

workarounds

• Use Google & Bing Webmaster Tools

keyword data (and download data regularly)

• Study keyword data available via Adwords &

keyword suggestion tools

• Use competitive intelligence tools that use

different sources of keyword data


@ChrisChurchill Copyright 2014 KeyRelevance LLC 25

Thank You!

Christine Churchill

www.keyrelevance.com

[email protected]

972-429-1222

@KeyRelevance

@ChrisChurchill

http://twitter.com/appstotweet

keyword research on ‘roids! advanced workarounds for vanishing keyword data by christine chruchill

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