Article Marketing - Keywords, The Road Not Taken

Using keywords correctly in article marketing is one of the most important things the marketer can do. It's the keyphrases that an internet marketer uses that determine when and whether the article is found and read, or not.

Keywords, or keyphrases, are the phrases that we are trying to match up with for a search term entered into a search engine. When a user enters, for example, "Article Marketing" into a search engine, that is known as a keyphrase and it's these that an article marketer needs to weave into their articles so they are displayed in the results pages.

The problem is that the more common the keyphrase is, the more competition there is going to be for that keyphrase. One way around this is to not try and compete, at least not in the highly competitive areas. It makes more sense to use more specific search terms that cater to a smaller audience but have less competition. This is done by using what is known as long-tail keywords.

Long-tail keywords are really keyphrases that consist of a number of words, usually at least 5 words and are designed to be highly targeted towards a very specific search term. An example would be "Article marketing software for SEO improvement", this is far more specific than just "Article Marketing" and is going to be used as a search term less frequently. Because this is searched less there will also be less competition, less articles or websites using that keyphrase as part of their content. Because fewer marketers will be using the keyphrase it's going to be easier to get good search engine rankings if you decide to use it. The issue is that less people will ever use the longer keyphrase in a search engine but those who do are more likely to find your article or website as a result of using these long-tail keywords. They're also more likely to be looking for exactly what you're offering if your article or website is relevant to the keyphrase you're using, as it should always be.

Robert Frost wrote a poem called "The Road Not Taken" that sums up the thinking behind the long-tail. Don't cater to the crowd, provide the path that is less traveled and capture a small, but focused and hungry, audience.

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