When it comes to Internet marketing, the most important aspect of your online business is its visibility. You might have a flashy website and brilliant copy, but if potential customers can’t find you, there’s not much hope for financial success. Proper keyword usage is a huge part of improving your ranking so that when your potential clients or customers go to a search engine like Google or Yahoo, they have a chance of finding your website.

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Sitting down and making a list of keywords is often harder than it sounds. You may know the rules about being specific and using “buying” terms, but sometimes it’s tough to come up with a comprehensive list. Even if you do come up with an extensive number of keywords and phrases to use on your site, in your blogs, and throughout your social media, how do you know they’re the ones your potential clients and customers are entering into search engines?

Luckily, there are a number of great online resources to not only help you come up with scads of keyword options, but to research and analyze those keywords to make sure they’re optimal for driving traffic to your site.

Here’s a list of a few online tools to check out:

Wordtracker Free Keyword Suggestion Tool

http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/

Google Adwords External & Internal Keyword Tool

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Google Sets

http://labs.google.com/sets

Trellian Free Keyword Suggestion Tool

http://www.keyworddiscovery.com/search.html

Don’t forget to update your keywords as necessary. Over time, as your site and your customer’s needs change, so will your optimal keyword choices. Monitor trends so you can stay on top of your game and ahead of your competition.

Bigger isn’t always better and just because you attract tons of visitors to your site, it doesn’t mean you’re attracting potential clients. The point of an Internet business is not to reach as many people as possible, but to reach as many ideal clients as possible. Flooding your web pages with random keywords may bring a ton of hits to your site, but if they’re not potential clients, or if they instantly hit the back button, what’s the point?

In order to attract the right people to your site and in turn make contact with as many potential clients looking for your particular services as possible, it’s important to choose your keywords wisely. Search engine optimization can be a delicate business. Fishing with a wide net may bring in the specific variety you’re looking for, but it will also bring in a lot of other fish and sea life you don’t want. However, if you use the right lure and drop your line in the right area, you can target and catch the exact fish you want.

Here’s a list of tips for selecting keywords to attract potential clients to your website:

• Be precise. Instead of using “music lessons,” use “guitar lessons for intermediate students.”
• Pinpoint your niche. If you’re a writer, identify what kind of writer you are. “Journalist specializing in international business” will bring in clients looking for international business articles and not those looking for someone to review rock albums.
• Use “buying” keywords. A person searching for “plumbing” may be looking for do-it-yourself information; a person searching for “plumber” is looking to hire someone.
• Look at competing websites. What keywords do your competition use? Which ones will work for you?
• Keep yourself in check. Don’t go crazy flooding your site with your keywords hoping to climb to the top of search results. You’ll repel clients and get rejected by search engines.
• Use your keywords wisely. Put them in titles, links, meta tags and headlines.

Using the proper keywords for your particular market is important. So is paying attention to number of times you use them. Going overboard with repeating keywords is counter productive. Experts agree that a 1-6% keyword density (the number of times your keyword or phrase appears in comparison to the other words on your page) is best, but there’s no need to get into specific formulas or calculations. Have good judgment and use your keywords and phrases when it makes sense, but don’t force them into every paragraph, and you’ll hit your mark.