Keyword Mapping – The Why, What & How.

Why is keyword mapping important?

People hardly ever visit websites without a clear goal in mind. And yes, one of those goals might be visiting YouTube to simply to be entertained or get their minds off daily reality. But how likely is it that they spend time on your business website to be entertained?

Not. Likely.

Which means, you better help them solve for their need quickly and effortlessly. By finding exactly what they need make the decision ahead of them. Which, ideally, benefits both of you.

Keyword mapping helps you with that because it will show you what information they need.

But wait, there’s more.

When done well, keyword mapping also shows search engines like Google what your field of expertise is and what pages are more important than others. The hierarchy of pages with internal links upwards to the top gives the search bots insights into what content is more important than others.

And this brings me to my interview with Eugene. Because, once you have your keywords grouped and structured, you will need to come up with content that solves for a need for information. And that persuades to action. And that is where many of my clients struggle.

How to determine when to create a content pillar page or a sales / landing page for a keyword group?

Thanks for your help with this, Eugene! One of the issues my clients struggle with is whether to create and build links to a content pillar page or to create a sales / landing page for a major keyword group. Let’s use “wedding gifts” as an example. What would you recommend?

With pleasure, Yvette. First of all, we would need to understand the business behind the website. After all, some solve for other needs than others. Businesses could for instance:

• offer services like custom creating wedding gifts;
• specialize in selling wedding gifts;
• sell all sorts of gifts, including those gifts for weddings. 

If you look at the top results for the search phrase “wedding gifts”, you will see that the results are mixed. Some content solves for people who want to check out what is for sale right away. Other content solves for people who are a bit earlier in the buying process and are just looking for inspiration.

Your choice will probably be based on your business goals. If you are the owner of a webshop, you may want to focus on optimizing a category page for “wedding gifts”. If you sell custom gifts or offer related services and you don’t have a webshop, it will be better to create a pillar page or a long form article with tips.

How to solve for the right search intent?

As a general rule of thumb, SEO specialists recommend checking the top search results to discover the search intent for a keyword. But what would you recommend if the top search results show a mixture and there does not seem to be a clear preference between informational, commercial, and transactional intent?

Similar to the previous question, this depends on your business goals and on the top results for the keyword. If the results are mixed, that means search engines will look for the most relevant pages for each category. IN that case, you could use SEO spyglass to estimate how powerful the top results are. That way, you will find out for which of the three search intent options competition is weakest. With that in mind, you could create a page that competes for that category and start building links.

What to do if you find out that some of your pages compete for the same keyword?

Thank you so much, that was really helpful. Now sometimes, my clients notice that some of their pages compete for the same keyword. What would you recommend them?

First, you may want to have a good look at the content of each page. Do they solve for a different need or can they be combined? If you can combine the content into one article, that will improve the user experience and make the one page more powerful.

Next, if the content solves for a different need, however, it may not be smart to combine the content. In some cases, for instance, one page contains a tool and the other page is the user guide. In that case, just make sure the meta description of each page clearly states what to expect when visiting that page. Other than that, there is no need to take action. People who search for that keyword then have the option to visit the page that solves for their need.

For more examples of keyword cannibalization and how to deal with that, you may want to check out this article.

Thanks Eugene, that was really helpful. I had a lot of fun interviewing you and would love to do that again in a while. On another, related, topic for instance.

Are you struggling with keyword mapping or creating keyword focused copy?

Let’s chat and get to know each other. If we both feel we resonate, we’ll discuss ways to collaborate.

Photo credit: Ferenc Horvath on Unsplash