Big Head Versus Long Tail Keywords – An Adwords Tip

A couple of days ago I talked about the importance of selecting targeted keywords for your Adwords campaign. It is essential that you select 2-3 word phrases of what people actually type in the search engines.

Using key phrases with four or more words could actually do more damage than help you. However, if you start with a few key concepts and build on or look at what’s available from your web analytics, you might be able to match what your top competition is doing and make some money from Adwords.

When selecting keywords, there are long tail and big head keywords. A big head keyword is the opposite of long tail. It’s a basic keyword and when most novices first begin an Adwords campaign, they utilize big head keywords. That’s a no-no. Big head keywords are not specific enough for a successful Adwords campaign. They are usually high volume; high competition and they cost a lot.

An example of a big head keyword is the word movie. What you want to do is break that word ‘movie’ down into specific types of movies. Such as ‘how to find movies starring young girls,’—this key phrase would be specific, and have very lots of competition. You want to take this key phrase and ‘drill down,’ that is, keep building and relating more and more words and phrases to it. The more keywords you can derive from this key phrase, the better off you will be. Even though big head keywords don’t convert as well as long tail ones, they still cause you to think of other possible search terms for your Adwords campaign.

Long tail keywords have low competition, are more specific than big head keywords and have awesome conversion rates. Actually, in your keyword analysis, you want both types of keywords—this shows your searchers that you have what they are looking for.

Big head keywords are the beginning or the core of your keyword development. It’s like having a core concept that you can add to. For example, a core concept could be: ‘action movie.’ The synonym would be ‘feature movie.’ A more drill down approach would give you ‘family movies,’ ‘recent movies,’ or ‘female movies.’

It’s like playing a word game, see how many words you can get to relate to your core concept, and you have the beginning of a great list of keywords. You will also develop a great list of key phrases in which to bid on in Adwords.

Use the keyword search string tool that Adwords provides. This will allow you to hone in on those keywords that will give you a high placement. The more successful your keywords are, the higher your click thru rate (CTR) will be and the less you will pay per click. If you work continuously on refining your keywords drilling down from big head keywords to long tail, you will make lots of money with Adwords.

To easily receive updates on new articles subscribe to Home Business Success today.

Using Google Adwords To Make Money Online

Mastering a Google Adwords campaign is lucrative. I have watched as my brother monitored his successful online success. Sure he was alerted on his smart phone each time a sale was made, but watching his behind the scenes work was what interested me. I was totally amazed by his constant tweaking of his keywords and his ads.

Part of running a successful Adwords campaign is staying on top of things. One of the ways you can stay on top of your Adwords campaign is by constantly refining your keyword list. Initially, think of all the synonyms that are related to your core keywords. Your core keywords are the ones you come up with just off the top of your head.

Take your core keywords and run them through the Google Keyword Tool and generate even more ideas. For example, you have a credit card search website, so your broad, core keyword is credit cards. However, when you start thinking about what it is your site actually offers, you come up with more specific terms, like credit cards for people with bad credit, low interest credit cards, etc. Instead of focusing on keywords for your Adwords campaign that are broad and general, think like a consumer and use the keywords and keyword phrases that a person might search for.

Drilling down within your keyword list is beneficial to your Adwords campaign. Performing this simple task will identify long tail keywords--these are keywords that in theory states that the 'collective sales of products in low demand can exceed that of popular products and the best sellers.' In short, long tail keywords are simply Adwords key phrases that lead to higher conversions, are easier to rank, and lead to higher monetization.

The long tail theory also states that most websites are likely to receive most of their search engine visits through a variety of low-volume (long tail) search engine queries instead of a handful of major (broad or core) keywords. A successful Adwords campaign that focuses on converting the most sales is best ran with long tail keywords.

In essence, the more specific your keywords in an Adwords campaign, the more likely a consumer will click on your ad. People type in key phrases when they search for products and services. An Adwords campaign utilizing 2-3 word phrases will bring more volume (more traffic), thus more sales.
Take a look at what your competition is doing and build on that using key concepts for your Adwords campaign. Usually anything more than 2 - 3 word phrases are too broad, and you won't hit your target Adwords audience. In addition, broad phrases are expensive, and that's the last thing you want to do if you are watching your budget. Remember, you can never have too many keywords.

Adwords is an awesome income maker if you follow the rules, learn how to create proper keywords using the free tools available to you from Google or any other free keyword tool. A couple that I have use and give high marks are Wordtracker and Web CEO. They both have free as well as paid versions.

This is the first in a series of creating a smooth running Google Adwords campaign. The next post will address long tail versus big head keywords.


To easily receive updates on new articles subscribe to Home Business Success today.