Number of words in a keyword phrase

[Soph]

Hi All,

This is my first post here so nice to meet you all :)

What is the maximum number of words people think should be used in a keyword phrase?

I am tossing up 3 or 4. It is for an Australian website with branches in numerous states. Basically I have to decide whether as well as the keywords for the product to just add the state or the state and the country. ie
xxxx xxxx sydney
or
xxxx xxxx sydney australia

Any thoughts?
Sose

[Marcia]

Soph, welcome to WmW, it's nice to meet you, too!

I think three or four is just about right, and what I consider the best route to go before trying for more competitive, shorter phrases on a site. It depends on what the phrase - the product or service is, but generally the 3 and 4 word phrases are very targeted, more so than the shorter ones, and easier to rank for too, when first starting on a site.

>branches in numerous states
I don't believe you'd have to include Australia unless it was country specific rather than state specific, or city specific.

Using American states as an example, let's say you had a site with homes for sale in a few states. You could have Pennsylvania homes for sale (4 words) and you could even have New Jersey homes for sale (5 words). If someone were looking for Los Angeles homes for sale (5 words) that's all they'd type in - just the city, not necessarily California. A broader term would be California homes for sale.

Another example: someone might look for Brisbane restaurants. It's doubful they'd add the country to the search phrase. Then, they might look for Brisbane hotels, or hotels in Brisbane, or hotels in Australia, or hotels Australia.

Get the drift? You have to formulate the keyword phrases based on what it's most likely people will be searching for. It takes a little brainstorming, and if there are alternate phrases people might use, optimize pages for those phrases. Keep them tightly focused.

If there will be separate pages for xxxx xxxx in different states or cities, then xxxx xxxx is the "theme" of the site, which you'll want to carry across all the pages of the site, with the individual pages or sections geared to the specifics.

Hope this helps.

[Soph]

Thanks for your reply Marcia. :)

I have always wondered if not having to worry about adding a keyword for the country was more relevant to the US than other countries, especially as many of the main search engines are US.

I guess it depends on whether a user is searching through a US/International search engine (Google, Alltheweb, HotBot) or a regional one (AltaVista Australia, Excite Australia, Anzwers etc). For me on a regional search engine I am less inclined to add the country.

For what it's worth we are generally ranking 1 or at least top 10 in the main engines for both
xxxx xxxx sydney
&
xxxx xxxx sydney australia

I am just trying to decide which is better to focus on and whether 3 or 4 would be better :-)

Thanks again,
Soph

[4eyes]

Don't bother with the longer version unless the city has other popular cities with the same name.

e.g. Manchester - US and UK versions

You should be OK with Sydney.

In my experience, if Australia is mentioned anywhere on the page, you will be found well enough for "xxxx xxxx sydney australia" without optimising for the Australia bit.

[Brett_Tabke]

I think it depends on how popular the 3word version is, and if there are very many sites that are using it. It's not just the number of raw searches, it is the number of searches compared to the number of pages that include the phrase on the net.

If it is a competitive phrase -- say more than 50k pages in google -- then I'd think about the 4word phrase too. If there are under 10k pages on the phrase in Google, then I'd target it. Also depends on the rest of your sites rankings.

I don't concern myself so much any more with the word length of the phrase, but rather the ratio between searches performed and the number of pages on the net. Let me see if I can insert a table here that illistrates it better:

Search Phrase Page Count:1	Keyword Search Counts 2	Effort and Value
High (1mil+)	Low	very low and difficult to rank under
High (1mil+)	med	competitive phrase and difficult to get ranked
High (1mil+)	High	Ultra competitive phrases and difficult to get ranked.
Med (100k+)	Low	Easier to get ranked under. Top seo targets
Med (100k+)	Med	average.
Med (100k+)	High	competitive, but lucrative phrases
Low (-10k)	Low	easier rankings, and less effort to get those rankings.
Low (-10k)	Med	This is money. Easy rankings, high reward.
Low (-10k)	High	This is more money. Easy rankings, high reward.
Slim (-1k)	low	Target with a page and forget. A year from now, you may make out like a bandit if the phrase "hits".
Slim (-1k)	High	I, I have a dream. If you can find one of these a month, you should be making a comfortable living.

¹: count of pages found on Google search. ²: keyword search numbers such as Goto.

[Robert Charlton]

Brett - Another great chart... thank you. I was just trying to explain this to somebody, and you've made it really easy.

One important question, though... in the Keyword Search Counts column, what numerical ranges would you put on high, med, and low?

[NFFC]

>I have a dream. If you can find one of these a month, you should be making a comfortable living

On one a month you would be rich beyond your wildest dreams. I have found just one this year, every day I thank that little two word phrase.

Are you searching using " " when establishing the page counts.

[netcommr]

I used to target the terms which had high traffic, but after running a few ecommerce sites and found the 1-2 word terms were shoppers and 3-4 word terms were buyers, my focus changed.

[Soph]

Hi guys,

Just wanted to thank you all for your advice.
Brett that table is a great help and netcommer your advice make heaps of sense.

Thanks again,
Soph