Niche Keyword Opportunities in Canada when US Market Dominates
-
Hey,
I have an interesting question. I am the owner of a Canadian E-Commerce site, and I have been brainstorming ways to find opportunities and niches for Canadian online shoppers in an industry that is dominated by American E-commerce sites.
I looked around at another Canadian e-commerce site, and I wanted to get some advice on whether this strategy is sound. Here is an example.
Well.ca is a large e-commerce site in Canada. They take a competitive product like a "KONG Goodie Bone" (a dog toy) and include local and intent terms in their title. For example "Buy KONG Goodie Bone from Canada at Well.ca - Free Shipping".
If a Canadian shopper searches for "Kong Goodie Bone", they are going to find results for amazon.com, ebay.com, the Kong company website, Petco (which is not in Canada) etc. I would imagine that Canadian shoppers would start to add terms such as Canada, Buy, or online to try to find Canadian sellers. If that is the case, then Well.ca ranks.
I guess my question is, if the dominant search terms in my industry are polluted with irrelevant or American companies (even in Canada), is this form of localization a good idea? The terms don't seem to be searched much according to any keyword research tool I've used, but I know that I add "canada" to my search terms in order to find Canadian results?
I will also note that our website recently launched, we are using 100% original product page content, we are using videos, and we are really putting a lot of energy into quality content. I am just wondering if patience is the name of the game when you are dealing with sites with incredible domain authority, or if we are better off trying to find niche opportunities.
Thoughts?
-
I like EGOL's idea of partnering with US websites that do not ship to Canada and arranging a referral scheme. This is one way to take advantage of US sites taking up real estate in Canadian results.
I agree that "canada" is likely a common modifier - if the product is niche enough or bought in small enough quantities, large-scale keyword research tools might not be of much use. Consider other modifiers, such as "ca" as well.
Don't go overboard on the keyword usage though: stuffing "Canada" into every title is unnecessary and will start to look unnatural. Make sure you've taken advantage of localisation tools and techniques such as geo-targeting and the rel="alternative" tag for language, i.e. specifying en-ca as English language, for Canada (or French as well, if that's part of your market!).
Unfortunately if your competition, albeit irrelevant US sites, are incredibly strong, you'll need to compete with them on standard metrics such as the rate of link acquisition and the quality of the links you both build. Don't worry yourself with building the same number of links Petco has outright, but you may need to look at figuring out their rate of link building and look at their social / content activity, and devise a plan to match that as best you can in the future. You don't need to build the same historical numbers as these huge sites have, but your competitiveness needs to rise to match or better the sites you want to keep up with / pass.
-
Find USA companies who do not ship to Canada and ask them to refer visitors to you on their shipping policies page.
I will also note that our website recently launched, we are using 100% original product page content, we are using videos, and we are really putting a lot of energy into quality content. I am just wondering if patience is the name of the game when you are dealing with sites with incredible domain authority, or if we are better off trying to find niche opportunities.
Original content is highly commendable. I am one who uses and recommends the content attack almost exclusively. But, the real key is how fast you are able to shovel. If you can shovel 100 tons per hour but your competitors are using these... then you are wasting your money.... but if the commodity that you are shoveling has a higher value per ton, then you might have a chance.
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
-
Keyword and Branded Title Tags Site Wide
I have a client who is using a structure like this for site wide title tags: Page specific keyword | Brand Name | Industry specific keyword + locations So in an example it'd look like: Drupal Development | BrandName | Web Services for Los Angeles, San Fransisco, New York I've researched this structure pretty thoroughly to be able to make a case for or against doing this site wide.
Local SEO | | culturefoundry
However, I've received many mixed signals on many things. My questions are as follows: Should brand name be last in this structure? Does it matter? The length of this is obviously causing truncated Title in search results, so which is more useful? Is using a keyword intended for site ranking like "Web Services", "Digital Agency", "SEO Specialist" useful for every page to have or damaging? Is this cannibalizing that keyword? Is having multiple locations on every page title helping, hurting, or neutral It seems like all these things could go either way to me, but I don't want to tell them one way or another without having some more detailed explanations to give them. Thanks for your help!0 -
Keywords not ranking at google.COM, only at google.com.br
I have a website registered with .com.br. And I have noticed that some (not all of them, some are ranking the same way at both "Googles") of its keywords are ranking only when I search at google.com.br, but if I search the same term at google.COM, those pages aren't ranking. What could I do to rank not just at google.com.br, but also at google.com. My chrome, for example, redirects searches automatically for google.com. If this happens with a large number of people, the impact in my website's visits would be very harmful. Please, help me.
Local SEO | | Ricardocpereira0 -
Find high DA link opportunities in your local area
Hi, part of my link building strategy is ideally going to be from outreach to local businesses. I run a local service business operating in multiple locations (with no physical base). I have created local landing pages on which I'm showcasing local businesses and photographers (relevant not in terms of industry but location). Its my intention to show off their business as best I can, then get in touch to say "hey, we love what you're doing with X product/service, check out our site here [link]. We'd love it if you could link to us etc etc". Assuming that this is a valid strategy, what is the best way to find locally relevant sites with the highest domain authority?
Local SEO | | Cleanily0 -
Multi location strategy - tracking keywords
I have very recently taken on a local business to manage and quite new to all of this. Your posts on the subject of multi-location SEO have been incredibly useful and the original blogpost on Local landing pages by Miriam Ellis is in my reading list and I am sure will be revisited regularly. I have another question on this obviously complex subject, what to do about tracking your keywords in MOZ Pro? I have subscribed and set up my main keywords and linked each to the 40 different service locations for our business, which is based in a single location but services a wide area, however this now gives me 400 keywords to track, which seems way too much and unmanageable. Can you give me some advice on how to make this much more effective? Many thanks, Sarah
Local SEO | | Mutatio_Digital0 -
Digital Marketers Take on Traditional Advertising (Billboards, Radio, TV, etc.)
So I have some questions (probably more of a discussion really) about how to do traditional advertising in 2015. I started working with a local company that has done very well for themselves throughout the years but has lacked in the digital marketing space. Today we are doing a lot better digitally and I have been put in a position that will also affect how we do traditional...which I've never really done before (I'm a digital marketer so why would I?). Here's my question (or discussion item): If we have always done radio jingles (include Pandora here too), cheesy commercials, and traditional billboards and they seem to have done well through the years should we keep doing those? I have 2 issues here as a digital marketer: I have virtually no data on people that see or hear our advertisements because there isn't an Analytics platform for the real world. This means that I can't stay with them, better their experience, or nurture them along the way with my advertising. My thinking here is that I want to get them to my website then -- Please correct me if I'm wrong or if there are other ways of thinking for this out there that make sense. I want to test test test these jingles, commercials, and billboards but I'm unsure how to. How can you tell what's working and what's not? Also, are there others out there doing things like this that can at least show me that jingles work (or do not work)? My impression is that they work because people remember the cheesy jingles and such but also that they don't work because everyone's take on them is "they are so annoying!" -- Again, please shed some light here and correct me if I'm wrong in my thinking. My final note here and MAIN purpose for posting here is because I want to change the way things are done with traditional. It all seems to be the same thing over and over, and I want to get creative with this and push the limits. This is why I have turned to the Moz community, because I think we have those types of minds here.
Local SEO | | HashtagJeff1 -
Developing a content marketing strategy for a social security disability firm.
I have a client that I've been working with for a little over a year now and I've been struggling to generate new business from his online presence. Initially, I completely re-designed his website with semantically correct html markup, and used all of typical, site level SEO tactics, i.e., keywords in title tags, h tags, paragraphs, correct NAP, etc. We've only seen very low marginal returns off of our efforts. Part of the problem is that my client is not an attorney, but instead he runs a social security disability advocacy firm. He still performs all of the operations that an attorney performs, but due to the fact that he is not an attorney, we cannot optimize his site for search phrases containing "attorney", which is a common keyword that people would generally use to find the services that my client offers. So I've decided to try a different approach. A content marketing approach. The only reason I prolonged avoided this approach for so long is that, to be frank, I had no idea how to target his ideal clients with content. After talking to my client the other day and recommending this new approach, I uncovered some similarities between his previous clients. Most his clients live in rural areas, and they like nascar, hunting, fishing, etc. So I suggested that I create blog for him, and begin finding some freelance writers that can create some killer content about nascar, hunting and fishing. Admittedly, I don't have a much experience with a content marketing approach, but I want to learn everything there is to know about it. I guess I'm a little unsure about this approach that we're getting ready to try, and would love to hear from some people that have been down this path, and might be able to offer any advice. I really want to help my client's business flourish, and it's now very clear to me that solely relying on an old SEO line of thinking is not doing the trick anymore. Any tips, tactics and strategies would be greatly appreciated. Am I on the right track here? How would we get this content in front of his ideal clients, and market it in such a way that he will get a good return on his investment?
Local SEO | | ScottMcPherson0 -
I'm starting an internet marketing company along with a newspaper company
I'm starting a project for a newspaper company where I just started working as the in-house SEO. I'll have ownership along with the newspaper for this new internet marketing company and could use some advice.Should I build our new site on the newspapers domain with good pr already or start a fresh site from square one. I'm trying to weigh out the pro's and cons and I'm still undecided.This news company has been around since the 50's and the trust is there. But just one sticky situation with an uneducated client could hurt the reputation of the newspaper.Your thoughts please!
Local SEO | | onetwotree0 -
How to get links for boring niches/industries?
I've asked this question before, but it's 12/18 months on, the SEO landscape has changed, and new people are aboard. So basically, how do others look/achieve links for industries that generally have static sites with little to report. My books are awash with forklift truck, accountants, concrete companies. Very little happens in their businesses - someone orders concrete... my client delivers concrete. Someone orders a forklift.... my client sends a forklift..... Yes, we can do a bit of social, but where else would people go for link building. If my client was a wedding photographer, a mountain climber or cancer specialist, I'd be rolling in ideas, as it is, I find myself a little stumped sometimes.
Local SEO | | Gordon_Hall0