Speaker 1: 0:54

Hello and welcome to SEO is not that hard. I'm your host, ed Dawson, the founder of the SEO intelligence platform, keywordfupoleasercom, where we help you discover the questions people ask online and learn how to optimize your content for traffic and authority. I've been in SEO and online marketing for over 20 years and I'm here to share the wealth of knowledge, hints and tips I've amassed over that time. Hello, welcome back to SEO is not that hard. It's Ed Dawson hosting, as usual, and today I'm going to well, yeah, talk about why I believe audience research is better than keyword research, and you know this. This topic area came up to me because I saw a great quote by a guy called Russell Junsu, who's CEO of, I think, siege Media, an SEO services company, and he said Start with a keyword research tool and you will find high-difficulty terms that don't convert. Start with audience research and you'll find low-difficulty terms that do convert. Now, this I love because it's kind of the opposite of the traditional SEO approach. So the traditional approach that you'll hear from most people is you know, their approach is keyword research. So what they'll do is they will heavily rely on a keyword research tool to identify high volume search terms and the logic being. You know, find what people are searching for, optimize your content around those keywords and watch the traffic roll in, however, however, however and if you've listened to me talk before, you know I've always think this approach has its pitfalls. Keyword research tools often highlight highly competitive terms which may bring traffic. They won't always lead to conversions and that's because they probably don't align with the specific needs or intent of your target audience, example being broadbandcouk.

Speaker 1: 2:40

You know we ranked really well for the term broadband for many, many, many, many years and we used to get lots and lots of traffic on that term. But it was so broad that it just didn't convert very well because those people would land on a very broad page and you know, only a small amount of them were the ones that were actually going to convert to a sale, and though others that did land, you know it's really hard to sort of get them to the right place where they might find content that served their intent. And also, every man and his dog was trying to rank for the term broadband because A it's a trophy term, b they think they're getting loads of traffic and then they are going to make a whole load of money just after that. So you get a whole load of competition on those terms, which isn't the greatest term. You'll find that, basically, people who don't know what they're searching for to start with will start with very sort of short, short head terms like broadband. They will quickly narrow you know, narrow their search down using longer and longer tail keywords until they get to the content they're actually looking for that actually serves their intent.

Speaker 1: 3:43

So I can sum that up in kind of three major limitations of keyword research, which is, you know, one, high competition. You're going to get popular keywords saturated with content from established websites and which makes it tougher for smaller or newer sites to rank. Two, lack of intent insight. So again, keywords alone don't provide the context about why users intent is aware they are in the buyer's journey. And three, it overlooks those niche opportunities. Where you know we're focusing on these generic, high volume keywords, you miss out on the niche keywords that are really relevant to the audience that you're and these will be easier to rank for. And that's why, you know, as ross says in his quote, you know, keyword research will often lead you to high difficulty terms that don't convert well, and this, this is one of the reasons why I've hesitated in the past to call Keywords.

Speaker 1: 4:31

People Use a keyword research tool because we're trying to make it more than that and you might have noticed, from the new podcast intro I've been doing for the past few episodes, I'm now talking about Keywords. People Use as a search intelligence tool, an SEO intelligence tool, because we are not trying to just be keywords volume. Keywords volume, you know, to create content around that, which is I've always said it's something I've never done because I've never found it works right. And this is this is just summing it up nicely. So what's our alternative?

Speaker 1: 5:01

Well, this is where we come to audience research and the concept of audience research. So, instead of starting with keywords, we start by kind of deeply understand our target audience. What are their needs, their pain points, their preferences, behaviors, that kind of thing. And this kind of research involves demographic analysis, so thinking about who are they, what their age is, the gender, the location, that kind of thing. Graphic analysis, so what are their interests, their values, their lifestyles, and then behavioral analysis so how do they interact with our content or our products? And and that kind of thing. Graphic analysis, so what are their interests, their values, their lifestyles, and then behavioral analysis so how do they interact with our content or our products and what are their purchasing habits? So we try to understand these aspects. We can then create the content that resonates with them on a personal level and addresses their specific needs, problems and their fears as an audience. We also again this goes back to why we keywords. People are using that under process. I've always used this is by thinking about the kind of questions these people ask as well. Okay, which sounds like keyword research, but it isn't really because we're not concentrating on keywords. We're concentrating on the questions people are asking and then trying to make sure that you find all the questions they're asking and then get them answers to those questions.

Speaker 1: 6:05

Now, within one site, you'll find you have multiple audiences. So, for example, in Broadbent at Cuddey Decade, we had a whole different range of people with different questions and different problems they're trying to solve and from different demographic backgrounds. So we would have a lot of elderly people, oaps, who were trying to get online or get Broadbent for the first time and were very you know, they didn't have the technical skills that a much younger generation would have. So they had different questions. They had different types of products looking to purchase. They needed helping in a different way and you had people like gamers, for example, generally very tech savvy, but they but they had very specific needs around the type of broadband they wanted, and some of them needed a bit of education in terms of what that was. Others knew what they wanted and some of them needed a bit of education in terms of what that was. Others knew what they wanted and just wanted to find the deal. So you had to find those, the kind of those kind of deals for them.

Speaker 1: 6:54

So don't think you can only have one audience for a site. You, depending on your site, you can have multiple audiences, but each audience in itself is important. So how does all the research help us find um, you know better keywords? Well, it helps us find the low difficulty terms that do convert, as ross mentions. And so when you know your audience, you can identify those long tail keywords that those are longer, more specific keyword phrases and questions that visitors are more likely to use when they're closer to the point of purchase or when they're you know that they have lower search volumes. Okay, these things do, but they're closer to the point of purchase. Or when they're you know they have lower search volumes. Okay, these things do, but they have higher conversion rates. It helps you understand the search intent you know.

Speaker 1: 7:34

Knowing whether an audience is looking to buy, learn, pair, whatever helps you tailor the content you're producing for them accordingly. It helps you create relevant content topics. So, instead of guessing what the audience might be interested in, you can create content based on the actual needs and questions they've expressed. And it reduces competition. So by targeting the specific niches within an audience, we face less competition. You've got a better chance of ranking client research results if you really sort of niche down and tailor the content specifically to those kind of audiences rather than trying to be a generalist for everybody.

Speaker 1: 8:08

So if you've bought into this idea, which I hope you have, then here's some practical steps you can use to conduct audience research. So some of these will involve talking to people, some of these will involve tools. But listen, this is everything. Do as many as you can. Some you won't be able to do, but do the ones that you can. So, first of all, surveys and interviews. So directly ask your audience about the challenges they have, the preferences they have and what they're looking for.

Speaker 1: 8:30

Social media listening. So monitor social media platforms, see what the audience is talking about sharing and engaging with analytics data. So use any tools you've got where we can understand how users are interacting with your site, what pages they're visiting how long, how long they're staying where they drop off, what they don't show interest in that kind of thing. The kind of flows they take through your site as they're using it. Customer feedback, pay any reviews you get, any comments, any customer service interactions, that kind of thing. Look for insights into whether customers are finding things satisfying and also whether they're finding things less than satisfying, what their pain points are.

Speaker 1: 9:02

And competitor analysis look at what your competitors are doing, what's working for them and where are they missing out. And there are tools. Some of these okay is literally you know, just got to go out there and read what people are saying in certain places about you. Other times it's again tools like curious people use where we can help you find the questions people are asking online. We can also help you with competitor analysis. It's a big part of when you cluster a whole load of questions or keywords. We'll do that competitor research because we're going to the search engine result pages and we're downloading everyone that's ranking and cross-comparing who's ranking for each keyword and we can see what your competitors are in that landscape for those keywords and those questions you're targeting. So that kind of thing. You know we can help this, certainly.

Speaker 1: 9:46

Yeah, and speak to people. You can speak to any opportunity you get to speak to people in your audience. Then you know that's really key to do as well. So let's think some actual tips to get started if you're wanting to start thinking about audience research. First of all, develop by personas, by personas. So create profiles of your audio customers to guide your content creation. Going back, like I said, we had our OAP type or Odech Pensioner type personas on Broadlinecouk. We had a game of personas. We had student personas. We had all sorts of personas of who the particular audience is or who we were writing any piece of content for.

Speaker 1: 10:20

Engage with the audience. Use your email newsletters, social media polls, qa sessions, if you can get a hold of them, that kind of thing. Talk to people. We do this with keywords people use. We're always putting out, asking people for feedback. We have demo sessions with people and we get feedback from them there and we share that internally within the team for any feedback we get from people who are using that. So using a tool. So, you know, get that engagement with your audience, because nothing beats that.

Speaker 1: 10:48

Monitor industry trends, you know. Start to know what's happening in the industry, what the timely topics are, what people are asking again, something like qsp, please, is really good here towards those people also ask um questions and how they're changing over time. They're really really good for that. Test. Iterate you know this goes across. Everything you should do really is testing and iterating, but implement your findings, monitor results and adjust accordingly and collaborate with other teams. If you've got other teams in your company, work with your sales and customer service teams, because they're the ones who've got direct contact with your customers and ask. Ask them what the questions are going up all the time when you're trying to sell something, what the problems people always clone up about. Find out those things, because those are questions that you can really help build into this and help your product based on that sort of really unique and targeted feedback that you're not going to get anywhere else.

Speaker 1: 11:37

Okay, so now, if we just go back to the beginning, remember ross's original quote. It reminds us that, while keyword research is a valuable tool, it's not the starting point. Okay, by beginning with audience research, you're going to uncover the topics in terms that truly matter to your customers. This will lead you to create content that not only ranks but also converts. And remember, the goal of SEO is not just to attract visitors. It's to attract the right visitors who will engage with your content and ultimately become customers. Okay, so let's move beyond keywords and focus on people, because, at the end of the day, understanding your audience is really key to SEO success. So that's it for today and until next time. Remember, keep optimizing, stay curious and remember SEO is not that hard when you understand the basics. Thanks for listening. It means a lot to me.

Speaker 1: 12:28

This is where I get to remind you where you can connect with me and my SEO tools and services. You can find links to all the links I mentioned here in the show notes. Just remember, with all these places where I use my name, that Ed is spelled with two d's. You can find me on LinkedIn and Blue Sky. Just search for Ed Dawson.

Speaker 1: 12:42

On both you can record a voice question to get answers on the podcast. The link is in the show notes. You can try our SEO intelligence platform, keywords People Use at keywordspeopleusecom, where we can help you discover the questions and keywords people are asking online. Post those questions and keywords into related groups so you know what content you need to build topical authority. And finally, connect your Google search console account for your sites so we can crawl and understand your actual content, find what keywords you rank for and then help you optimize. Continually refine your content, targeted, personalized advice, keep your traffic growing. If you're interested in learning more about me personally or looking for dedicated consulting advice, then visit wwweddawsoncom. Bye for now and see you in the next episode of se. Seo is not that hard.