It is no great revelation that keywords are essential in getting your website to rank higher in Google search results. That said, too often not enough attention is paid to keyword research. Knowing the queries people actually use, is integral in getting the visitors you want to your website

Now, the folks at Google are going to tell you to just write good copy that your potential visitors find compelling, and your rankings will take care of themselves. While that is true in a perfect world, it isn’t quite that simple.

Of course there are may factors (Google’s Matt Cutts says 200+ “signals”) that dictate where your listing shows up on Google’s search results pages, and the keywords on your web pages are only part of it. The fact is, they play a very big role.

Why is keyword research important? Well, your visitors won’t get to your website so they can read your “compelling copy” unless it contains the keywords your potential visitors use when they do a search on Google, or other search engine. Your web pages may have “compelling copy” as far as you are concerned, but are you thinking about the same keywords as your potential visitors? Keyword research can help you figure that out.

Where to start? Write your compelling copy, and then read it out loud. How does it sound? Did you or your audience hear keywords you believe potential visitors would use to find your products or services?

Make a list of keywords you believe identify your products or services. Ask for input from co-workers, customers, friends, your barber, or hair dresser.

Take a good look at the list. Are all or some of those keywords on your website? Remember, Google sells relevance. Your pages should be product or service-specific, as should your keywords. The wrong keywords may get visitors to your website, but those visitors may not stay, because they were looking for something you don’t offer. Your goal should be to attract self-qualified visitors (leads, prospects) that want or need what you offer.

Okay, let’s see if anyone actually searches for your keywords. Google has a good free tool (Google Keyword Tool) for you to use. It is geared toward those who are using, or may use, Google AdWords. You do not have to have an AdWords account to use the keyword tool. It will show how much competition there is for your keywords, global monthly searches, local monthly searches, and more. You may do a simple search, or they’ll give you more options than you will care to deal with. Keep it simple. You just want to see if people really are searching using your keywords.

If your keywords have a lot of search volume, you should use Google Trends, where you can search for two terms, e.g. lake property, lakefront property, and you’ll see charts showing the relative search volume (more people search for lake property). You can filter the results by date, regions, cities, etc.

There are non-Google tools out there as well. A very good one is the Free Keyword Suggestion Tool From Wordtracker. Another is WordStream’s Free Keyword Tool.

There is a great deal more to say about keywords, and we’ll discuss them again. Hopefully, this will give you an understanding of the importance of choosing the right keywords. One of America’s favorite authors knew something about choosing the right words when he said, “The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.” Oh, that author if you are wondering, was Mark Twain.

Go to work and make that keyword list today! Edit that compelling copy to contain your researched keywords, and get results!

If you have claimed your Google Places page, please feel free to skip the rest of this. If you have not claimed your Google Places page. Do it! Better yet, talk with the people you trust most with your web presence about why and how. That may be someone on your staff, your webmaster, or your web marketing people. Oh, by the way, if they haven’t been telling you to use Google Local Business Center (before it morphed into Google Places) for the last few years, you should ask them why not.

Why is claiming your Google Place Page important? On April 20, 2010, while introducing Google Places, they said, “One out of five Google searches is related to location.” Seven months later, the frequency of local searches has surely grown.

Google says, “More people search for businesses online than anywhere else, so it’s important to make sure your business listing can be easily found on Google.com and Google Maps.” They obviously believe it, as demonstrated by their blog post, “Place Search: a faster, easier way to find local information.”

After you claim your page, you may enhance the Place Page for your business by adding photos, videos, tags, hours of operation, coupons, and even real-time updates like weekly specials. One of the “features” is “ Reviews by Google users” which presents a compelling reason to “claim” your business Places page. Business owners that claim their listing may respond to negative (and positive) reviews. Here are some guidelines for managing your listing.

When is your Google Places listing displayed? Your listing will display when someone does a search on Google Web Search, Google Maps, Mobile search, 1-800-GOOG-411 voice directory search, or Google Earth. On any of these services, a search directly for your business name and city, will most likely display your listing. If your listing is well crafted, searches for your business category or services will trigger a display of your listing.

There is a lot more to be said, but I’ll just close, by telling you, this is the most important local business search-related action you can take. Google Places is free, and you can easily claim and enhance the listing yourself. Invest a little time, and do this today!

Learn more about Google Places, and remember, Don’t Lose Your Place!

As always, feel free to post a comment or question, or call John at 1-800-281-9993 or 608-822-3750.

Last week, Google introduced Instant Previews, “a new search feature that helps people find information faster by showing a visual preview of each result.”

Now, every page of your website that gets returned in Google search page results (SERPS) will have a preview displayed as you see above. The display appears when the searcher clicks on the magnifying glass. Once the magnifying glass has been clicked, scrolling up or down through the listings will trigger the display for each listing. In other words, some or possibly many visitors will be making decisions based on appearance rather than solely  on the text “snippet” displayed.

What does this mean to you? Well, the importance of a visually appealing web page just got ratcheted up another notch. Nearly everyone knows that a poor website design and layout will not retain visitors. You have very little time in which to present your case.  Now, website design is a factor in the decision to click on a Google search result listing. A bad first impression may keep potential visitors (read: customers, clients, members) from ever getting to your website.

You will certainly want to look at your list of most important keywords, or search terms (You have determined what they are, haven’t you?), and do some searches to see how your web pages are displayed. Check out how your most important pages look. You will likely be surprised. On some pages, possibly all, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Others, may not look so hot, either visually, or from a search term (keyword) perspective.

Most people will likely think only of the visual depiction of the web page. With a closer look, you’ll notice Google will use orange highlights to indicate highly relevant content on the page, and text call outs show search terms in context.

As always, you need to have pages that are visually appealing, and have compelling, search-engine-friendly content. Please remember, the keywords searchers use will be displayed in a call out. Of course, if you don’t have well-written content containing keywords your potential visitors are using in their search, you won’t show up at all.

Here is what Google says about Google Instant Previews.