5 Tips on Niche Keyword Research for Manufacturing
Keyword research is the foundation of SEO and pay-per-click advertising.
If you have the budget to make your ads appear for every keyword or the domain authority to climb to the top of the rankings for every piece you publish, then congrats on the job at Toyota or Samsung.
For the rest of us, it’s going to take a lot of time, money and effort to get to the top for a popular keyword like robots. But something like industrial robotic spot welding machine? Now we’re talking.
When conducting niche keyword research, try to find a balance between search volume, competition and intent. The best keywords have real people searching for them, a low level of competition so your brand can win and the right intent to drive conversions.
No matter how big or small your company, or how niche or technologically challenged your industry, you can find terms that will work for your brand. Here are five tips to help you get started on niche keyword research.
Talk to your sales team
Your first step should be chatting with Sales. They know your customers better than anyone, so they should be able to share the words and phrases real people use to talk about your products and industry. If your customers are using those phrases over the phone or in email, then others are likely Googling them.
A good place to start would be identifying what your customers need. Focusing on terms that address specific pain points is the best way to hone in on the intent we just told you about.
The list you put together from your sales team will be a great starting point for the rest of your research.
Brainstorm top-down
The best niche terms are going to be long, specific phrases that often focus on one industry. The more focused you can get with your terms, the less competition you’ll face—and the easier it will be to reach the top.
It may seem counterintuitive, but you’ll need to start by making a list of some of the biggest, broadest phrases you have. Think of the most general words people would use to describe what you do.
Machine Tools
Turning Center
Machining Center
Then, start adding elements of your target audience, the industries you serve or specific pain points discovered in your chat with the sales team to round out your growing list.
High Precision CNC Turning Center
Precision Turn-Mill Machining Center with Gear Hobbing Capability
Vertical Machining Center Automotive Industry
Horizontal Machining Center with Pallet Changer
5-Axis Vertical Machining Center
Twin Spindle Twin Turret Turning Center
Learn from the competition
Your competitors are another great source of long-tail keywords. You could go through their website to identify the words and phrases they’re targeting, but that would be silly.
Instead, here are some free tools that will do it for you: Wordstream and Google Keyword Planner. Simply enter a domain and then watch those sweet new keyword ideas roll in.
But remember that competitor research is only one part of the puzzle. You don’t want to limit yourself to what they’re doing, so examine where they’re strong but also where they’re weak. Find the holes in their plan. Think of this list of weaknesses as a road map for how to beat them.
Google Search Console and AdWords Search Term Report
What better way to find new niche keywords than by reviewing the specific queries that are already driving visitors to your website?
The Google Search Console Queries Report lists the search terms that generated impressions of your website in organic search results. The AdWords Search Terms Report does the same, but for your ads.
Dive in and start from the bottom of the list. You probably already know the top impression-generating terms. We’re interested in the long ones. The weird ones. The ones that only have one or two impressions.
Anyone could look at a robotics website and guess that “robotic automation” would be an important term, but what about “how does robotic process automation differ from intelligent automation?” That’s a real term we found in AdWords Search Term Report, and it sounds like the start of a great, traffic-driving blog.
Google AutoComplete
You know how when you start typing into Google it pulls in a list of suggestions below your search? Those are all real terms being searched by real people, just waiting to be utilized by your company.
Start typing some of the broad phrases related to your business into Google and see what comes up. Some of the terms will be good, others will probably be bad. Play around with longer or shorter phrases and variations of the terms you brainstormed earlier to see what people are actually searching for.
Bonus Round: Negative Keywords
Negative keywords are words you want to exclude from your campaign. If you’re running search ads, they’re going to be just as important as coming up with the phrases you want to appear for.
If you sell cylindrical grinding machines, adding coffee, sandwich and electric hand and die as negative keywords will prevent your ads from showing on searches that aren’t relevant to your business.
You can use all of the same tools we recommended for niche keyword research to help identify negatives. Just change your focus from what you want to be found for to what you don’t. Building out a strong list of negative keywords will block out irrelevant traffic so your budget can go toward the niche keywords that will drive sales and leads for your business.
Now go out there and find some keywords for your niche! And if you hit a roadblock, don’t worry. We can guide you from finding the right terms all the way to turning them into quality content. Just send us a message.
