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June 09, 2005
June 10 - Recent Wordtracker Questions & Answers
Wordtracker related Question:
I have a quick WT question - hope you don't mind...
If I want to do a search for keywords to optimize a site that sells Acupuncture, Oriental Medicine and Chinese herbology books, how would you do that search most efficiently?
I tried to save some time by entering the following keyword phrases in the Comprehensive Search keyword text-entry box and changing the pulldown from 100 to 500 - but all I got back was the below.
-acupuncture books Count 6 Predict 5
-acupuncture books australia Count 3 Predict 3
-Acupuncture Books Count 2 Predict 2
I tried entering the following instead and got more results, but the results didn't seem relevant.
-acupuncture
-oriental medicine
-chinese herbology
I thought that if anyone would have some wisdom on this to share, you would - can you please let me know your thoughts on this?
ANSWER: John Alexander replies:
The key to improving on your Wordtracker research, is to move out of the realm of a "keyword hunting" and move more into the realm of behavioral research. This means that you want to think laterally at least two or three levels beyond the more obvious terms that involve "acupuncture" as a root.
What you need to do is explore the term involving the "benefits" of what acupuncture can accomplish! Does that make sense?
Expand your lateral thinking to research several topics for example like the relief of pain, or how to quit smoking or weight loss or in other words, focus on finding a high KEI valued phrase related to a "solution to the affliction" or perhaps the dealing with the affliction itself.
Does your acupuncturist have treatment for spinal afflictions?
Does he have an interesting spinal diagram he could display of the nervous system?
Here's just one quick example:
Example:
"Nervous System Spinal Diagram" KEI 840.5
It's not acupuncture related, but it could be (if acupuncture can help a back condition.)
Does acupuncture help people with relief from various addictions?
Example:
"addictions-therapy" KEI 481.08
Could you have some pages dealing with various symptoms that can be helped through acupuncture?
"Symptoms for Medical Conditions" KEI 656.1
In other words, stop focusing on what it is that you have to sell (like a oriental medicine book, or a chinese herbology book, or an acupuncture book.)
Instead, I would make a "list of solutions" that your acupuncture book might deal with or assist with and then research the afflictions or the conditions. From that point, once the reader lands on your page, you can introduce the acupuncture book as a resource offering THE solution to the readers trouble.
WORDTRACKER QUESTION:
I've often been tempted to do WT searches with multiple words - to save time or to get some sense out of the most valuable keyword phrases across more than one query string entered. But I never feel like I understand the results - or feel that the results are truly valuable and usable.
ANSWER: John Alexander replies:
There is a good reason why you feel like you're not finding great phrases and why you may be missing millions of great opportunities that would otherwise be revealed.
The ultimate way to "save time" is by following the exact process that I teach in Wordtracker Magic. Instead of working with phrases, or lists multiple words (which ultimately won't save you time if you can't find good results in the end) and instead, try narrowing down to a single "root word" and the beauty of Wordtracker is, that it can show you every instance of that single term AND EVEN MORE importantly, exactly how that term is being used within all phrase combinations existing within the millions of terms in the database. Finally, Wordtracker will easily sort out the mess and bring the best windows of opportunity to the top. This is extremely powerful.
I would say that where some people make a major mistake is in trying to find a way to "save time" by working with multiple words instead of working with a single, behaviorally related root word.
As far as "saving time" goes, by following Wordtracker Magic's technique, I can pull up more high KEI pure gold in 10 minutes of focused research (lateral thought plus exploring behavior) than many people would find in hundreds of hours of research, simply by letting Wordtracker do the really tough work for you.
There are always huge opportunities to be discovered if we can just get out of the keyword hunting mindest and really focus on the solutions being provided. My expectation is you should come up with a load of great ideas once you focus on the benefits, instead of the main keyword that is pre-programmed into our minds. It's not really about "acupuncture" it's about what acupuncture can do for you. It's not about herbal medicines, it's about what they can do for you.
I should also say that, you can still optimize for low KEI phrases or what ever you want. You'll just need to work much harder to gain the rankings, that's all. But it can be done.
I hope this is helps give you many new things to explore in Wordtracker.
Highest regards
John Alexander
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Posted by John at June 9, 2005 10:43 AM