Long Tail Keywords Can Be Important To Any SEO Campaign

March 08, 2019

Long tail keywords are more specific types of keywords, because they include more information than a normal keyword. For example, a broad keyword might be "tree surgeon", but a long tail keyword would be "tree surgeon Tonbridge, Kent." This keyword is much more specific than the broad keyword.

In this article, we'll take a look at why you should focus on long tail keywords. The reasons may surprise you.

1. Interested Customers

Long tail keywords might include specific queries or locations, thus showing that the customer has a more specialized interest in the niche. Let's go back to our tree surgery example from above. The broad keyword "tree surgery" is very vague and searchers who are searching that might only want a definition or they might want to learn about tree surgery in general. Since it's so broad, that keyword doesn't show much interest in the customer wanting to avail of tree surgery services.

In comparison, let's look at "tree surgeon Tonbridge, Kent." This keyword pinpoints with precision accuracy the customer's intent. From looking at this keyword, we know that the customer wants to hire a tree surgeon in Tonbridge, preferably. While this keyword may get very few searches per month, those searches are precise and accurate, and are much more profitable than broad keywords. If you have a business ranking for those keywords, that person will be more likely to buy your services.

2. Competition

Long tail keywords might get less searches each month, because they are so specific, but these are the keywords which are easier to rank for. It is virtually impossible for a small business to start ranking for very broad keywords such as "tree surgery" or "confectionery" or "candles", because these keywords are already dominated by big name websites such as Wikipedia, Amazon, and eBay. These websites have bulletproof SEO embedded within their online marketing, and so, it is impossible to get past them for such a broad keyword.

However, if you narrow down your keyword by turning it into a long tail keyword, such as "candle shop Kent" or "confectionery for birthday parties Kent", the competition will decrease hugely.

This is because less websites have the exact long tail keyword "confectionery for birthday parties" embedded within their text. They might serve confectionery across the globe, but don't specialize for birthday party catering or for Kent. That's where your business comes in.

How Do I Rank For Long Tail Keywords?

You don't need to write blog posts for certain long tail keywords specifically, but you can use the Google Keyword Planner to find keywords which might be profitable for your business. Don't let the amount of searches daze you, if they only get fifty searches a month. If you think about it, that's fifty interested people each month looking for your business's products or services. Even if you retain a few of them after the first purchase, that's enough to really increase earnings.

You might be naturally ranking for certain long tail keywords without even knowing. If your website contains a lot of textual content such as paragraphs describing your services, location, and products, the Googlebot will automatically start ranking you for certain keywords. You can build up your blog post numbers to start creating more textual content for the Googlebot to scan.

However, if you find that you'd like to rank for a certain long tail keyword, you can write a blog post specifically with that phrase embedded in the title and in the text.