Stepwise Analysis of SEO Long Tail
In spite of all the debate about Long Tail in Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and PPC, the concept remains unclear and ignored. Commonly used in Search Engine Marketing, the term is used to describe the situation where a small number of customers/products create huge profits, but the major portion of overall profit is contributed by a greater number of small profit customers/products.
A quick view of the long tail phenomenon will help you understand the impact of this process on your website traffic.
Every month, over 10,000 visitors come to one of my sites. This search traffic is the result of over 6,500 varying search terms.
A few key terms are searched by about 10% of this traffic while the remaining 90% comes from different search terms, each bringing not more than 0.1% of traffic.
This is what we call the long tail. A large number of search terms that are not bringing significant traffic alone, but still have an important contribution to the overall search traffic. Among this wide array of search terms lie the opportunities you can take advantage of.
Let us see how…
Step #1 – Evaluation of Long Tail
by exporting search term data from your analytics package, you can make a graph of your site’s long tail in Excel. Take Traffic on the Y axis and Terms on the X axis.
A few long tail graphs that must be created for your site include:
a) The overall long tail graph
This graph includes all your search traffic and shows the terms driving it. In the ‘head‘ section, branded items will appear high.
b) The branded and non-branded long tail graphs
Considering the varying behavior of branded and non-branded terms, you should analyze them separately as well as in combination.
c) SEO and PPC long tail graphs
You need to separate the organic and paid traffic to know the source of traffic and optimize it. After this step has been completed, you can finally start analyzing the long tail.
Step # 2 – Analyze the Long Tail
now, you must start looking for patterns in your long tail. This involves asking a few questions like:
a) Do the smaller terms usually include your main terms? If so, this indicates effectiveness of SEO strategy with your long tail terms benefiting from the main SEO. Is it possible to replicate this to create other ‘free’ longtail campaigns? A good SEO strategy aims to increase the ranking of particular terms, which implies greater visibility for less popular but similar terms as well.
b) Are there any surprising common themes? A lot of long tail traffic obtained for a common theme in your website is a factor for considering whether there is a related ‘head’ term that can be included in your SEO or PPC strategy.
c) Which are the main themes? If there are a few main themes, try to build your SEO strategy for developing some ‘free’ long tail campaigns. You must also consider how to group these terms into a comprehensive PPC long tail campaign. The aim is to organize your long tail for better management.
d) Do branded items form the PPC head? If so, you must ask yourself whether this can be shifted to natural traffic to save money.
e) Do tail terms define most of your non-branded SEO traffic? For specific terms, this can prove to be an ineffective SEO plan. It is important to target high traffic terms and get head terms fromm SEO to reduce dependence on the fluctuations in PPC bidding market.
This list of questions can form part of your analysis of the long tail, supplemented by other questions and patterns.
Step # 3 – Deriving Terms for Your Long Tail
Keyword research can be conducted in several ways. The simplest way is to use your normal keyword tools to find more terms. Another option is to use Google’s Search-based Keyword Tool. Once you type your URL, it suggests terms for your site and links them to specific landing pages.
Your natural search term traffic report is also a good source of finding terms. Buy these cheap terms and test them to see if you can make your natural search performance better. The chosen natural tail terms can then be used to generate other terms with help of your normal keyword tools.
Instead of getting into long tail keyword research, several PPC marketers may consider using broad match in Adwords as a better alternative. This can be done but won’t give optimal results in the long term. Most traffic will be brought in for terms that have your nominated search terms as stems. A harmless option is to make a long tail keyword list and see if anyone is searching for those terms before you pay.
For effective long tail PPC campaigning, you must ensure that your long tail terms are grouped properly so that your ads are targeted suitably and wasted clicks minimized.
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thanks neha…. Agarwal rocks….
It really helped me. thanks a lot