Today we are going to look at the last two elements of choosing good keywords for your niche campaign idea. Yesterday we covered search volume and today we will cover the level of competition your keywords have.
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6. How to Measure Your Campaign Idea’s Competition
· 100 Comments · OWM Month 1
Tags: owm week 1
100 responses so far ↓
1 Bill // Jan 9, 2009 at 9:15 am
I noticed that today (Jan 9, 09) “fry a turkey” in Google shows about 28,000 competing sites. It’s barely under 30,000. Would you still use it?
Also, how did you arrive at the number 30,000 for most competing sites?
Thanks,
Bill
2 Jackie and Andrea // Jan 9, 2009 at 10:10 am
Hey Bill,
30k is a guideline. I’ve been found this is about the level that it is fairly easy to get things to rank in google using squidoo. I do try to find keywords that are a lot less, and they aren’t that hard to find.
I would still use this keyword, I even do some that are a little over 30k, but really I try to find things that are much lower.
Once you do a few lenses you will start to get a feel for your personal competition level. Everyone’s is a little different, but 30k is where I start.
Jackie
3 Bill // Jan 10, 2009 at 12:30 am
Sounds good to me
Thanks
4 Joyce Thorburn // Feb 6, 2009 at 11:40 am
You sent me some OWM tools. They did nor open in Word but opened in Notepad and had some strange computer language, consisting of strings of yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy s alternated with weird symbols.
Theses were the tool sheets. The explanation came out fine in Notepad. Could you resend these tools in ….what do you calll that? …different format??
Thanks in advance
Joyce
5 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 6, 2009 at 1:00 pm
Hi Joyce -
The spread sheets (.xls) open in Excel.
The .docs in Word
The directions in notepad.
If you don’t have one these - you can email them to yourself in gmail and open them in Google docs
There’s also something called “Open Office” which is an open source (free) version of Microsoft Office.
Depends on your machine whether you want to install though - it’s kinda big.
hth,
Andrea
6 Bernita Burdick // Feb 6, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Jennifer mentions doing a lot of test lens and if one is getting activity she will do a more lens like we are doing here. What are your thoughts on just testing the waters first with one lens before putting a lot of work into many lens?
7 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 6, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Hi Bernita -
I find it works best for me to have both going - a main project (or two) and also as an idea strikes me, to put it into action by doing a ‘quickie’.
Otherwise I find my ideas slip away just quick as they came - lol.
Andrea
8 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 6, 2009 at 5:12 pm
We have covered test lenses somewhere in the process lol, not sure exactly where though.
They are a fantastic idea. I’d say whenever you come across an idea, or a keyword or a thought you think sounds cool throw up a quick test lens. You might be surprised what takes off.
I just answered a very similar question earlier today, but now I can’t find my answer lol.
I’d just do the indexing tricks she shows for the test lenses and leave them alone. See what happens. If one starts getting traffic then you can build a campaign around it.
Your main/personal account is where I do my test lenses.
Hope that helps
Jackie
9 Bernita Burdick // Feb 6, 2009 at 6:45 pm
Yes, that helps. Thank you to both of you
10 Joyce Thorburn // Feb 6, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Hi Gals,
Oops, and sorry. I cried “Wolf”. It wasn’t your sheet I opened with Notepad. Yours opened automatically in Excell. I seem to have the tendency to “panic” too soon. One of my many flaws.
Thanks for answering, anyway.
Joyce
11 Brambles // Feb 8, 2009 at 1:25 am
In this lesson, you mention to “check if there are Adsense Ads on the right side of the page”. If the ads are there, is this something beneficial, or is it best if the ads weren’t there. In other words, does it mean there is too much competition?
Thank you
12 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 8, 2009 at 4:48 am
Hi Brambles -
Adsense ads in this case are good.
It means that it’s a niche that’s worth it to someone to pay for traffic (there’s a market). It also means that you will have that as a monetization option later - we’ll evaluate whether the ads PAY enough to be bothered with when we get to that point.
Andrea
13 TY EVANS // Feb 8, 2009 at 1:29 pm
When I put my key words/phrase in google, it came up with zero. But there were a few different adsence ads.
Do you think that is normal?
14 TY EVANS // Feb 8, 2009 at 2:00 pm
Maybe I am doing this wrong.
Example: My Campaign name is (Making my dog listen)
The title of my articles/lenses is ( How do I feed my dog), ( Why does my dog listen to other people), (When will I get my dog to listen) these are all fake so don’t look them up.
But, what I have been doing is putting my titles into google then doing a search to check competition. Can I do that or should I only put the campaign name. When I put my campaign name in google it came up with 72,000
What to do!!!!!
15 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 8, 2009 at 2:43 pm
This is all part of the process Ty. You have to just keep looking until you find keywords that fit the requirements. I would not go with a keyword for Squidoo with 72k other competing pages.
Remember you are looking for tiny keywords ~ we’re working in the kiddie pool here. They will not have a LOT of searches, but you will have a great chance of getting them ranked high in the search engines so you will get the traffic they are getting.
and FYI, in your above example ~ you should NOT be using how do I feed my dog ~ which has nothing to do with making your dog listen. the 5-7 keywords you find for each campaign MUST be very closely related.
Refer back to the conversation with Nick as PotPieGirl covers this quite well in that part of the OWM package.
Keep putting new/related keywords in the google keyword tool and dig deeper into the niche. There are posts where I have done examples of this, so check through other posts on this site.
Jackie
16 TY EVANS // Feb 8, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Sorry the dog example was fake, that would never have been part of a real search.
I have put lots of different key words in the tool and I have found a lot just like you said, with 500 or more. Now that I have my 10 niches, I made a word doc file for this campaign and I have everything in it so far. What do I do with it now?
17 Jackie and Andrea // Feb 8, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Read the next post and do what it says.
Jackie
18 Peggy Hurd // Mar 9, 2009 at 1:14 pm
I keep coming across “test lenses” and I know how to set them up and why they’re important, but I do not understand how to move a test lens to a different account, like potpie girl says she does. Once the lens is set up under your main account, if it is a success and you want to make a whole campaign, how do you take it off of your main account and put it onto a new account? Thanks in advance. =)
19 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 9, 2009 at 1:33 pm
It’s pretty simple. There is a link in your dashboard area that says transfer a lens. You simply choose the lens you wish to transfer, and then enter the email address of the account you wish to transfer it to.
Jackie
20 Russell Hart // Mar 16, 2009 at 12:17 am
There’s obviously a simple answer to this. I working on my 1st lense and want to know what other lenses, articles (and I guess blogs) I’m competing with. If I go, as I have to Google Seach, all I get is a stack of website summaries, not lenses & articles. So, please, where should I look?
Russell
21 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 16, 2009 at 7:19 am
Hey Russell,
You are trying to get to the first position in google for your keywords, so doing a google search for your keywords will show you the sites you are competing against.
The top sites in google may well not be lenses or articles, they may be websites, and it doesn’t really matter.
If you have found your keywords the way we teach, and do the promotion that we teach you to do you can get yourself to the top of google ~ at minimum to the first page.
It’s not quite so important WHO the competition is as the AMOUNT of competition there is.
Jackie
22 Russell Hart // Mar 16, 2009 at 6:25 pm
Jackie, you’ve partly answerered my question, thanks. But the thing is, for my own personal interest I’d like to SEE and READ just how competitors are presenting my selected topic on their lenses and in articles. I have, of course, already looked at competitive websites, but now I wish to look at lenses/articles. Does that make sense?
Thanks, and regards
RUSSELL
23 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 16, 2009 at 7:29 pm
ok ~ then go to squidoo and type in your keywords in the search bar.
then go to ezinearticles.com and type in your keywords there.
That should give you lenses and articles on your topics.
Jackie
24 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 16, 2009 at 7:31 pm
But understand that how anyone else presents it is really kind of irrelevant. It’s what you do and how you market that will get you traffic and sales.
If the other lenses and articles were doing what they needed to do, they would be at the top of google getting the traffic.
see what I mean?
Jackie
25 Russell Hart // Mar 16, 2009 at 11:54 pm
Many thanks to you both.
By no means do I mean to copy what others are doing … I believe I’m creative enough to do my own thing.
I guess I’m just curious to see what various approaches are being used by others.
My own way of doing a bit of ‘market research’.
I really do appreciate the comments you’ve made.
Regards, RUSSELL
26 Randall Avant // Mar 20, 2009 at 10:45 pm
Howdy, y’all.
My first comment.
I did a google search with my keyword and got 1 (one) result. Is that a good thing? It’s definitely less than 30k, but maybe my product doesn’t even exist?
It was a keyword generated by the kw tool, so I’m confused.
Randall
27 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 21, 2009 at 8:15 am
Well that is definitely less than 30k huh?! Did your keyword have more than 500 searches? If it did I’d say you may be on to a good thing. Keep moving forward, you should have a LIST of options now, so as you move forward you will see if this is going to be a good keyword or not.
You will need 5-8 related keywords to build your campaign on ~ did you find that for this keyword?
Jackie
28 Darryl Hurst // Mar 25, 2009 at 7:51 pm
Generally speaking, for one’s first campaign is it wise to work on a hot new product with a good amount of competition already? Or do you think it’s best to work on something not so much in the spotlight?
29 Darryl Hurst // Mar 25, 2009 at 7:57 pm
You may have aswered my last question already, but what concerns me is a new product name that is too new to have data (no available data) in google keyword tool.
30 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 25, 2009 at 8:07 pm
Using the product name for your keyword is probably not the best idea. You want to find keywords related to the product or that solve the problem the product solves.
Jackie
31 Joel Champe // Mar 31, 2009 at 10:15 am
Hi, all!! Hope things are all coming together nicely for everyone (sweating bleeding and crying
). I was just wondering, when running my keywords in quotes thru the google search engine, for example if I’m using keywords for “cure a slice”, if I know one of my lenses will be “a review of…to cure a slice”…or review of whatever other keyword I have for the niche, should I be running them ever with the review part in google with quotes or just the keyword phrase I have?….I’m gonna go pull up conversation with Nick. We should probably also keep word doc just for reading thru some of OWM…a quick reference guide/”highlight notebook” Have fun!! Joel
32 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 31, 2009 at 10:53 am
Hey Joel,
You can certainly check the “review” keywords in the google kw tool to see if the review has any searches as well.
However if your kw is “cure a slice” you want to check the comp for that specific kw. You can always use the review words in your title, but your kw will be there too.
Jackie
33 Joel Champe // Mar 31, 2009 at 9:58 pm
Cool! So then just like with, “review of (keyword phrase)”, the same could also be said of:
“Playing with (keyword phrase)”
“Dancing with(keyword phrase)”
“Running from (”"”)
Basically, however you can position it, because the keyword phrase that you have is fitting the 500 or more annual search and less than 13,000 (or whatever we wind up finding does work down the road) competing pages (when typed in quotes in google). We want to check on what is out there for the “Playing, Dancing, Running…keyword phrase”, just to be aware of what is there and see if we can find a better edge on any direct competition as far as product goes, but if our keyword phrase themselves are fitting, it’s probably worth a go?
I did actually breath through all that, I’m okay
How are you, lol?
Joel
34 Jackie and Andrea // Mar 31, 2009 at 10:20 pm
yep. You don’t have to really worry about the words around your keywords, but if they work too then all the better.
Jackie
35 Russell Hart // Apr 6, 2009 at 1:02 am
Hi,
I’ve been away for a few weeks, but now back on focus, but quickly back-tracking to freshen-up on these previous lessons. I have a campaign I’d love to do but it’s based on two very topical subjects which are quite different, but work extremely well together. I’ve come up a number of keyword phrases, one of which (long-tailed) I particularly like. When I put it to Google, in quotes, it comes up with ‘not enough data’. I tried a second, shorter, keyword phrase with the same result. Does this mean I should avoid going ahead with these?
Russell
36 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 6, 2009 at 4:56 am
Hi Russell -
The search number is a quick check to see whether you’ll have any audience. Two possibilities here:
1. they’re using different words to find info on the topic
2. not enough people are looking (no market)
Since it’s something you like, you might indulge in 1 test site - ’cause it’s good to do topics you enjoy really enjoy - just don’t do a whole full blown campaign, k?
Andrea
37 Russell Hart // Apr 8, 2009 at 8:19 pm
Thanks Andrea
I’ve been using my brain for further keyword research was good results and propose to test 2 or 3. I realise I’ll have to change my lens copy to accommodate each keyword phrase. Do I need to make major changes to the copy for each lens apart from this?
Regards
RUSSELL
38 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 8, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Russell,
It’s best to have unique content on each of your lenses. If you need some ideas on how to create unique content with similar keywords check out these article templates for some ideas.
http://blog.ezinearticles.com/category/article-templates/
Jackie
39 Linda Servis // Apr 28, 2009 at 2:37 pm
I have found a keyword with low competition, but there are no adsense entries.
40 Carole Rowland // Apr 28, 2009 at 2:45 pm
I am now doing the “searches” and am finding that there are no sponsored links on any of my searches, I find this very odd because it is a very big niche. Could there be something in my settings that is preventing these from coming up? I am currently traveling in another country, should that matter?
Thanks,
Carole
41 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 28, 2009 at 3:26 pm
@Linda if you can find an affiliate product I wouldn’t worry too much about the adsense ads, although that is generally a pretty good indicator of whether or not it is a workable market.
@Carole I don’t really know. It may be part of it. I’ll ask Andrea when she gets back. She may know.
Jackie
42 Carole Rowland // Apr 28, 2009 at 3:39 pm
OK, here is another question. Hopefully, it hasn’t already been answered. I did my spreadsheet with my 20 KW for my 1st campaign. I know to eliminate the KW’s that have over 30K competing pages and to look for KW’s that have about 500 average monthly searches. My questions is, I have found a KW that has 590 average monthly searches but only 229 competing pages. My first thought is, THIS IS AWESOME-GO FOR IT!, but is my thinking correct?
If my thinking is correct, I choose this KW for my campaign, then I choose 5 more out of my group of 20 that are related and fit within the number perameters?? Hope this makes sense.
Thanks a bunch for your input!
Carole
43 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 28, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Hi Carole -
No clue on the searches and ads sorry.
And yes anything with over 500 searches (the more the better) and under even 10k is perfect.
Sounds like you’re moving doing OWM just right
Andrea
44 Carole Rowland // Apr 28, 2009 at 4:23 pm
OK, I have narrowed my original 20KW’s down to 10, eliminated the ones that had over 10K competing pages.
I know you say that anything over 500 monthly searches and under 10K competing pages is good, however, my question is this.
If I have 10KW that fit that criteria, should I eliminate the ones with the highest # of competing pages (even though they are under 10K, in order to narrow down to my 6 needed KW for this one campaign??
Just trying to find out the best process of elimination when everything fits within the parameters needed.
Thanks Again,
Carole
45 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 28, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Now I think I would pick from the easiest to write about and highest searches.
Andrea
46 Carole Rowland // Apr 28, 2009 at 5:02 pm
Thanks, now I got it, glad I asked because I would have gone with the lowest competition.
Glad I joined, I have been going through WA 8 weeks which was a great starting point. But the more I got into it, I knew I needed a little more (maybe a lot more) beginners training. And thanks to PPG, I found you two.
Great concept for helping us newbies.
Carole
47 Shalisha Alston // Apr 28, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Hi. I keep hearing the phrase “throw up a quick lens” what does that mean? How is a lens different from an article and a blog post? I’m confused. Is the content different? I find that I put the same thing on my squidoo lens as my articles. Then what do I put on the free blog? Going in circles…
48 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 28, 2009 at 8:06 pm
Your lens content should be unique to itself. Your articles ~ at least for EZA should be unique as well.
Your blog posts should be different at least a little bit as well.
You are looking to create unique content for everything.
Keep reading, everything is explained as you move forward.
Jackie
49 Jackie and Andrea // Apr 28, 2009 at 8:08 pm
Shalisha,
This is just about competition now, we will explain the rest in future posts. Just do the action step for this post, then move on to the next action step. It will all be explained in detail as we go.
Jackie
50 Carole Rowland // May 4, 2009 at 8:31 am
Ok, I know I keep reading not to stress about your KW’s, but I am. Here is what I came up with my KW search and I just want to make sure I am on the right track.
Search Volume Competing Pages
KW#1 720 9440
KW#2 880 3340
KW#3 1000 7390
KW#4 1300 9360
KW#5 2900 6610
KW#6 590 229
KW#5 and #6 each had 1 sponsored link
I also looked up these KW on Squidoo to see how many articles were written and they are very few, and nothing exactly like I want to do.
Am I on the right TRACK?
Thanks,
Carole
51 Jackie and Andrea // May 4, 2009 at 8:38 am
Hi Carole -
Looks fine and dandy to me
Andrea
52 Sonja Davis // May 8, 2009 at 9:49 pm
Hi Ladies,
What is the difference between searching in quotes and using the exact match in the google kwt? What I did was export the keywords as broad match, which would be the search volumes, then I went back and switched the kwt to exact and then exported those results.
I then took the exact match results next to the appropriate search volume for that keyword. But as a check, something told me to search in google with quotes. And wouldn’t you know it, the results are vastly different.
So why do we use the exact match at all and why are they different than doing a google quotes search.?
53 Jackie and Andrea // May 8, 2009 at 9:58 pm
You’re looking at two different things.
exact match tells you how many people are searching for that exact phrase. That’s search volume.
When you look in google with quotes you are looking at the number of competing websites. These are sites that you are competing against for that keyword. Two totally different things. Both important measures when choosing a “good” keyword.
You want high search volume, (keyword tool) and low competition (google in quotes)
Jackie
54 Jackie and Andrea // May 8, 2009 at 9:59 pm
The difference between broad match and exact match is only within the phrase people are searching for ~ it has nothing to do with competition.
broad match means those words, any order.
exact match is the exact words/phrasing you entered.
Jackie
55 Sonja Davis // May 8, 2009 at 10:14 pm
ooooooo….wait a minute…having a light bulb moment here! So I should forget about broad match and use exact match in the kwt?
Maybe that’s where I am getting confused because I could have sworn that in your video example it showed you looking at broad match because there weren’t any brackets around the words.
So I am still a little foggy on the process but getting there.
56 Jackie and Andrea // May 9, 2009 at 7:05 am
Sonja,
We use broad match for OWM ~ this gives you an idea of people looking for your phrase in any combination. For what we are trying to do broad match works fine.
Jackie
57 jamie tanner // May 24, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Hello Jackie, Andrew, and fellow members!
I’m new and just started and really find the lessons here very helpful. So far I’ve done all the lessons up to this point and I’m very excited to further ones. I think I really lucked out on my first chosen campaign. From what I understand, I have struck on some really excellent keywords as follows:
keyword: 224000 5850
keyword: 22800000 3890
keyword: 644000 98
keyword: 197000 7850
keyword: 32000 524
keyword: 83200 4390
keyword: 158000 1080
This is with the first set of numbers being the search volume and the second set of #’s is the competing pages. I’m excited to see how this campaign turns out. Will continue to do as the lessons say and feel confident of my success.
Jamie
58 jamie tanner // May 24, 2009 at 9:03 pm
I’m sorry about the typo Andrea!
Jamie
59 Jackie and Andrea // May 24, 2009 at 10:07 pm
LOL - no worries - glad you’re here and excited
Andrea
60 greg baker // Jun 5, 2009 at 11:52 pm
I seen this question asked somewhere else here and I can’t find where now. Is it normal for your KW competition to just go through the roof?
For example one longtail KW phrase I was going to use was at 3120 pgs and now is 37500 in less than a week. Another went from 12700 to 88,000. Highly competitive market.
But now I’m curious, even though this market is so competitive, if I still look for KW’s that are under 30,000 like those I mentioned, would it be a good thing if the new KW volume shot up like the others? Or would it be I just get blown by? I guess that second part would depend on how relevant the content is and backlinks pointing back to that KW.
It appears to me that because this market is so competitive, that the KW competition is at a frenzy and their scrambling for anything they can come up with.
Jen showed how to get into some of these markets through the back door but it looks like somebody is closing the door fast.
But holy competitve markets Batman…. is that normal? 3120 to 37,500 and 12,700 to 88,000 that was like 3 or 4 days ago when I did this research.
61 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 6, 2009 at 5:32 am
Hi Greg -
I wouldn’t say it’s normal, but it’s certainly possible. Could also be that google had an update somewhere or an algorithm change.
Remember that OWM is just about testing niches - and getting a feel for the market waters. Just imagine if you’d devoted 3 months (or more!) to building an authority site only to have the numbers shift like that - of course authority sites can handle higher comp numbers …
This is exactly why diversifying your niches while you learn all this stuff is so important - so you can get real time first-hand knowledge of what different markets are doing and find the right niche(s) for you. When you have a collection going, it becomes much easier to remain objective and not be emotionally attached (and bummed) if one goes haywire.
Andrea
62 Rich Wright // Jun 9, 2009 at 2:07 pm
I understand why it’s important to develop niches. As you know I’ve spent a good bit of time trying to develop some keywords for my campaign and while I followed your guide and went for individual “branding” doesn’t that defeat the purpose of an “overall” scenario, you know, an entire market segment? Perhaps I’m being anal and just need a time out so I can go suck on my thumb!
Thanks,
Rich
63 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 9, 2009 at 2:14 pm
LOL - only thing that matters is the numbers … if a niche is small but has enough search/low comp then it’s a decent niche for OWM.
The whole OWM process is intended to reveal markets that are buying - micro markets not whole market segments.
And yeah - breaks are a very good thing
Andrea
64 Neville Davidson // Jun 11, 2009 at 11:08 am
Hi, I know you checked ‘fry a turkey’ in January but I have just checked the same kew phrase as an example and the google figure shows 2,190,000. Is it common for the popularity of a particular key phrase to increase so dramatically in such a short space of time? if so is there any benfit to finding an alternative in the same niche?
Thanks
Neville
65 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 11, 2009 at 11:37 am
Hi Neville
Make sure you’re trying it in Google in “quotations” - ie “fry a turkey” … I come up with 45k comp. So yes, there’s been a decent shift, but not quite as huge as that.
If Jackie had continued to do backlinking promotion for that phrase (comes later in the course) she would probably own the Google top spots since she began when comp was low.
Alternative phrases in the same niche - assuming they had the right numbers - would be your micro niches …
When you find those, it’s generally a good thing - means you have a shot at page 1 of google.
Andrea
66 Neville Davidson // Jun 11, 2009 at 11:59 am
Thanks Andrea
67 Neville Davidson // Jun 11, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Andrea, I am sorry to sound a bit dumb but I put “fry a turkey” in the google search bar and 24000 came up, then when I ticked the box for the UK search only only 356 came up, I just want to make sure I am doing this right, did you mean include ” before and after the phrase? because that is what I did this time and my results were still different to yours so I think I am doing something wrong. Also if you do mean putting the quotation marks in I am wondering how many people actually do that when they search because I have never done that.
Thanks
Neville
68 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 11, 2009 at 12:37 pm
Hmm - well you don’t want UK only … also make sure you’re logged out of google when you search, sometimes that can affect results.
Yes to ” before and after the phrase - and no it’s not how people search but what it tells the Google search is “bring me results with that exact phrase” - these are your first line of competition for a given phrase. It’s a research technique - not how we actually use Google as consumers.
It seems like there’s some shifting going on in Google again - the need to logout so Google doesn’t give you ’smart’ customized to you searches is new and the perfect example of how fluid things can be. Still give you an indication of direction (search and comp) and possibilities topic-wise.
I’m sure this sounds a little vague - I always feel like there’s way more art than science to finding niches and you only get better (more creative in your thinking about potential ‘niches’) by practicing.
So you know, your questions are way common so don’t feel like the Lone Ranger
Andrea
69 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 11, 2009 at 6:47 pm
Aha Neville -
I just realized something - you need to use Google.com for the numbers to match up.
I just clued in that you had a UK only option and that happens only on non-google.com sites.
Phew that’s one mystery solved
Andrea
70 Breakthroughguy // Jun 20, 2009 at 1:24 am
Hi Jackie & Andrea,
I managed to find 5 closely related long tail keywords with low competition in a niche I have wanted to start for my first campaign.
I’ve also selected a clickbank product. (priced $37)
But, I’ve also noticed that the result pages of all the 5 keywords had a lone ad marketing another quite similar ebook (non-clickbank) but priced much lower at only one-third of that of the clickbank product…lol.
I wouldn’t have any problems had there been more ads there, but one ad… it sort of really stood out.
I compared both sales copies and both offered a money-back guarantee but that of the clickbank product was better written…at least I thought.
What irks me is having to compete against a much cheaper ebook.
Personally, with the benefit of your experience, would you go ahead with this campaign? And if you do, from a marketing point of view, what would you do to increase the odds of a visitor buying a higher priced product?
On another note, would you use for a campaign a keyword which has no ads on its result pages?
Thanks
Greg
71 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 20, 2009 at 7:39 am
Hi Greg,
I don’t really look at the ads much. People are much more likely to click on the actual search results than the ads and that’s where you’re trying to get.
If you feel you have a quality sales page, you feel you’ve chosen keywords with good search volume and minimal competition then I’d go for it.
If you’re feeling uncomfortable about it, maybe put one lens up for this campaign ~ do the linking for it and see how it does before you spend all the time involved to complete a whole campaign. Let the one lens be a “tester” lens to see if it’s going to be worth spending the time.
Personally, if the keywords fit I would use them even if they had no ads on the page.
Jackie
72 Breakthroughguy // Jun 22, 2009 at 4:17 am
Hey Jackie,
Thanks for your most practical and straight-to-the point answers.
I know there can’t be any easy answers to some of the questions as there are many variables involved.
I can guess how PPG would have answered namely when in doubt, do it to find out for yourself especially when using free methods.
With the experience gained from testing and tweaking, one can only get better as one puts up more lenses, whether it be choosing keywords, niches or products to sell. But this takes time.
Besides, it seems that a lot of it is a numbers game - if you throw enough stuff out there, some have got to stick.
In posting these questions here, guess I’m drawing upon your experience, and I think this is the real value of this membership.
So, I’m getting the best of both worlds by learning from my own experience as well as tapping into yours.
Such a personal straight answer from one who has been there before definitely gives me the encouragement to go ahead instead of asking ’shall I or shall I not’. It might or might not work but a the very least I know it is not pointless to try.
Sorry for the rant.
Thanks
Greg
73 Jackie and Andrea // Jun 22, 2009 at 6:49 am
Hi Greg -
My feeling is - it’s never pointless to try. Each bit of empirical experience that you get is SO much more valuable than any theory on a piece of paper.
The test lens approach is an awesome one because it let’s you just go with your promptings and then LET GO … not so much emotion and time wrapped up in each topic.
Rants now and then are cool - might even think about developing a blog to post them on and start build a following that way too
Andrea
74 Breakthroughguy // Jun 25, 2009 at 4:21 am
Hi Andrea,
Yes, I agree with the test lens approach. If just one lens can get results, imagine what it will be like with a full campaign.
Thanks
Greg
75 Sue Bledsoe // Sep 18, 2009 at 2:31 am
Hello Jackie and Andrea,
I joined your program late last week and have been going through the lessons. I also have purchased OWM a couple of weeks ago. I came to your program through asking PPG if there was tutoring for OWM. I find your site very helpful and inormative. I like how OWM is broken down into such small steps.
I have already hit my first speedbump and now I am totally frustrated. I think I have an idea for a cmpaing but it might be too broad. I have spent the last day or so trying to come up with keywords but I haven’t been too successful.
Sue
76 Jackie and Andrea // Sep 18, 2009 at 8:45 am
The tighter your niche the easier it will be to find keywords. So if you are working with a broad topic right now think of a way to tighten it up, and then try looking for keywords.
Here’s an example:
and I haven’t researched this ~ just an example of tightening your niche:
baby stuff –> baby strollers –> baby strollers for twins
baby strollers for twins is going to be MUCH less competitive than baby stuff, and even baby strollers ~ if you want you can get even MORE tight with your niche and review specific baby strollers for twins.
If you check search volume you’d be surprised what people are searching for specifically.
The other benefit of that is people are at the END of the buying cycle. People looking for a specific stroller aren’t looking to get more information about strollers ~ they are pricing and getting ready to BUY that particular model.
The other benefit is not many people go this specific with their keywords so there is usually not much competition, which means you can rank pretty quickly.
Probably too much information, but I just had coffee.
Jackie
77 Sue Bledsoe // Sep 18, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Hi Jackie and Andrea,
I figured I would post a comment and introduce myself to ladies. I am compleltely new to internet marketing. I think I maybe on the right track but I am not sure. A niche is a specific market you wan to market to. A campaign is the whole process of marketing or is it a broad idea for marketing? Once you have an idea than you research keywords. Once you have keywords than you would do a Squidoo lens. After that I am guessing you than write articles. I am wondering is broad picture correct? I just wonder I am “getting” this or not.
I just have two more questions, even though are random. Can anyone be successful at this despite the fact they are new to it? Does it matter if you have you college education to do this? I did get your answer this morning.
Thank you for answers.
sue
78 Jackie and Andrea // Sep 18, 2009 at 7:09 pm
Your niche is the people who are interested in your topic or your topic area in general.
Your campaign is the total process of putting your lenses together and marketing them.
You have a pretty good idea of the broad concept. If you follow through the program one step at a time and try to complete the action steps at the bottom of each lesson you will complete a whole campaign when you are done with the lessons.
Yes, you can be successful with this even if you are new ~ just follow along and complete all the action steps. It will get easier as you go along, and you will learn things that can help you be a “better” marketer as time goes on. (as with anything new, the more you do it the better you get).
No you don’t need a college education ~ your education is “on the job” and just by doing you are learning ~ it’s not rocket science, you just need to know what to do, and then do it.
You’ll do great, just keep taking action.
Jackie
79 Sue Bledsoe // Sep 19, 2009 at 1:42 am
Hi Jackie and Andrea,
I just have a quick question since I have pestered you enough for the day. I was wondering if you offer coaching and how does it work? Like is just a small group of people or do you pair people up?
Thanks for the info.
sue
80 Jackie and Andrea // Sep 19, 2009 at 9:01 am
We are not currently offering coaching at this time. If you ask your questions on the site though we will do our best to help you figure things out.
Jackie
81 Sue Bledsoe // Sep 19, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Hi ladies,
I did get your response about niches, but
I am really “stuck” on trying to come up with a niche. I have been pulling my hair out the last day or so trying to come up with a niche.
This is what I have come up with so far:
I am thinking something in the mental health area, which I know is really broad. Than to narrow it some, I was thinking self esteem. I am thinking an aspect of self esteem would be loneliness. I have found an ebook on CB dealing with loneliness. I understand that loneliness is still a broad niche. I am “stuck” on trying to find a smaller niche. Any input will be appreciated.
sue
82 Jackie and Andrea // Sep 19, 2009 at 6:32 pm
You are probably going to find the area of mental health ~ even when you dig in a bit is going to be pretty competitive.
I’d suggest you go back to the lessons on finding a niche (lesson 2 and 3) and try to do some of the exercises we mentioned ~ just so you can try to find a bunch of ideas you can look at and then pick the BEST one, instead of trying to push a square peg into a round hole.
Jackie
83 Jackie and Andrea // Sep 20, 2009 at 7:35 am
Hi Sue ~
I deleted your comment so everyone wouldn’t see the niche you found. Your numbers look good. If you want to post numbers just use something like keyword 1 and then the numbers, keyword 2 and then the numbers.
That way we can give you feedback about your topic, and not give it away to everyone.
Jackie
84 George Varghese // Oct 8, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Hi Andrea & Jackie
I have found a key word with a search volume of more than 4000 but competing page in web has only 166 nos.Is that a good no. In another case sv is around 1600 but competing pages more than 30 k. Which one is good. Pls. specify.
George
George
85 Jackie and Andrea // Oct 8, 2009 at 1:02 pm
They are probably both good.
Are they about the same topic or different topics?
IF they are about the same topic use them both in your campaign. If they are about different topics pick one and then do the other one next.
Jackie
86 Shalisha Alston // Dec 5, 2009 at 11:07 pm
Hi! I was wondering, if I pick a keyword with a lot of search volume, then put in google search site:squidoo.com “keyword phrase” and it comes up “0″ that means no squidoo lenses have been created on the keyword. But what if I put the same keyword phrase in the google search without site:squidoo.com and it comes up over 30,000 - does it matter? According to PotPie, what really matters is who on Squidoo is competing with you since they only pick 2 Squidoo lenses to display on page 1.
87 Jackie and Andrea // Dec 5, 2009 at 11:21 pm
It’s true they will only pick 2 lenses to display (and not necessarily on page one together) ~ but if the keyword you’ve chosen is so competitive you can’t get onto page one at all it won’t matter how many other lenses there are.
Jackie
88 Shalisha Alston // Dec 5, 2009 at 11:44 pm
Thank you for answering. Okay so which matters more, having less than 10,000 or seeing having a low amount of other competing Squidoo lenses? I read try to get less than 5,000 in Wealthy Affiliate. What is your take on my question?
89 Jackie and Andrea // Dec 6, 2009 at 7:48 am
Hi Shalisha -
It isn’t either/or - you need both. 10k is a good measure. First you have to get to the first page - then you need to be one of the two … less competition in both areas is what gets you what you want.
Hope that helps,
Andrea
90 Laura Mendelsohn // Dec 24, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Hi Jackie & Andrea,
Happy Holidays!
I thought I read above (but now can’t find it) that it is NOT advisable to use specific brand names as keywords.
Would you offer come clarification on the logic behind choosing keywords that attract buyers versus those just doing research.
I had chosen a few brand names keywords with favorable search volume to competition ratio. I thought these kws would be indicative of a buyer rather than someone just surfing for info.
Thanks!
Laura
91 Jackie and Andrea // Dec 24, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Hi Laura -
National product names can be good - clickbank product names (unless there’s a search volume for them) … not so much.
I guess another thing to realize is that if you’re doing a product name campaign, you’re very limiting your options for moving that campaign to a new product should the next model come out… as opposed to an evergreen topic.
In the end, some of each are probably in order, ‘ya know? But for SEO - the keywords are the line in the sand/ final word.
Andrea
92 Laura Mendelsohn // Dec 24, 2009 at 4:01 pm
hi Andrea,
Thanks. I see your points. Thanks so much!
Laura
93 Jackie and Andrea // Dec 25, 2009 at 9:19 am
I personally love brand name keywords.
Those people are seriously at the end of the buying cycle and they are LOOKING to buy that very product. If you can get your lens in front of them you’re likely to make a sale. I only do one lens for these though ~ as Andrea’s right if the new model comes out you can’t really change the keywords.
The only other issue you can run into and it’s never happened to me is you could get notification to stop using a copyrighted brand name ~ this is really more of a concern if you buy a domain name with the brand name in it ~ I’ve done this as well, and haven’t had any problems as of yet.
It’s really a personal decision. I kind of think brand names is a great way for beginners to get started, get a feel for the buying cycle, get a feel for what people want and will buy, then you can branch out into more ambigious items if you choose.
just my .02
Jackie
94 Laura Mendelsohn // Dec 25, 2009 at 3:50 pm
Thanks Jackie,
Makes sense. I do remember reading something from PPG about how a very specific brand name with model number, version number, etc. did indicate buyer was near end of buying cycle. So I wanted to use some that came up when I did a search on a specific campaign I am going to start with.
Your words have alerted me to copyright infringements. I will stay aware of this as I move forward.
Thanks a bunch!
Laura
95 Jackie and Andrea // Dec 25, 2009 at 9:09 pm
I wasn’t really trying to “alert you to” something as much as being aware of a possibility. I target a LOT of brand name keywords especially when it comes to squidoo. It’s a personal decision, and it’s a risk I’m willing to take.
Jackie
96 Laura Mendelsohn // Dec 26, 2009 at 10:32 am
Thanks again, Jackie.
And, I do see what Andrea means about CK product names. That is definately not a “draw” because their is little brand awareness of them, they could change rapidly, etc., etc..
Thanks so much!
Laura
97 Gary Materra // Jan 29, 2010 at 1:22 am
Hi Andrea and Jackie,
I have 5 or 6 keyword phrases that fit the parameters, but I don’t know if I should be putting a campaign together around a specific product or around the main keyword? For instance, all the phrases are about 4 Poster Beds (not really, just an example). Now I could get an affiliate link to a sales page that has a variety of 4 Poster Beds, and gear my lens and articles to talk about how great 4 Poster Beds are in general and list several good ones that are on the sales page. Whichever one they pick I make money, right? Or should I be trying to sell ABC 4 Poster Bed, or should I be even more specific and try to sell ABC 4 Poster Bed Model #123? I could do any of those with the 4 Poster Bed keyword phrases.
Thanks…Gary
98 Jackie and Andrea // Jan 29, 2010 at 5:45 am
Hi Gary -
It’s good to try both - more general and more specific (ie. model number if the search numbers are right).
The more specific, the more likely they’re in buying mode. The more general, the longer your content will not be outdated by the next great thing model-wise. And you can shift that general traffic to new model #xyz.
Andrea
99 Gary Materra // Jan 29, 2010 at 11:49 pm
Thanks Andrea, I guess I’m not clear about a couple of things. When I mentioned trying to sell something more specific, I was thinking about still having the same general titled lens, like “4 Poster Beds - 3 Great Advantages,” but then guiding to a specific type and linking to the specific type. It seems to me like you are suggesting having the lens title itself and keywords all about the specific item. But I can’t have lenses or domain names around brand names, can I? Don’t those run the risk of being taken by the brand holder? And I can’t have articles around a specific brand, can I? Wouldn’t that be considered advertising? I’m sorry sometimes I get confused about all this…thanks for your help!
–Gary
100 Jackie and Andrea // Jan 30, 2010 at 7:57 am
Hi Gary -
You can for sure link with your keywords to whatever will convert for your traffic - sometimes that takes testing.
As far as specific brand names on lenses - I am absolutely not a lawyer … but my personal feeling is that if all you’re wanting to do is sell their product and you’re not making any outlandish claims - I doubt there’s be any repercussions.
If on the other hand you were calling their product a scam or something - you might have to answer to that.
Squidoo is okay with marketing - hubpages (as an example) not so much. And in any case - your job is not to ’sell’ - it’s to lead people to the thing they’re seeking. If you’ve made a message to market match, you shouldn’t have to “sell” - that’s the job of the sales page.
Hope that helps,
Andrea