1. KEYWORD RESEARCH FOR CONVERSION MARKETING By Kathleen Garvin @Kathleen_Garvin @SEMrush

2. Kathleen Garvin Director of Content Development at SEMrush, www.semrush.com www.semrush.com Manage the SEMrush blog, www.semrush.com/blog www.semrush.com/blog Tweet me @Kathleen_Garvin and say, “Hello!”… …or tell me what “Mill-e-wah-que” is Algonquin for

3. Today’s Presentation About SEMrush Keyword Research Panda 4.0 & Keywords Call to Action

4. SEMrush Founded in August 2008 HQ in Saint Petersburg, Russia North American office in Trevose, PA SaaS company

5. SEMrush 25 Google databases specific to countries & U.S. Bing We track more than 106 million keywords selected based on search volume (and you can specify more using the Position Tracker feature!) SEMrush analyzes the top 20 Google (and Bing U.S.) search results for each keyword in our database, so you get the best-performing keywords of all!

6. SEMrush SEMrush is a data provider and the industry leader in competitive research software E-commerce managers can learn about the effectiveness of your and your competitor’s digital marketing campaigns Agencies can investigate prospects for search campaigns Custom Reports and API NEW Backlinks, Site Audit and Keyword Difficulty tools

7. SEMrush & Keyword Research With SEMrush, you can see the keywords bringing traffic to your site You can also see the keywords bringing visitors to your competition (hint: they’re spying on you, too!) If a keyword is working well for your competitor, it could work for you See the landing pages and content, too

8. Keyword Research “Keyword research is one of the most important, valuable and high return activities in the search marketing field. Ranking for the ‘right’ keywords can make or break your website.” - Rand Fishkin, Moz

9. Keywords are not dead! Don’t believe the hype: keywords are not dead

10. Keywords: Interest & Intent Beth Morgan (@bethmorgan) created an infographic for Kissmetrics 1. Create a seed list of starting terms 2. Expand your list using keyword research tools 3. Refine your list with competitive research

12. Targeting the Right Keywords 1. Brand terms. People who are familiar with your brand already are the easiest of all to convert In terms of volume, this category of keywords might not produce the most impressions or page views, but they usually will have the best conversion rate (in both paid and natural search)

13. 2. Product terms. This is what your product is or does and what problems it solves. Depending on how diverse your array of products or services is, this list could be huge. People who are searching for these terms are a little further back in the decision cycle 3. Competitor terms.

14. 4. Substitute product terms. If you’re selling pens, you might consider bidding on (or optimizing for) “pencils.” 5. Complementary product terms. These are things that go with your product, such as “TV stands” if you sell TVs. Basically, they are someone else’s product terms. You might win some marginal conversions with them. 6. Audience terms. Beth talks about this category as being more experimental – what you think your audience might also be interested in

15. The Right Keywords Not all visitors are created equally; you want to target the right users with the right keywords Dreamers Browsers Shoppers Buyers

16. The Right Keywords, cont’d One-word, “head term” ambiguity… Frame: picture frame or eye frame? What is the searcher looking for? How will you know without longer phrases? What does Auto Suggest/Autocomplete say?

17. Sample query, “sandals”

18. Phrase match report for “sandals”

20. Takeaways “Sandals” versus “Cheap Birkenstock sandals for women” – one suggests browsing, while the other suggests intent to buy As shoppers NARROW their choices, they LENGTHEN their keywords

21. Beware of obstacles to findability Long or difficult-to-spell product name or brand name Ambiguous product name or brand name Acronym for a product name or a brand name

22. Difficult-to-spell brand name Commonly misspelled or purposely misspelled

24. Krispy Kreme

25. Ambiguous brand name That time I worked at The Meat Store…

26. Acronym for a brand name APTA

27. Keywords & Searcher Intent What are the signals, built into the keywords, that suggest intent to buy? “coupon code,” “coupon,” “cheap” suggest someone who’s ready to make a purchase

28. Panda 4.0

29. And Payday Loans 2.0 The industry was filled with eBay-Panda 4.0 news Press releases took a hit On May 29, Sean Malseed wrote about this on the SEER Interactive blog

30. “On May 27th, PRWeb.com lost more than half of their traffic overnight. They dropped out of the first 20 Google results for more than 8,000 keywords. According to SEMrush data, these ranking losses have cost prweb.com nearly a half-million daily sessions.”

31. “Protein shake diet plan”

32. Panda 4.0 Detection and Industry Effects SEMrush, Barry Schwartz, Moz and RefuGeeks round- ups Dr. Pete: The top 25 keywords where eBay lost top 10 rank positions: “Beats by Dr. Dre” to “Lilly Pulitzer bedding” Michael Stricker blog post on SEMrush

33. Affected by Panda 4.0? If you have been affected, examine how your competitors fared. It is clear that in many industries, there have been winners and losers. Assess who may have gained share, and who has lost. Then, examine the design and content of those pages most affected to decipher the differences and discover any applicable edits to improve your own results.

34. Affected by Panda 4.0? Some are pointing to the “duplicate content” factor as a culprit, so pay attention to the URL structure and be mindful of subdomains, intervening directories and canonicalization. Google may be doing a more stringent job of indexing and displaying a single page per domain for product keywords. It would be a pity to be victimized by your own canonicalization when you might prefer to have other pages rank highly.

35. Panda 4.0 takeaways Thin, shallow, scraped content is asking for trouble High-traffic keywords tempt the e-comm SEO to take shortcuts might attract the Panda

36. Trust Make the process to buy streamlined, but then make them feel safe Trust Marks Trust Pages Risk Reduction Secure checkout, HTTPS protocol, Certificate Authority Don’t make the site look blank

37. Getting customers to follow the call to action Alicia Lawrence (@Alicia_Lw) works in content development at Webpage FX She wrote a two-part call to action post for SEMrush

38. Know Where Your Audience Stands In order to convince them to follow a call to action you have to understand where they stand in each of these categories: knowledge of your business and products, why they would be interested in purchasing your products or services, background and previous experience with the type of products you sell, and their beliefs or feelings toward your brand Keyword research helps with this process

39. Keep it simple Offering product choices is a good thing, but keep in mind when you are trying to persuade a consumer to follow the call to action, simplicity is always best When it comes to a call to action, make the choice simple and clear

40. Create a sense of urgency Use words like “call,” “buy now,” “register,” “donate,” “for a short time only,” and “order now to receive a free gift.” “Save” vs. “lose”: customers are afraid of losing something Neuromarketing blog post featuring results from Science:

41. Reduce skepticism Clearly explain what the customer will receive Add a link for FAQs, terms and conditions Customer reviews

42. Continued reading SEO Strategic Tips for E-Commerce By Kinjal Adeshara http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/20-strategic-seo- tips-to-increase-e-commerce-sales/ http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/20-strategic-seo- tips-to-increase-e-commerce-sales/ How to Persuade Customers to Follow the Call to Action (Parts 1 & 2) By Alicia Lawrence http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/how-to-persuade- customers-follow-call-action-part-1/ http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/how-to-persuade- customers-follow-call-action-part-1/ http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/how-to-persuade- customers-follow-call-action-part-2/ http://www.semrush.com/blog/publications/how-to-persuade- customers-follow-call-action-part-2/

43. Milwaukee is Algonquin for “The good land”

44. Thank you! www.semrush.com @Kathleen_Garvin @SEMrush Here is a promo code for a free, two-week trial of Guru: SAVVY-37H182X9