Longtail keywords

Internet marketing term of the week:

Longtail keywords

By Derek Gehl

In Nicole Ephgrave’s article on Yahoo Search Marketing’s “Panama” upgrade, she mentions the strategy of bidding on “longtail keywords” as an effective low-cost way to drive targeted traffic to your site.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with this term, here’s the IMC definition:

Longtail keywords are 3 to 5-word phrases with a very specific meaning that applies directly to the product or service you sell.

The more specific, the better! That’s because people who are searching on highly specific phrases are closer to making a buying decision. And that means they’re far more likely to purchase your product than people who are searching for more general information.

For example, if you sell custom-made hubcaps for antique cars, who do you think is more likely to buy your product:

… someone who does a search on the keyword, “antique car info”

— or —

… someone who does a search on “1935 Chevy truck hubcaps”?

The second person, obviously!

So when you run your own pay-per-click ads, make sure you try to target as many highly specific phrases as possible. There’ll be fewer people searching on those phrases, but they’ll be far more likely to buy your product.

And the great thing is, longtail keywords are cheaper than more popular ones — which means you’ll get more converting customers and save money on your ad campaigns at the same time!

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