Yes. You read it right! You can generate 100,000 organic traffic by just changing your keyword approach.

A keyword is a crucial part of SEO. The keyword approach varies from website to website and SEOs to SEOs. It has been changing a lot in the past few years. 

And here we are in mid-2020. Before moving towards the right keyword approach you should understand

Why do you need to change your keyword approach?

Let’s understand more about Google’s Core Updates

Google recently rolled out Core Update on the 4th of May 2020. As Google has started moving towards understanding users’ intent behind search queries now it’s the right time to change your keyword approach and dominate search results.

Why did Google roll out these quarterly core updates?

For search engines like Google, it becomes difficult to understand the intention behind a search query. If they don’t know what a user is looking for it will become even more difficult to determine which search results to display. 

Let me give you an example. See the image below;

Here I tried searching for a generic search term, seo expert. When you search these types of generic keywords search engines don’t really understand what you are looking for. I mean your intention is not clear here. You may be searching for what seo expert is or maybe their job profile or it could be something else. Right? 

Now, think from a search engine’s perspective. How difficult would it be for Google? But Google has to show something for these search queries. 

In every core update, Google tries to find how to deal with these keywords. If you take a closer look at this search results you will see Google displayed local search results and after that Google has added People also ask in order to understand the user's intention what a user is looking for. If you are looking for something similar you will click on the question and Google will display relevant search results for that particular question. 

See, this is how Google understands users' intentions. 

Now see this screenshot;

Here the intention is clear. A user is looking for an SEO expert for his/her website. And based on that you will see the most relevant results at the top. Here Also Google has displayed People also ask. 

Now you will ask

Why People also ask for this search query?

Here the user's intention is clear but what if he/she scrolls more search results. So that means either this is not what they are looking for or the result Google is displaying at the top is not the most relevant result for this search query. 

Here, Google doesn't want you to check other search results. It will try to understand what you are looking for by serving similar questions people are asking instead. So, you don’t have to scroll many search results to get what you are looking for. 

This is why Google has added People also ask here as well.

P.S. You can also conclude that now it is even more difficult to rank on the top of SERP!

So, this is very important for search engines to understand what a user is looking for, and based on that display the most relevant search results.

Core updates are a part of their initiative for making search engine ideal. Understand the intention and serve them the exact thing they are looking for. From every core update, our takeaway is creating user-centric content. And Google also recommends this. You don’t really have to worry if your website got hit by any core updates. Just focus on creating more user-centric content. 

Now that you understand the importance of user-centric content let’s right dig into what your approach should be.

Keyword grouping will take your content strategy to the next level

I would like to start with a basic thing. I have seen many SEOs still focusing on targeting keywords for a blog. Some marketers are focusing on topics. 

Let me clear this by giving a simple example.

Consider yourself as an SEO expert (because you are the one!). You want to write about your SEO strategy. So, first, you will be doing keyword research. Right? You use many keyword research tools and find a list of the best keywords (high search volume and low competition) for your blog. Your list somewhat looks like this;

This list is from Ubersuggest.

Now, you have a list. So, you will create content for each of these keywords. This is an old school method for creating content. To be honest, there is nothing wrong with it.

Now, let’s talk about the 2nd approach which is focusing on topics. So here our topic is the SEO strategy. Now, you will search for this topic to see which content is ranking. You will see a lot of different content is ranking for SEO strategy. Now, you will select the topics from those results and combine all of them in one blog like Ultimate Guide for Creating a Killer SEO Strategy. The title is a killer! Isn’t it?

Now, you will add different sub-topics like seo strategy 2020, x pillar of an effective strategy, seo strategy for beginners, etc. into it.

I am not saying this is wrong. It just if your focus is driving quality traffic and by quality traffic, I meant your actual target audience then this won’t give you that.

So, now what?

You need to think out of the box. 

Don’t think much. I have already figured it out for you. Just stay on this article for a little longer. 

Let’s combine both these approaches like focusing on keywords and topics.

Define the main topic

You should start by defining the main key topic for your content. Once you have the content topic now you can think of what to include and what not. Just make sure your content should be around the main topic. 

Generate content ideas 

Now, you have the topic to write on. But what are you going to write? So, for that, you should generate content ideas. You can include all the questions you can answer using the content. Answering the questions will be the best strategy as voice search is becoming more and more popular nowadays. 

There is a tool called Answerthepublic which I use for generating content ideas. All you need to add is your main topic and this will suggest a lot of content ideas around it. The best part of this tool is, it will give you 5 different types of queries like Questions-based, Prepositions-based, Comparison-based, Alphabetical, and related on a single page. You can either download the CSV file or download it as images. 

See the following image;

These are questions-based queries for seo strategy. Choose the most appropriate ideas from the list. You can utilize all these ideas into your content.

Explore different keyword ideas

Now you have a topic and content to write for. It's time for exploring different keyword ideas for content. Let’s say you want to write about how to build seo strategy. This could be your subtopic. So, you need to find keywords that are related to your subtopic. There are lots of different keywords you can include like seo strategy from scratch, seo strategy plan 2020, elements of seo strategy, seo plans, seo steps, etc. 

You can get more ideas from Google’s related searches tab. See this image;

Now, all you have to do is, use all these keywords while creating content on how to build seo strategy. This is called keyword grouping.

There are multiple ways for finding keyword ideas. You can use 3rd party keyword research tools like Ubersuggest, Ahrefs, Google Keyword Planner, Keyword Tool, etc. 

In my opinion, Google Search itself best for finding keyword ideas. You can find long-tail or intent keywords as well. See the below screenshot;

Google also displays People also ask which is very helpful when it comes to finding question-based keywords. See this image;

You can explore more using other 3rd party tools.

Final thoughts

Keyword grouping should be your approach while drafting content for your website. It helps you to generate relevant traffic as the keywords you are targeting are relevant to your content. I applied this keyword strategy to one of my clients and it drove 100,000 organic visits.

And the bounce rate dropped from 85% to 60%. As we are getting our actual target audience it increases the number of conversions. So, try this keyword strategy and I am sure you will see some growth in the organic traffic of your website. I am really excited to know your thoughts on it. 

Image Credit

1. Featured Image: Image by Unsplash.
2. The screenshots are taken by the author.