You have a target keyword. You want to display your website in the search results for that keyword.
How do you do it? How do you actually rank keywords?
Follow this guide to learn how.
Just because there is a keyword doesn’t mean it’s the right goal.
Sometimes, keywords are just a sub-topic under a broader main topic. Or, this could be another way of wording, not the most popular wording.
Google knows this, so the ranking is almost the same for all these keywords. For example, our Keyword Research Guide Ranking of 2,100 keywords:
Most of them are just variations of the main topic of “Keyword Research”:
You also need to make sure you don’t search for keywords for anyone. Otherwise, you will waste all your time and energy.
How do you find out if it is targeted to the right keywords? Simple: Go Keyword Explorer And enter your target keyword. For example, suppose I type “How to create content”. Here is what I saw:
So the search volume tells me that the keyword “How to create content” is searched 500 times a month. However, it may be a sub-theme, nor is it major, as its overall transportation potential is much higher, at 1,200.
Side note.
Traffic potential is the total traffic volume of the No. 1 ranking page obtained by the target keyword from all the keywords it ranks.
Parent topics tell me that the possible main topic is “content creation.” Therefore, this topic is worth targeting because it has high traffic potential, but we should target “content creation” (rather than “how to create content”.).
Ranking #1 There is nothing if there is no bottom line that helps you. You need not only search traffic; you need to convert to customer search traffic.
Assign it as a business potential score before chasing keywords.
For example, the topic “Keyword Research” scores “3” because it is almost impossible to do a good keyword research without tools. For “content creation”, it might be “2” because you can make content without tools, but you can use a tool to do it better.
You want to prioritize keywords with at least 2 or more ratings.
Make sure your target keywords are the keywords you want? Amazing. Now you need to know what Google wants to rank.
Google ranks the pages that best meet the content people want. So if your content doesn’t match what the user expects to see, you won’t rank.
How do you know what Google is looking for? Simple: Check out SERP to find out search intent.
For example, if we look at the top pages of Content Creation, we will find that they are mainly beginners’ guides on content creation:
A faster way to find out the search intention is to click Confirm intention Button input Keyword Explorer:
So if we want to rank for this keyword, we might have to make a beginner’s guide covering content creation, how to create, etc.
OK Search content Detailed: It covers all the steps of the process, lists all the resources the reader needs, and answers all the questions that need to be answered. It provides commitment and there are no significant gaps.
even Google’s useful content guide Q: “Does the content provide a large, complete or comprehensive description of the subject?”
To find out the subtopics you should cover, enter the keyword AI Content Assistant It would suggest covering the subject matter. For example, here is the suggestion for “content creation”:
- What is content creation
- AI in content creation
- Steps involved in creating content (e.g., conception, planning, creation, etc.)
- Content Performance Analysis
- The role of SEO in content creation
- Content Strategy
- Content Type
- Content Creation Tool
If you want to create a comprehensive beginner’s guide, all important sub-topics.
Honestly: The internet doesn’t need another general article on your topic. If someone searches for your keywords, you may have hundreds of thousands or even millions of results.
Why do anyone care about you?
In content games, “good enough” is no longer enough. and Google’s AI Overview Stealing clicks, people turn AI search engineuniversal content is becoming increasingly invisible.
Even if you manage to create the most comprehensive guide ever, it still fails if your content looks and feels like everything else.
Your content needs a unique angle that makes people think: “Wow, I’ve never seen this before!”
How do you find these unique angles? There are three ways:
- experiment: Be the original source and create your own data that others want to quote. Have a mini experience, conduct polls or collect data from your user base.
- experience: Anyone can write a theory. Few people can write from Hard-Won’s experience. Share your first-hand insights or things to try.
- effort: Most content creators are lazy. Take advantage of it for your advantage. What can you add your content to, which will make your competitors look at it and think “that would be too much work”?
For example, when Ryan Lawour content marketing director wants to write about Best AI image generatorhe not only listed them. He actually went to test everyone:
Your outline is finished and your sub-theme is set. Now it’s time to delete the actual word on the page. Set the time and make it by hand or use it on Chatgpt – Here is your choice. Just make sure you:
- Write an introduction to attract readers to the collar: Either keep a brief and lively introduction with bold claims, surprising statistics or counterintuitive truths or drive the reader out of daze.
- Talk to another person like a person: You can use AI, but it doesn’t sound like one. Have a conversation. Share opinions. Use “I” and “You”.
- Decompose text: Use images, charts, blocks, bullets, numbered lists and occasional single sentence paragraphs to keep the reader’s eyes moving.
- Make your suggestions workable: Don’t just say “do keyword research”. The way to accurately display screenshots, templates, and specific steps. Delete all guesses.
Think of page SEO as a language of love for Google. Your content may be amazing to human readers, but it also needs to be communicated in a way Google understands it.
The list is really simple:
- The title includes the target keyword, URL, H1 and Intro paragraphs.
- Write a fascinating meta description.
- Link to other useful pages on your website.
- Add to Alt text to all your images.
Links are Google ranking factors. So if you want to rank high on Google, you may need a link to your content. Especially if you are competing with keywords that are highly competitive.
To get backlinks, you need to give people a reason to link with you. Each link building strategy is a change in reason. For example, Guest Blog As a link building strategy, you are providing free content to the other party in exchange for links.
same Podcast Link Building: You provide free insights as a guest, podcast host link back to you.
That’s why I say you need a unique perspective to provide content. If you have data, stories, or designs that others have, you can make it easier to get links to sell to other sites.
Link building itself is a huge topic, so I suggest reading ours Link building guide Understand how it works.
If you are using Google, the keyword you are using today, you may see a lot of AI overviews:
You may consider two issues:
- How do I get into there?
- Is ranking still important on Google? I shouldn’t do this LLM Optimization instead?
First, don’t panic. Take a deep breath.
Google’s AI overview still requires source material to generate its summary. At least for the time being, the original material or reference is still from the search.
So whether you want to call it llmo, Geo or this week’s name is no different from SEO. At least for now. I highly recommend reading Ryan’s post on why.
TL;dr: This strategy remains fundamentally the same: create excellent, comprehensive, unique value content that serves users more than anything else.
The final thought
Even the perfect content cannot rank if search engines cannot access and understand your website correctly. Technical SEO issues can silently undermine your ranking work.
I recommend registering for our free AHREFS Webmaster Tools And run your website crawl. Capturing and fixing failures early can save you from mysteriously missing search traffic.
