With over a billion queries processed by Google every day, the search for relevant results is infinite. Every webmaster at one point or another, must’ve seen the How Google Works video by Matt Cutts, which mentions a couple of terms such as keywords, page rank, relevance and inbound links – all of which are quintessential factors in some voodoo magic we folks like to call SEO.
Google’s enormous database contains 30 trillion indexed pages. The most sought-after keywords are stroked millions of times every day. Some of these webpages are as old as the Internet! So how are you going to rank in Google (or any search engine for that matter) given the current mind-numbing statistics? Well, you could be Tony Stark and ask Jarvis to outsmart Google’s algorithms, but let’s be real. One of the legit ways to accomplish this, is by aiming for the relevant keywords. This choice of correct keywords is one of the most powerful factors when it comes to ranking a website in a SERP (Search Engine Results Page).
But wait! There’s a catch! All the popular keywords are already taken; i.e. they’re ranked for by thousands and sometimes millions of webpages. So what keyword would you rank for? And how would you know which ones to use? This is where I introduce HitTail – the smart new kid in the SEO biz, helping you move one step closer to Google’s first page.
What’s HitTail?
HitTail is essentially a super easy to use website analytics and keyword research & suggestion software. In a nutshell, HitTail sweeps through your website’s incoming keywords (i.e. search terms people use to find your site) and suggests the ones you could rank higher for.
What are “long tail keywords”?
Glad you asked, junior! As I’ve mentioned earlier, all the popular keywords – i.e. the ones that are short and catchy – for example say “cool iphone cases” have hundreds of sites waiting to be ranked for them. But 70% of the people who search the web, use long tail keywords! Example: “blue iphone cases with hello kitty” These keywords describe your query in a more efficient manner and thus help Google return the most relevant results. Thankfully, these keywords aren’t all taken. The possibilities/combinations of long tail keywords are exponentially large which make ’em easy to rank for.
So what does HitTail do?
HitTail goes through your site’s incoming search terms in real-time, i.e. keywords people (and not spiders) use to land on your site; applies complex algorithms on those terms to generate those keywords which you could rank high for – i.e. the long tail keywords which are of the highest relevance to your site. Thus, HitTail bases its research and keyword suggestions on real/valid data (keywords) rather than suggesting them based on your site’s content. To put it in one line:
If keywords were a bunch of apples, HitTail selects the absolute “juicy” ones!
Conclusion:
Based on the information HitTail gives you, you could modify your site’s content to include those long tail keywords and rank for them! If implemented correctly, this would bring a lot of targeted organic traffic to your website which would, in turn, be immensely beneficial for long term SEO.
HitTail’s pricing policy is based on the number of monthly unique visitors to your site – starting at 9.95 USD per month for 4000 UVs, and it works on unlimited websites. It has been featured in TechCrunch, PCWorld, CNET and other prestigious websites as one of the most user-friendly SEO software out there. It’s incredibly useful (and easy to use) for both beginners and SEO geeks.
So Tony, what are you waiting for? Try out this 21 day free trail (you’ve got nothing to lose here) and fall in love with HitTail!
EDIT: In light of Stephen’s comments, it seems that Google’s latest Hummingbird algorithm opens a door to a new realm in SEO. As Jean pointed out, the guys over at HitTail are constantly working on new methods to improve their keyword prediction algorithm (he emailed them about this issue). I should reiterate the fact that HitTail provides a 21 day trial – so the only investment you’re making is your time and effort.
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6 Responses
Hi Jean,
This isn’t about me being knowledgeable. It’s about WP Mayor sending people to an affiliate link without explaining a significant issue.
Like I said, I don’t think that was done on purpose and I think it’s fine to send people there (after acknowledging the issue).
Anyway, I don’t mean to troll you, so I’ll leave it there! 🙂
Hi Jean,
It’s not only Google that has moved to secure search. Yahoo has moved to secure search as well and Bing has started down that road too (although most user will be using the non secure version for the forseeable future).
And there are plenty of SEOs out there saying that (for Google at least) keyword research has fundamentally changed (or will shortly) due to the Hummingbird algorithm.
So HitTail have some significant challenges in front of them. I hope they can roll with it and pivot in a way that allows them to provide continued value to customers. I’m sure there’s a path there for them that will allow them to do that.
However, leaving all that aside, I thought that this article should have at least mentioned some of the issues. If it had explained these issues and then said, “but go ahead and try it yourself, using the free trial (you’ve got nothing to lose)”, then would have been fine!
As it stands, it looks like it’s hiding issues that potential buyers should be aware of.. I’m sure it wasn’t intentional, but it doesn’t seem right.
Thanks for the feedback Stephen, it’s clear that you are very knowledgeable in this area and many of us are already aware of the changes in the SEO landscape. Hopefully tools like HitTail can keep evolving to give us that extra help that keeps us delivering content people are actually searching for.
Here’s how HitTail is dealing with “not provided” keywords:
1. This change from Google makes each keyword you can grab that much more valuable since they are now hard to get. The new Keyword Planner is not very good (not sure if you’ve tried it). So HitTail has become more valuable for most folks, since most other sources of keywords are quickly drying up.
2. Google is 67% of U.S. search traffic. HitTail supports all of the major engines, so it still can value from the other 33% of searches.
3. There is no charge for “not provided” keywords.
The guys at HitTail are also working on some changes that will result in HitTail being able to provide more suggestions even though Google is no longer providing keyword data, and I’m looking forward to see what they can come up with.
Oh dear. To write this and not even include the words “not provided” in the article seems irresponsible to me. I don’t use HitTail, but it seems to me that it must be having major problems with Google encrypting keywords.
The incoming keywords are “not provided” for pretty much all traffic from Google. There are no keywords anymore. HitTail can’t conjure this data up from nowhere. If Google doesn’t pass the keywords along, HitTail doesn’t get the data.
You will get keywords for traffic you get from Bing or Yahoo, although Yahoo is encrypting more and Bing is considering encryption as well and the traffic for these is general much lower.
I’m not even going to get into the effects of Hummingbird on this style of keyword research (basically, keyword research is shifting away from the HitTail model).
I don’t want to say that HitTail won’t provide any value, but the value it does provide must be far diminished over what it could provide 6 months ago – and I think you need to state that in your article rather than mislead people who get their expectations up.
Interesting – but you say “HitTail goes through your site’s incoming search terms in real-time, i.e. keywords people (and not spiders) use to land on your site”. Given that most incoming keywords are now encrypted and cannot be read any more – at least those coming in from Google, how does HitTail go through what people are searching for real time? Thanks