A Guide to Long Tail Keywords, and Crafting Content that gets Ranked

I once knew a man who was considered as a bit of an SEO wizard and during a brief conversation I had with him, we got talking about long tail keywords. I asked him what he thought about my own direction with one of my blogs and the content being created specifically to target long tail keywords. His basic response was that long tail keywords are the key to business blogging success and by targeting them, I was opening myself up to lucrative searchers that had the maximum potential to convert.

How right he was. After blogging for a year and aiming to get ranked for hugely competitive keyword terms, my traffic sucked. I was getting 20 or 30 visitors a day. After a year more of blogging and targeting my posts specifically at long tail keywords, my blogs traffic was around 500 – 1000 per day. Now, it’s over 5000.

So what are long tail keywords?

In their most basic format, a long tail keyword is as such:

– Short tail: Cake

– Medium tail: Chocolate cake

– Long tail: How to make chocolate cake

We have the search engines and their development to thank for long tail keywords. 15 years ago, search engines would chuck up a load of irrelevant nonsense for long tail keyword terms. In 2013, as they are much more advanced, internet users are now more than ever searching for keywords exactly how they would speak them. The search engines now consistently deliver good web pages to searchers which are relevant to them, no matter which search engine they use.

As a business owner or webmaster, sit down and think about the 10 questions your customer or web visitor would ask about your product.

When trying to come up with long tail keyword terms to target for a blog post, you will probably be looking at it the wrong way. The key to creating useful and engaging blog posts is to answer the question that your customers are asking. As such, sitting down and writing out the 10 top questions that your customers will be asking about your product or services is the best way to come up with ideas. If you own a cake topper business, for example, a post entitled “How to Make a Simple Cake Topper” would be a great place to start.

Is there a basic format for a post to be considered long tail?

In a word, no. The basic format for blog posts should always be as it would with a business’s web page. So – the URL should mention the keywords being targeted, the post title which displays as either a H1 or H2 tag on the page should mention the keywords being targeted, and the blog posts page title, meta description and meta keyword tags should also mention the keywords they are targeting.

The above basic format is the beginning of the story when it comes to trying to craft a successful long tail blog post, though. Here is the basic format of a long tail blog post we at Content Hero would personally create, using the cake topper example above.

The basic format for a successful long tail blog post

Page title: How to Make a Simple Cake Topper

Meta description: How to make a simple cake topper – In this helpful guide, we show you how to lovingly create your very own cake topper.

Meta keyword tags: how to, how to make, cake topper, cake toppers, cake topper guide, simple cake topper

The body of content created for this post would naturally be around 400 – 500 words in length and be broken up in to segments in order to make it scannable. By breaking up your long tail blog posts you are increasing the readability of that content.

At Content Hero we can write you killer blog posts that target long tail keyword terms. Contact us today to get in touch and kick start the process.