Why use good keyword research tools?

Last Tools of the Trade Tuesday, I covered most of the essential affiliate marketing tools in general. This week I'll focus on the importance of using good keyword research tools and how they can help you with your affiliate marketing business. As you may know, keywords are actual search terms used by potential customers to help them find something. They normally do this by going to a search engine (like Google) and typing into the search box the term of what it is they want. Even though this is only one method people use to find something on the Internet, it still carries enough weight to be important to take a closer look.

Keywords help you to connect with your audience in these major ways

• Help you discover what it is your customers want and are looking for.
• Use to create relevant content for your website or discover where your potential customer’s go to find that information.
• Determine if a particular market is profitable and the level of competition you face.
• Help your market find your site when they use search engines.
• Help you find relevant products or services to promote to your specific market.

Keyword research helps you find markets of interested people who are looking to find something. For information that interests them, but more often they are looking for a solution to a problem they, or a loved one is experiencing. As a marketer (in any field) your main purpose is to offer solutions to problems your customers face and who are looking to find help or relief. The better you can understand and relate to your customer’s problems, the better you can find and offer valuable solutions to them. And it all starts with proper keyword research.

Helps you find topics for your blog

If you have a website or blog, keyword research helps you discover topics that your market is interested in knowing more about. It helps you create or find information that is genuinely helpful to them. You then become a more valued resource for them, and in turn, they will become more willing to buy from you. If you don’t have a website or blog, you can still use keywords to discover places where your potential customer’s hang out, like specific forums or social media sites. Once there, you can answer questions they may have and then point them in the right direction (with your affiliate link).

Helps you find your market

Another big factor with keyword research is to know if the market you want to pursue is even profitable. And if so, how much competition there is that you face. One way to really know is to look at potential search terms your customers would use and see just how many people are actually searching for it. Keyword search terms help you know that ballpark number. Once you see that enough people are interested (at least a few thousand per day), the next focus is finding out how competitive is that search term. If it's a well established market with many well known competitors and you are just starting out, you might want to avoid it or find another angle to enter into it. A quick example would be 'diet' vs 'weight loss' vs 'low calorie recipes'. Each term is related, but the competition varies. By using a keyword research tool will help you find a less competitive terms within a very profitable market. Also these tools will help you find other related terms you didn’t think of and would have missed. Most likely they will be long tail search terms. Do you have your own website or blog? The search terms you discover for your market will help you put together related articles to post on your site. The more related the terms used within your site, the more valuable they become for search engines to find you and rank your site. This of course is known as SEO (search engine optimization). Keywords are a valuable part of SEO which equates into targeted traffic for your site.

Helps you find related products or services

And finally with the right set of keywords, will help you to find relevant products or services to promote. Information that offers the solutions your potential customers are looking to find. The key factor is that you can put it altogether in one place on your website and attract targeted visitors. As you can see, keyword research does make a difference. Using the right keyword research tools will help you find a profitable market. Keywords will help you find what products to promote, and give you valuable solutions to offer your target market. As always, I invite you to leave a comment with your opinions, questions, and insights. :)