Over the Christmas Holidays we spent some serious time digging into the latest changes that Google has made in the values it reports in the Keyword Tool and the Estimator Tool inside of Google adwords. I thought I would share what we found
and how it should affect the way you build out your website blueprint.
For a long time Google returned the same value for broad match search and phrase match search – it’s only been very recently that they have started giving unique values to phrase match search.
The way I tend to look at it is that people search by default in broad match – very few people put quotes in their searches. So broad match search volume can do a valid estimate for the number of people looking for your keywords.
Take for instance “Phoenix plumbers” and “plumbers Phoenix” – if you were searching for a plumber in phoenix you might type the query in one way one time, and the other way the next time. Broad match takes this into account and gives you the same number of searches for both keyword phrases.
However terms like “Phoenix unemployed plumbers” is also a valid broad match phrase for “Phoenix plumber”. It’s hard to get too far off the mark when you are in a niche. However, when you start getting into broader markets the number of inappropriate phrases included in the search volume can become significant.
So I find broad match search values particularly well suited for niches – it helps you figure out where your best bets are because meaningful keywords will have larger values in broad match. When you are doing research on local markets or niches, the search values for the keywords tend to be so small as to not be tracked by Google. So by switching over to broad match when you are looking at small markets, you actually see more keywords with values and can pick keywords more intelli
gently because of this contrast. This is why The Last Keyword Tool uses broad match search values.
If you are doing market domination, then it becomes more important to know exactly which terms are being searched for and what the searches for each specific term are. Because phrase match searches values help so immensely there, we use those values in Krakken.
In “truth” when I compare what my “impressions” are as opposed to what the “searches” are reported to be by Google, I find the actual numbers vary widely from both the phrase and the broad match values. So a bit of “salt” needs to be taken no matter which number you are choosing to go by.
When importing your data into DWS for cost and profit estimations, if you are using the broad match numbers from TLKT, you might want to
estimate your conversions to be a bit lower – maybe 1/2 to 1 percent lower – just to make sure the estimates DWS is giving you are not unrealistic. The best thing would be for you to run an adwords campaign for your silo terms to make sure you know what your traffic values are and to have an idea of what terms are converting the best.
About RussellRussell Wright is a search engine optimization auditor and co-inventor of the Theme Zoom (Krakken) keyword research tool. This tool was founded on Russell's proprietary keyword reporting system and the 9 different keyword types. This keyword system is designed to unveil the unique keyword fingerprint of your website that will assist you in dominating your niche at a high level.
