Weaving Keywords Naturally into Your Writing for SEO

Mike Templeman — December 28, 2016 Follow @miketempleman1

Most agencies and businesses looking to improve their SEO now know that you should avoid keyword-stuffing. Not only does the overuse of keywords irritate customers but search engines have also wised up to it. So just using the same keyword over and over isn’t going to get you to the top of a search engine’s list of results. In fact, it might have the opposite effect; the search engine might actually penalize you for using the same keyword instead of something else.

Does this mean that you stop using keywords altogether? Surprisingly enough, it doesn’t. As per this article from Forbes, “you might think that keywords are basically a “dead” strategy, but this isn’t exactly true.” You can still use keywords. In fact, doing so might be inevitable. For example, if you’re a real estate agent, you’re going to have to use keywords like “house,” “home”, “apartment” etc. And you’ll probably need to use them a significant number of times because this is the business you’re in.

However, it’s important to make sure that these keywords are naturally embedded in your writing. Use them when it’s necessary to use them and use different words when they seem more appropriate. For example, this article has used the word “keyword” nine times so far (including the last use, in quotes). That’s quite a bit of keyword density. However, the use of this word was never forced; it was woven naturally into the fabric of the writing.

Here are a few tips to help you do the same with your content and improve SEO:

Avoid Keyword-Stuffing

Before you understand what you should do with keywords, it might be necessary to be clear about what you shouldn’t do. Here’s a good example of what a real estate firm shouldn’t do to include more keywords in their content: “If you’re looking to buy a house, keep in mind that house prices in – area have soared. Houses aren’t going cheap. Houses are costing twice as much as before. If you want to buy a house at a decent price, contact our real estate agents who will be able to find a house for you.”

Obviously, this excerpt has no value as a piece of writing. It barely gives any information to the prospective buyer. And it will only serve to irritate them by the use of the word “house” over and over when a pronoun would have served just as well. And as this article from Entrepreneur says, “you need to prioritize user experience over keyword placement.”

This is the type of keyword-stuffing that people used to do in the beginning, before search engine optimization became more sophisticated. They just used keywords as often as possible, even when they weren’t necessary. And unfortunately, this worked well enough at the time—it enabled search engines to find them.

Now, however, search engine parameters have changed to resemble what a human being might think or perceive when reading something. They’re looking for good writing which includes keyword variety and complex sentence structures. A search engine is still not going to be able to judge elegance of language as well as human beings. But they’re definitely giving it a try.

Introduce Keyword Variety

This is one of the rules of good writing, in general. You shouldn’t be using the same words over and over in your writing. Instead, it’s a good idea to introduce keyword variety. Instead of just using the word “house,” you could also use the words “home,” “residence,” “cottage,” “mansion” etc. This will make sure that your content flows smoothly; it will also help you to show up in more than one type of search.

A lot of other real estate places might be using the keyword “house” but not that many might have thought of using the word “cottage.” So when people search for “cottage,” you might have the advantage of being one of the few websites that uses this keyword.

Additionally, the use of different words that mean the same thing (or something similar) has the advantage of making your content read better because it mimics the way that human beings think. Our thoughts are complex; no two of them are the same. There might be a general theme running through them but it expresses itself in many different ways.

Use the Same Keyword in a Different Way

In addition to keyword variety, you can also experiment with using the same keyword in a different way. This is particularly effective when you do it in titles. For example, if other people on the internet are currently writing articles about “Inexpensive Housing in Florida” or “Cheap Housing in Florida,” you could write an article titled “Budgeting for Your New House in Florida” or “Financial Planning for Your House in Florida.” The articles might be similar in content but the use of different keywords will make them stand out.

Try to write something a little different from what’s currently being written about. Go against the grain. Not only does this make people sit up and take notice, it also prevents you from being lumped together with other websites by search engines. If there are a whole bunch of articles with similar titles being published around the same time, a search engine won’t necessarily display all the results. Instead, it will give priority to a result that is unique in some way.

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