A keyword is an arbitrary term, with a specific and intended meaning, used by a human reader in an electronic context to locate a particular content or to retrieve information. Keywords are used both by the writer and the reader in an electronic document and therefore have a grammar of their own. The subject of keywords is often the whole word or phrase enclosed within quotation marks; thus, “the man behind the curtain.” An index word, topic word, subject name, or subject phrase, in an information retrieval, is usually a single word or a phrase that captures the subject’s essence.
Keywords are used in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to improve both the quantity and quality of traffic directed to a website. People searching for a particular subject will enter a search phrase that best describes the subject. The keyword is chosen based on what people are looking for and how well the search engines can match the searchers’ needs with those of the site. Thus, a keyword can be a very useful tool for Internet users who wish to search for information using specific terms and are able to find it conveniently by a process of elimination of words from the original phrase. This is the reason why some sites rank well in the search engines and others do not.
In advertising, a keyword can mean the difference between a sale and no sale at all. Online advertisements need to be optimized for the search engines to be effective and this is done by including keywords in the advertisement. In marketing or web copywriting, a keyword is another way of saying the main idea of the article. It’s a key ingredient that makes a piece of writing complete and also sets it apart from similar articles written by different people. The words in a phrase or a sentence are important indicators of its meaning.
Keywords are also used in meta descriptions, the code that describes a website. Meta description is important because it explains in simple words what the website is about. However, the keywords need to be right because the code of the site is not able to check these for itself and has to rely on the user to see whether the description is telling the truth or not. For example, if the keyword Meta Description for the keyword “online casino” mentioned above is “How to gamble online” than the website is definitely lying.
Website owners and webmasters should also know how to analyze and make use of website analytics. By this we mean the number of unique visitors and the average time that each visited the page. Web analytics is not the same as the web-marketing metric s but it helps you to know more about your traffic. Website owners who do not have knowledge about web analytics should consider getting a professional to analyze their data for them.
A keyword phrase is not always a good choice for a website. When it comes to choosing a keyword that will be the main keyword on your website then you need to keep a few things in mind. It must rank well in the search engines and it should not be too competitive. Keep in mind that the best keyword phrases are the ones that are used by the most people to look for something that the keyword phrase is offering.