The best time for your brand to start using Search Engine Optimization (SEO) was ten years ago. The first-movers of SEO are now well-entrenched at the top of the search results. They receive tons of organic search traffic, creating significant revenue for their businesses.

Luckily, it isn’t too late to get into the SEO game. If you execute a well-organized SEO campaign starting today, you’ll begin to generate organic search traffic within a few months. A year from now, you can be on the front page of the search results for a few valuable keywords.

Does that sound worth it to you? If so, the first step is to research your keywords.

Keywords are Crucial

Great keywords are the foundation of any successful SEO campaign. When people search for your keywords, your goal is to be at the top of the search results.

If you execute a hard-fought campaign around the wrong keywords, it’ll do you no good. You can’t switch to new ones partway through the campaign. If you abandon your keywords, you have to start from scratch.

Take the time to get this part of the SEO process right. It’s worth a few extra days of thinking and researching to make sure that you pick the best possible keywords for your SEO campaign.

Different Kinds of Keywords

Short keywords are the most valuable for developing organic search traffic. However, they are far too competitive to be worth the hassle for most brands.

The major players in digital marketing have been waging war over the best keywords for more than a decade. There’s just no way for a small business to target keywords like “women’s fashion” or “coffee” these days. It would require huge amounts of money, talent, and time to even begin to compete.

Any phrase with four or more words is considered a “long-tail keyword”. These are the perfect target for new SEO marketers. Your brand can identify a few long-tail keywords that get a reasonable amount of search traffic, target your SEO strategy towards those phrases, and get real results within months.

Google Keyword Planner

Your goal is to find keyword phrases with between 10,000 and 50,000 hits per month. Google’s Keyword Planner tool is by far the best free tool for doing this research.

You have to set up an Adsense account to access the keyword planner. This account is Google’s way of selling ad space to businesses, but you won’t need to pay a dollar to sign up. You can safely ignore all of the information about purchasing ads and load up the keyword planner for free.

Once you arrive at the keyword planner, start testing keyword phrases. Try as many relevant four word phrases as you can. You want to discover ten good phrases that fit into the 10,000 to 50,000 hits per month range.

After you identify ten usable keyword phrases, you can narrow it down to the three best ones for your brand. Keep in mind that you’ll have to use these phrases a lot on your website and blog. Pick the ones that best fit your brand image and personal style.

Keywords Are Crucial For SEO

Once your brand starts to receive organic search traffic, you’ll wonder how you ever survived without it. The value of a great SEO campaign is hard to overstate.

This is only possible with the right keywords. You need to be careful about this decision. If possible, ask for extra guidance from a friend or colleague who has already run a few SEO campaigns. If you choose great keyword phrases for your brand, you will set yourself up for incredible SEO success.