Keyword Use in the Body of the Text

keywords and phrases - SEO Content Topics

by Glenn Hefley - Freelance Writer

• Freelance SEO Writer Topics
• Freelance SEO Writer Tips
• How Do I find work as a Freelance Writer
• How Do I find work as a Freelance SEO Writer
• How Do I make Money on the Web
• How Can I find Work on the Web
• How Can I find work At Home
• How Do I get my Web Site Listed

In this SEO Topic for the Freelance Writer we are going to talk about:

• Text

• Content

• Page Summarization

• Keyword Value

  
  

Analytics Topics

• Landing Pages

• Keywords used for Search
  

• Content by Title

What is Text to the Freelance SEO Writer?

Text is the debris and blocks created by the dissection of content pages. After the churning of your well-crafted words, sent through the cold maw of the search engine, it becomes text. Parts. Bits and pieces of fragmented thoughts and calls-to-action.

Text is the fodder of search engines, and therefore, as a Freelance SEO Writer, we need to be aware of exactly how these bits and pieces are gong to appear; as the broken phrases lay fearful or sanguine under the cold judgment of query.

What is Content to the Freelance SEO Writer?

Content is the summary of Text as far as SEO writing is concerned. Through the control and composition of Text, the page (or web site as a whole), reveals its desired topical content.

What the page communicates to the average human reader, may not be what the same content is communicating to the average search engine reader. Since communication is what is heard, not what is said, the burden falls to the Freelance Writer to insure the Content is communicating the desired message to all readers; human and silicon.

What then is Page Summarization to the Freelance Writer?

If text is the broken up blocks of content, and content is the communication derived from text debris, what is Page Summarization? A fair question -- Page Summarization is the whole page outside the vacuum of SEO Writing. This is the page as a "whole", sitting in the vast space of the Internet, and being subjected to the Total Perspective Vortex.

If your task as a Freelance SEO Writer extends past simply completing the articles (and possibly posting them) for the client; and drifts into the area of Maintaining Effective Content, first -- get a raise -- and second the analytics topics below are going to be of great value to you in this area. The culturing and maintenance of Effective Content, sometimes called Maintaining State of the web site (though Maintaining State is usually referring to the Programming aspect of the web site these days, rather than content), is an advanced topic for most Freelance SEO Writers.

Keyword Value and the Freelance Writer

The Keyword Set we are utilizing for the foundation of an article (or blog post), as freelance writers, was probably supplied to us by the client. This set of words/phrases may or may not be effective; they may have been simply thought up as a 'wish-list', or painstakingly gleaned from the use of Trends (or other SEO Keyword Tools). As Freelance Writers, we rarely question the use or effectiveness of the word set supplied to us. Our task (and it is quite enough work to justify our payment), is to utilize this set of keywords (or more likely key phrases) in the most effective way possible.

The SEO Content Value of a Keyword Phrase is derived from several variables.

• The amount of usage in the content of the page

• Tags (i.e. H1, H2, , ,...) used around the phrases

• Placement density

• Keyword Weight
  

• Link Anchor Text usage

• Text around the Link Text

• Page Value/Content of the link's destination

• Page Vocabulary

• Possible Overuse (creating negative value 'keyword stuffing')

The amount of usage in the content of the page

The effectiveness of a keyword does have a great deal to do with the usage amount within the content of the page; However, do not make the mistake of believing this is all there is to SEO writing (even if your client believes this is all there is to it).

The Client, when sending your the list of key phrases, may have also sent a list of usage percentages as well. If the Client did send usage percentages, use them. Simple as that; the composition of the task ahead of you more than justifies your fee -- you are responsible for enough bullet points.

As a general rule, usage percentages should be in the range of 2%-6%. Your usage list may differ with each keyword/phrase. For example, you might get a list that looks something like this:

Freelance Writer -- 4%

Freelance SEO Writer -- 2%

keyword -- 3%

SEO Writing -- 4%

SEO Keyword -- 5%

What is meant by this list is: for the phrase Freelance Writer -- 4% of the 500 - 1000 words of the article should be comprised of "Freelance Writer". So, within 1000 words, "Freelance Writer" can be counted roughly 40 times.

As a point of interest, we are close to 900 words at this point, and I've only used "Freelance Writer" 12 times in this article so far. So you can see how the Usage of some Keyword Phrases will be difficult to work with depending on writing styles and client wishes.

Generally speaking (as a consensus of SEO experts) using a keyword phrase more that 10% of an article, brings in the dreaded dimension of 'keyword stuffing', and all of your work will be for naught (unless your client's goal is to remain anonymous on the Internet).

Filtered Word Frequency Test

Readability Test from Plain Language

Tags (i.e. H1, H2, <strong>, <en>,...) used around the phrases

Using key phrases as Headings, subheadings -- enhancing them with Bold and Italics -- adds to the effectiveness of the key phrase -- So say the SEO experts. For the most part, I agree with these experts, but warn strongly of the over use of this technique. For one thing, it could make an article unreadable, and irritating, so your bounce rate goes through the roof.

SEO is not a list item in the Profit Column of Website Accounting. Sales is... So a rule of thumb should always be 'if there is ever a choice between Sales and SEO, always go with SALES!'. Good use of SEO Writing has a very strong ROI, but Return on Investment is still not as profitable as Enhancement of Sales. (See the article on Freelance Sales Writing vs Freelance SEO Writing )

Placement density

When a Freelance SEO Writer talks about Placement Density, she is talking about how close the same keyword phrases are used, within the article. Placement Density is a warning flare, or check-point, for 'keyword stuffing'. Putting the same phrase in every sentence, for example, or repeating the same phrase in a block of text, is a heavy weighted mark towards identifying a block of text as 'spammed' or 'stuffed'. However, we want the density to be enough so that the keyword is seen as important and relevant to the subject matter of the page.

Placement Density for SEO Writing also deals with the geographical placement of the keywords and phrases in the body and code areas of the page. For example, keywords and phrases which show up at the beginning of the content, have greater effect on the search engine analysis than keywords which don't show up until the middle or end of the page content. This type of Placement Density focus is concerned with Keyword Weight Formulas, and Page Relevance formulas.

One tip however, especially with Corporation or Business subjects, is to use Bullet Point lists early and within the middle of the article. Bullet point lists are sort of a "Free Base" area when it comes to the Keyword Stuffing problem. Don't overdue it, but, you can get in a high percentage of weighted keywords in a bullet point list that you can't get away with in any other section of a content area. For example, for this article I might make a bullet point list something like :

• Freelance SEO Writer Topics
• Freelance SEO Writer Tips
• How Do I find work as a Freelance Writer
• How Do I find work as a Freelance SEO Writer
• How Do I make Money on the Web
• How Can I find Work on the Web
• How Can I find work At Home
• How Do I get my Web Site Listed

... and on and on... well, not too much more on and on... if your lists are above 15 bullet lines... you are getting greedy.

Don't be greedy... it makes you look fat.

Keyword Weight

Some SEO Writer books and reference material will talk about Keyword Weight, or Page Subject Weight. This term is used in relation to Relevance Formulas which attempt to bring together Density, Usage, and the other factors described in this SEO writer article, to give keyword phrases a numerical value similar to the value a search engine might come up with for your page. The term Weight, in this context is the Statistics Definition: a measure of the relative importance of an item in a statistical population.

I have seen some very sophisticated formulas, and some rather dim formulas. The credibility of each of them however is questionable (and this would include my own as well). Weight formulas is a topic for another article, which may or may not get written by myself, however, the basics of deriving a formula are outlined in this article, and from the experience acquired from years of testing and writing.

As a  Freelance SEO Writer, you do not have to worry much about either the formula, nor its accuracy level, as the terms and requirements for your writing will probably be given to you by the client. Simply follow the instructions given to you (and if possible, monitor the results of these instructions over a period of at least a year). 

Even though I have a great deal of experience in this area, and worked for Google as a Page Analyzer for three years, I do not argue (or even comment most of the time), on the formula a particular client wishes to use. First off, such comments are not what I'm being paid for, and secondly, things change on the web, so what I know may no longer be the "best" method for this particular client or this particular article.

Your best service to the client is to perform the task of writing to the best of your ability, and get the article, blog post, sell sheet, back to them as quickly as possible. Do that, and you will have more work than you can handle.

Link Anchor Text usage

The Link Anchor Text is simply the Text used in a Hyperlink Tag. For example, if we were going to link up with Christopher Avery's web site, we might create a hyperlink like this : Christopher Avery's Web Site.

Since Christopher Avery's web site is about Christopher Avery, and the URL is even www.christopheravery.com, this link would qualify as a Relevant Link. It is much better than say (here). "(here)" doesn't describe anything, and isn't relevant to the site we are linking to either. So for Key Word Value, "(here)" is worthless (to both this page, and Christopher Avery's web site).

We can do much better however. Using Hyperlink anchor text which is both: relevant to the article we are writing, and relevant the web site we are linking to -- may take some creative talent, but ... that's why we have professional freelance writers.

This article deals with Freelance Writing, or SEO Writing. Christopher Avery's web site talks mostly about Leadership, Responsibility and Teamwork. Our sentence could be something like "Freelance writers, need to take personal responsibility for their own success and leadership goals. " ... I've achieved in that sentence the basic requirements for good SEO link anchor text :

• I've use one or more of my own keyword phrases in the sentence
• I've used relevant words in the link anchor text for Christopher Avery's web site.

To create an even more effective link, we could use the Title or a Header Quote from a page on Christopher Avery's Blog.

"Freelance Writers create our own success, by taking Responsibility for our achievements we "Get LinkedIn with Responsibility" a Redefined term for some of us, but more effective than Luck, or Cursing the Heavens of the Freelancer Gods."

Text around the Link Text

The Text Around the Link, is exactly that, the text before and after a hyperlink inside the content body. When we talked about the Link Anchor text in the previous section, I gave two criteria for an effective link; The use of our own keyword phrases in the sentence containing the link, and words relevant to the content we are linking to within the anchor text.

While the sentence before and after the link may be stretching this tactic a bit thin, if we are writing good SEO performance articles, the paragraph will be relevant, so we don't need to worry much about the before and after sentences. Right?

Page Value/Content of the link's destination

Links to pages are weighted by a sum of several parts. We have already introduced the three biggest factors in links, the Text of the Link, The content around the Link, the Content of the Destination Page, and Deep Linking rather than linking to the directory or the main web site (i.e. http:www.christopheravery.com or http://www.christopheravery.com/blog/ )

Using the destination page's Title, or a Headline (text in H# tags i.e. <H1>, <H2>, <H3>...) adds to the effectiveness of the link for both your article and the destination page. This Effectiveness I speak of, is in the form of SERP listings.

Our final consideration then is the Quality of the Page we are linking to...

Again, we want the page we are linking to, to be Relevant to our article's content (or have a very good reason for linking to it like ... the client told you to do so), but we also want to link to pages which are of high PageRank, or at the very least of equal PageRank to the site we are linking from. This is some times a tall order.

Another alternative which is just as effective, is to find on the Destination Page, a key phrase, that when used as a Search Query, is SERP'd in the top 10 listings. Let's go to an example:

In the last section I created a final example, by using the Headline from one of Christopher Avery's Blog Posts. "Get LinkedIn with Responsibility Redefined". Using the same words "without quotations" I search on Google and Yahoo to see what comes up as a result... Christopher's Blog area comes up at the top of the list on both search engines. So, if Christopher's Blog Main Page is not high ranking, using these words in my Link Anchor Text, will still get the level of effect I'm looking for as a SERP goal for this article.

Why are we looking at the PageRank of the Main Page, and not the article of our link's destination? Because it is going to be rare to find single pages which rank higher than the directory they are in, and it is the Area of the web we ( and the Search Engines) are looking at as well.

To Check the PageRank of Web Sites you are visiting, use the:

Page Vocabulary

This is an area of much debate, and while I have no box to stand on, I do have some experience in this area, so I'll give you my two-cents.

First off, our main concern with this topic is not really SERP results; we are more interested in the Human Reader, Bounce Rates, Search results, Ad Link Click Visitors, and above all... SALES.

We don't want our article or Blog post to be quantified in the tally of Spam or Ad Page, ... which is what most books and articles talk about on the subject of Page Vocabulary.

I agree with this statement most profoundly, but aside from this wholly mathematical view, our efforts in Freelance SEO writing is to "attract readers through SERPS". If these Readers show up, and the article reads like the ingredients list of geriatric dietary ward, our Readers are going to go away.

... so what was really accomplished...?

Possible Overuse (creating negative value 'keyword stuffing')

Keyword Stuffing is an outdated, damaging practice. I'm not sure how effective it ever was, but I do know that just about every manager, owner, and webmaster who begins learning about SEO writing, comes up with it and tries it out. 

My basic policy with this particular topic, and others like it, is 'I don't do it.' Really it is that simple. You've read in this article and many others I have written, that most of the decisions for Freelance Writing are on the client. But this is one of the areas which I don't leave to the Client, because along with today's payment, is tomorrow's payment, and I would rather loose one client than loose several others because of reputation and complaint. As a Freelance Writer, you have very little holding you above the din of amateurs floating across the Internet. Those tethers of profitability are your reputation, and your client's reviews.

Keyword Stuffing will make whole websites disappear from Search Engine Listings.

You do not want a client to have the opportunity to put in a review or comment about your work something like "we posted her articles and our web site disappeared!"

If a client insists on you using Keyword Stuffing or other Black Hat techniques in the writing of his articles or blog posts, simply walk away. It is never worth it, ... never. There are far too many companies and people on the Internet today who need the services of a good SEO Writer. You are not loosing anything walking away from a client who cares nothing for your reputation or future work, or their own web site.

Analytics Topics

Note: In this area I use Google Analytics for Image sources and function "names", however, just about every Analytics program has the same features (if they are of any value at all), so a bit of patient exploration will turn up the same functionality in your Analytics software. If it doesn't, consider using Google Analytics or some other full featured Analytics software for your web site (or your client's web site).

Landing Pages

Again, we are talking about terms which are used in Analytics programs. "Landing Pages" has multiple definitions and ideas behind the term, but in this case we are talking about : the page which the visitor arrived on. This may not be (and if the visitor came in from a SERP, hopefully isn't) the front page.

The Landing Page Report in Google Analytics shows us the amount of traffic coming in to the site via individual pages. It also can show us where this traffic is coming in from, how long the visitor remained on the Landing Page, and where the visitor went afterwards. This is all very useful information for SEO adjustments to our web site.

NOTE: We do not want all of our traffic coming into the site through the front door. That would be bad, in fact that would be very ugly indeed.

If we have done our job as Freelance SEO Writers, then two things will happen in these reports. The number of landings on pages with our article will increase over a period of time, and the Page Bounce Rate will not rise above 50%.

Bounce Rate (according to Google Analytics) is:

...the percentage of single-page visits (i.e. visits in which the person left your site from the entrance page). Bounce Rate is a measure of visit quality and a high Bounce Rate generally indicates that site entrance (landing) pages aren't relevant to your visitors. You can minimize Bounce Rates by tailoring landing pages to each keyword and ad that you run. Landing pages should provide the information and services that were promised in the ad copy.

As Freelance SEO Writers, we probably do not want to adhere to this last sentence too often. Typically your work is going to come in from clients who wish to "sell something" or gain traffic to the web site. There are those who wish to simply get traffic into one page and have the visitor click on an ad (which would register as a Bounce, though it is also a Fulfillment). Most of your clients will want the visitor to continue on to another page (such as the shopping cart, or email list sign up, or some other fulfillment). If this Fulfillment goal is not achieved by the Landing Page, some other Call-to-Action should have kept the visitor on the Web Site, going to another page (another article, or blog entry), where another Call-to-Action can be presented for Fulfillment.  

Call-to-Actions, Fulfillment, and other Sales Topics are subjects we as Freelance Writers need to hone our skills on; Recall that SEO is not in the Profit column of the ledger, Sales is, so every article should have some type of Call-to-Action within the text. 

Fulfillment Percentage is much more important than Bounce Rate. If your Fulfillment Percentage is at 20% or 30% and your Bounce Rate is at 70%, you are a star! Bounce Rate is an important measure, but nothing that happens on a web site is in a vacuum. If a client read somewhere that bounce rates above 50% were horrible, and I had the stats I've described above (30% fulfillment) and he had the audacity to complain to me about it, then I would not be kind in my reply... I might even give him his money back and remove the article... serve him right ... just kidding of course. But don't look at only one stat on your articles and freak-out about your skills. Keep in mind the primary goal of our writing as Freelance Writers, and that is the success of our clients.

Keywords used for Search

This Analytics Report is always enlightening. We write our article using good SEO tactics, produce the page with the proper percentages of keywords, relevance weight, and all the other subjects we have discussed in this article, and... the visitors from SERP's are coming in for completely different reasons.<?>Awk!

Again, don't worry too much about this, but if a high percentage of users are coming in from SERPs, go through the article and HTML of the page, and attempt to figure out how this 'odd-man keyword phrase' is being ciphered by the Search Engines. Note also, which Search Engine is coming up with this result, and what the visitors are doing who come in through SERPs for these odd-man keyword phrases.

This report is probably the best report for the Freelance SEO Writer to gain experience and tactical skills. By ciphering out how effective your articles are with the Search Engines, and how those search engines perceived your articles, you learn to adjust your writing to become more effective in the SEO area.

Content By Title

To find the stats of a particular page on Google Analytics, go to the Side Menu and click on Content. On the Sub Menu for Content, is Content By Title. From the report listing archived by clicking on Content By Title, you can easily find the particular page/article you wish to explore.

From the Singular Page view, there is a drop down choice menu just under the Graph report, which has several options including Source (where the visitor came from), Keywords (what the search was for SERP sources), and Landing Page(what page did the visitor arrive on), as well as several other good reports.

In Closing

We have covered quite a bit of ground in this article, and though there is much more to Freelance SEO Writing than meets the eye, you have been exposed to enough of the topic to begin earning your keep on the market as a Freelance SEO Writer. However, this is not a topic which is learned an solid. SEO Writing techniques are always in flux, and are dependent on the ever-changing techniques of the Search Engines.

What I have exposed you to in this Freelance SEO Writer article are some of the more firm foundational areas. It is unlikely, for example, that the Search Engines will give up attempting to 'read' the content of a given page, to determine the page's subject matter. It is likely, however, that the Search Engines will continue to hone their ability to glean the value of the page itself against the value of other pages with similar subject matter -- and it is in this latter area, the true struggle begins.

As a Freelance SEO Writer, it is not your job to be an SEO expert -- it is your job to understand and compose articles or blog posts which adhere to the instructions of the client. Being able to do that effectively generally means continuing to maintain your knowledge of SEO tactics, so it is a good idea to keep tabs on what I (and other professional SEO writers) post in their own blogs and articles.