Small Business Inbound Marketing 101

3 Reasons Long-Tail Keywords are Overlooked in Internet Marketing

Long tail keywords may be the buzz in online marketing for veteran marketers. But, why do many people take little notice of them? Are they really as important as they are claimed to be? To begin, let’s start off with defining them. Basically, long tail keywords are search phrases that are typically longer than the usual keywords and contain more information about what is being searched. For example, the keyword “web hosting” is very short and broad but the keyword “cheap green web hosting” is more targeted and longer.

So, why are long tail keywords ignored for the most part by many people? Here are the top 3 reasons:

1. Low search volume - Long tail keywords usually receive much lower searches than short tail keywords. There are many reasons for this; a user may be simply searching for general information about a particular keyword, he may just not have time to type a very long keyword phrase or for another reason. For example, checking with the Google Keyword Tool, the keyword “web hosting” receives 2,740,000 global searches every month while “cheap green web hosting “receives only 12 searches per month.
2. Low competition in PPC - Long tail keywords typically have lower competition in pay per click ads. The general rule in PPC is that the more competition is in a market, the higher the chances of making money because it means people are buying in that market. Thus, many people tend to ignore keywords which have a low PPC competition mistakenly assuming the keywords are not profitable. However, you can use long tail keywords to launch profitable PPC campaigns. Moreover, with the low competition, you will pay less per click and your traffic will be more targeted and hence can convert at a higher percentage.
3. Limited keyword research - Most free keyword tools have limited information on long tail keywords. It is not uncommon to find a keyword tool indicating that no data is available for a particular long tail keyword. As a result, marketers are at a fix on whether they should target such keywords. The essence of optimizing your website for specific keywords is to get traffic. However, if you do not know whether there are any searches for a long tail keyword, targeting it can be quite a gamble.