Keyword Rankings & Traffic: Unknown Potential
I've been testing a few keyword tools, and trying to match up traffic stats from the tools vs traffic stats from my websites, to see which ones are accurate, or which ones are the most accurate compared to each other.
As I was looking through my website, I realized I was getting a lot more traffic than the numbers were showing. Why was nothing matching up?
Well, I figured out it was because even though I target ONE keyword per page, the page actually ranks for multiple keywords. Here's an example from Search Console, showing multiple iterations of similar phrases, or even LSI keywords (related phrases) that I didn't intend to rank for.
Sorry, I covered the actual keywords, but you can see highlighted are the ones that are the same. There are five in this screenshot.
The keyword I was targeting had just 16 traffic and 87 QSR. Not a great keyword, right? Well, I thought it was an interesting post idea anyway, so I wrote a very good article on the topic.
You can see that in November, this one blog post got over 1300 visits!
Also, the high traffic for this page came over time. I wasn't ranked on page one, then I creeped into spot #10, and now I sit at position #3 for my "main keyword". I don't even know everything else I rank for on this page.
From the screenshot below you can see how the traffic has increase over time. Those are stats for just one page on my website (per month).
This is a good reason to look at every keyword as a huge potential source of traffic. Even if it's not "perfect" according to the stats, if you can write an interesting, helpful blog post on the topic, then there's going to be long term potential for the content to draw traffic to your website.
Recent Comments
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Very useful observations, thanks! It's also a reminder of how Google can reward our efforts to write longer articles of original, quality content. The longer it is, the more long-tails it will inherently own.
I will now definitely pay attention to some of the lower searched terms I just glossed over after seeing a low number.
Thanks for helping us understand this.
This is such awesome news Nathaniel!
Thank you for sharing my Friend, just recently a member of WA posted a blog asking how She was able to rank for a Keyword that She wasn't even targeting.
Here you have shown us the amazing results with just a small amount of views, that has the potential to rank for so many other Keywords and drive much more traffic with great content.
Tony
Thanks Nathaniell, for your insight. I am new to the world of creating websites and affiliate marketing. Your Keyword post was helpful.
Brian
I believe, and I know it is a bit of a dangerous notion; write quality content and they will come. Not every post fits every dynamic such as quantity of words especially. Your point is well made here though. You made the average above average and proved quality and commitment wins again.
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Great. I ceetainly agree with you I have been experiencing the same thing.