Stupid Question?? Is [painter new york] the same keyword as [painter in new york]?
-
Hi,
This may be a stupid question but...
Google ignores short/common words like 'in', so if I optimize a page for 'painter in new york' will it rank just as well for 'painter new york'?
In Google's keyword tool, exact match gives [painter new york] 140 searches per month but [painter in new york] gets < 10.
However, it is much more difficult to write 'painter new york' naturally into body copy than it is 'painter in new york'.
So what do I do?
Thanks
-
Thanks Miriam
-
Hi Stray Cat,Your question isn't stupid at all and there is a great discussion happening here. I'd like to throw in a few details for your consideration.First of all, you cannot rely on the numbers provided by keyword research tools if you are including geo terms (like ny) in your phrases. There is currently no tool that provides accurate numbers for local keyword research. So, you can use things like Google Adwords Keyword Tool and Google Insights to give you an idea of search volumes, but numbers are not to be viewed as accurate. Most Local SEOs do their keyword research without geo modifiers and then add these terms back into the list of discovered product, service and brand terms.If you were my client and were a NY painter, we would be targeting all 3 variations of your example terms. So, in the body copy, we might find sentences like:"Call The Painter New York Schools Have Hired 234 Times Since 2003 For A Beautiful Job!"and"When Hiring A Painter In New York, Always Request A License Number Before You Sign A Contract."and "A Professional New York Painter Will Always Present Documents Proving That He Is Licensed, Bonded and Insured."You can come up with better sentences than these which I've just reeled off, but the point is that you need to find ways to incorporate all of your core phrases into the copy. I further believe that it's not necessary to group keyword phrases together every time. If one line in your copy is talking about New York and the next is talking about painters, you are still using your keywords and signifying to bots and humans what your business does and where it is. Go with the lighter touch when you can, to avoid having copy that reads like a robot wrote it, and remember that your local search rankings are dependent on tons of different factors. The optimization of your pages is definitely a core factor, but it is only one factor.
-
Thanks Ian - yes it seems a real struggle to deal with the difference between which search phrases have the most searches and which search phrases sound right in the context of a web page.
-
Not a stupid question at all, and to be honest something I really struggle with. Stopwords are somewhat important because the results are different based on the search the user enters.
For example (real), I have a page and the title is "The Writer's Stop at Disney's Hollywood Studios". My site ranks differently based on the following permutations.
The Writer's Stop at Disney's Hollywood Studios = Position 10
Writer's Stop at Disney's Hollywood Studios = Position 12
Writer's Stop Disney's Hollywood Studios = Position 14Interestingly removing the apostrophe's didn't appear to affect the search results. Only one test, so nothing conclusive I guess.
Ultimately my titles etc contain the proper phrase because from a user perspective it makes more sense.
-
Thanks Jared
-
Pay close attention to what Ben mentions about Local SEO. If you poke around long enough with your keywords you'll notice obvious trends in your area (that may not equate to other regions) particularly with the words "in" or "near".
You'll start to notice how certain prepositions trigger the map packs. It's just something to pay attention to depending on your keyword + locale.
-
Thanks Ben - I'll be sure to check those out
-
Thanks Micah
-
-
Ah, I misunderstood. In that case, the short answer is that "painter in new york" and "painter new york" are not exactly the same. However, as far as targeting it with your on-page SEO and your anchor text links, it makes little difference. "painter new york" and "painter in new york" hits the same 3 keywords either way. One does look much more natural than the other inside copy & anchor text, though.
-
That's why I used the words "usually" and "generally" lol
-
"painter new york" is what is referred to as a "head" phrase. That is, a phrase that has a high search volume but a high competition.
So on your home page's title; yes, I would target your head phrase. However you need to be building content in the longtail to rank well for that head phrase.
One of my favorite SEO Moz videos that talks about the longtail is back from 2009. It's dated but it's a great intro, and is still relevant for instruction purposes.
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-ignore-the-tail-at-your-peril
If you really want to digg deep into SEO I reccomend watching all of SEO Moz's old videos on Vimeo and You Tube. The 5 year old ones get into a bunch of great ideas that are still useful today, but no one is talking about.
-
Actually [painter new york] has an exact search volume of 140 whereas [new york painter] only has 22...
-
Thanks Ben - so you are saying that to target the difficult phrase 'painter new york' organically, I could optimise the page for 'new york painter' and that would work just as well.
-
Thanks Micah but this was just a made up example - it's the general point that I'm after - apologies for the confusion
-
I'm going to make a leap and assume that your business & website isn't about art. If this assumption is correct, then the answer to your question is that it doesn't matter. Neither of those are money keywords. Google thinks those keywords are about art. See the images from Google Insights.
See also the image of a universal search for "new york painters". Google Organic Search clearly believes that it's about art. Google Local Search believes it's about painting companies. This isn't a keyphrase you should be targeting organically. You should be doing some Local SEO, though.
-
Hi
Generally I find that phrases contain "in" "of" "near" are more difficult to rank because Google usually displays local business listing, where if you exclude those words you have a "normal" page.
So it's safe to say is there are:
- Different search volumes
- Different SERP results
The keywords are not the same.
You'll usually find that if you have a phrase like:
painter new york
Google will treat the swaping of words as having the same search volume for example:
new york painter
Hope this helps
@bnspak
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Best approach to rank for this keyword?
Hi i want to rank for the keyword "white sandals" on Google Australia. Currently, the top 5 ranking pages are not optimised and specific to white sandals. See screenshot: https://image.prntscr.com/image/WenSRHqTTFSqYNg2MHvH1A.png To rank for this keyword, would you create a page dedicated to white sandals even though it looks like it doesn't matter and you could rank the broader sandals page (not colour specific). Any recommendations? Cheers.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | crazy4seo780 -
Redirect question | new blog install on subdomain
Hi, I am running a wordpress site and our blog has grown to have a bit of a life of its own. I would like to use a more blog-oriented wordpress theme to take advantage of features that help with content discoverability, which is what the current theme I'm using doesn't really provide. I've seen sites like Canva, Mint and Hubspot put their blog on a subdomain, so the blog is sort of a separate site within a site. Advantages I see to this approach: Use a separate wordpress theme Help the blog feel like its own site and increase user engagement Give the blog its own name and identity My questions are: Are there any other SEO ramifications for taking this approach? For example, is a subdomain (blog.mysite.com) disadvantageous somehow, or inferior to to mysite.com/article-title? Regarding redirects, I read a recent Moz article about how 301s now do not lose page rank. I would also be able to implement https when I redirect, which is a plus. Is this an ok approach? Assuming I have to create redirect rules manually for each post though Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | mikequery0 -
'?q=:new&sort=new' URL parameters help...
Hey guys, I have these types of URLs being crawled and picked up on by MOZ but they are not visible to my users. The URLs are all 'hidden' from users as they are basically category pages that have no stock, however MOZ is crawling them and I dont understand how they are getting picked up as 'duplicate content'. Anyone have any info on this? http://www.example.ch/de/example/marken/brand/make-up/c/Cat_Perso_Brand_3?q=:new&sort=new Even if I understood the technicality behind it then I could try and fix it if need be. Thanks Guys Kay
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | eLab_London0 -
To redirect or not to redirect, that is the question
I work for a software company that is redeveloping the website (same domain.) We have tons of content in the form of articles and documents for support, how to use the product better, case studies, and blog posts. I've downloaded a landing page report and many of these have low impressions and little or no clicks (some ranked high other very low.) Should I redirect all this content to the new site where some of it won't exist or forget about it because of the lack of juice? Is there a rule-of-thumb threshold for redirecting for content?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Nobody15969167212220 -
Hypothetical SEO Question
I am running a website for a law firm. It has been running for many, many years and has plenty of backlinks and authority. I then create a standalone website for a specific type of case that the law firm is handling. On that website, I have a page that copies some of the attorney bio text from the main website. How much of a negative impact will this standalone website have on the main website as far as duplicate content issues are concerned? Please explain your answer in detail. Thank you in advance.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | goldbergweismancairo0 -
Do you get links from new websites?
There's a new industry specific website that looks decent. It's clean and nothing spammy. However, it's so new it's DA is under 10. Is it worth pursuing a link from a site like this? On one hand, there's nothing spammy and it is industry specific. On the other...it's just DA is so terrible (worse than any of our other links), I don't want it to hurt us. Any thoughts? Ruben
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | KempRugeLawGroup1 -
Need help for new website!
I want to a make new website. Can you please advise me what all things are involved which I should keep in mind before and during the website preparation. Like how to make pages, what to include in website, best way to create pages etc. Please provide me the link where I can study all the above information. I am planning to create global printing website.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AlexanderWhite0 -
Retargeting questions
The question is in reference to SEOmoz post - http://www.seomoz.org/blog/retargeting-basics-what-it-is-how-to-use-it 1. What is the size of a retargeting pixel and who places it on the site ? Is it the retargeting company ? Can we place it ourselves ? Does a code have to be added to the site ? 2. In the post mentioned above, the author talks about "burn pixel" "If a person in your audience converts then a "burn pixel" will fire" What do you mean by burn pixel ? How do we come to know that a burn pixel has fired ?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | seoug_20050