Choosing Keywords That Describe Your Book (Part II: Keywords for Authors Series)
In Part I (What Are Keywords?), we learned that keywords are simply the terms people type into the search engines when they’re looking for something. In this section and the next, we’re going to talk about how to figure out which keywords you should use to bring targeted readers (and book buyers) to your site.
The hardest part about keyword research is realizing that what keywords you’d use to describe your book aren’t necessarily what the general population is going to use. In order to bring in the most visitors (or “traffic”) to your site as possible, you want to target the keywords that the majority of the people are using.
Let me give you an example.
If you’re an author, you might be inclined to market your epic adventure story as a “fantasy novel.” Anything can be a book, but fiction works are called novels, right? That’s more precise, so you’ll want to use that in your web site copy, right?
Well, according to my keyword research tool, “fantasy book” is searched more often than fantasy novel. That means it’d make more sense for you to use book in your keyword phrase than novel.
I’ll post links to online keyword research tools in the next section. Right now, let’s just worry about brainstorming some keywords.
You’re going to want to take a moment and write down all the phrases you can think of that people might use to search for your novel. This is definitely a good time to ask friends, co-workers, relatives, etc. what they think too. You’re close to your work (probably an expert on your topic), and it’s hard to remember what terms the average non-expert might use to find your work.
I’ll stick to my fantasy novel keywords and give you a few that pop into my head:
fantasy novel
fantasy book
epic fantasy
swords and sorcery
best fantasy books
fantasy adventure
new fantasy authors
Ok, now it’s your turn. Write down all the keywords you can think of for your book. I’m a fiction person, so I’m using fantasy for an example, but keywords can work for non-fiction too (actually, it’s easier to be very specific with non-fiction–when people are looking to learn something, they usually have a more precise idea in their minds of what they’re looking for than when they’re simply looking to be entertained).
If you’re having trouble coming up with possible keywords, head over to Google Suggest and play around with it. You can start typing in a term, and the tool will suggest ways to finish it.
When you’re done brainstorming your list, you’re ready to move onto Part III: Finding out Which Keywords People Are Searching.
What Are Keywords? (Part I: Keywords for Authors Series)
In the search engine marketing world, we talk a lot about keywords. To put it simply, a keyword is a word or phrase that people type into the search engine box to find what they’re looking for in the search engine results.
If I were looking for a new author to read, I might type in “romance novels” or “epic fantasy.”
If I needed help doing something, I might type “how to lose weight” or “how to buy a house.”
Any of those phrases can be considered keywords (despite the fact that they are strings of words; apparently keyphrases didn’t roll easily off folks’ tongues).
Most people don’t type in a single word any more. There are simply too many web sites out there, and you won’t find what you’re looking for with a broad, single-word search. Instead of typing in something like “novels,” you’d probably type in “paranormal romance novels” to get more precise results.
Specific keywords are good for the searchers, and they’re good for you too. It’s a lot easier to rank (have your website come in at a high spot on the search engine results page) for a specific term. This is something to keep in mind in the next section, where we’ll discuss choosing keywords that describe your book.
Move onto the next section: What Are Keywords?
How Keywords Can Take Your Book from Obscurity to Popularity
When you first published your book, you may have thought it would be as easy as creating a web site to market it to the online word. People would magically show up and buy your book in droves.
Didn’t happen, did it?
That’s because there are zillions of web sites out there now, and (brutal honesty time here) it’s dumb luck if someone stumbles onto yours. Why?
1. You’re not a big name author yet, so nobody is going to be typing your name into the search engine.
2. Your book is new and nobody knows the name of it, so they won’t be typing that in either.
3. There are thousands (probably tens or even hundreds of thousands) of books that share your genre or topic, so the odds aren’t good of someone typing in “<genre> novel” or “how to <topic>” into the search box and landing on your site either.
Before I thoroughly depress you, I’m going to show you the virtual silver lining.
With a little Internet marketing, you can actually get those folks from the #3 category to your site. These people can account for a ton of traffic. The way to get them is by optimizing your site for certain keywords that are related to your book. Don’t know what a keyword is yet? Don’t worry. We’re covering that in the first part of this five-part series on keywords for authors.
You can use keywords to draw traffic (highly targeted traffic looking for exactly what’s in your book) to your site, and it can be done without spending money (although spending money does make things easier and can be written off on your taxes).
So, without further ado, let’s get this series off the ground. (You may want to bookmark this page to refer back to it later.)
Part I: What Are Keywords?
Part II: Choosing Keywords That Describe Your Book
Part III: Finding out Which Keywords People Are Searching
Part IV: Using Keywords on Your Website
Part V: Why Your Keywords Should Be in Links to Your Site
The Purpose of This Blog and Who It’s for
According to the people who follow such things, there are a million new blogs being created every second. Ok, that might be a slight exaggeration, but surely a million have cropped up since I started writing this post (I’m a slow typist). So why am I polluting the blogosphere by creating another one?
Basically, I’ve done some research and I haven’t found too many that do what I want to do. I want to create a resource for authors who are trying to promote their books via the Internet.
If you’ve published a book, or multiple books, and you’re not rich yet, you’re just the audience I’m looking for (if you are rich or you have not published a book, then please send this link to someone applicable and thank you for stopping by).
I am a writer myself (not published yet, but working on it!) and have come across quite a few authors in various workshops and critiquing circles. These authors have been published, but they quickly learned there’s more to selling your book than just getting it in print. Whether you are self-published or a publishing house printed your book, the sad fact is you’re probably on your own for selling it. From what I hear, all the marketing money seems to go to the big names with the proven record.
Many authors have turned to the Internet as a means of book promotion. When you look at the cost of traditional advertising methods, it’s not surprising. You can get web hosting and a domain name (the http:www.yoursnazzybook.com address) for about $100 a year. And just about everything else I’m going to talk about in this blog can be done for free (not that it won’t take you some work… it’ll just be your work instead of the work of someone you have to pay).
I make a living by writing content for a network of websites I’ve grown over the years, and the key to my success has been in learning how to get people to visit my sites. You can’t make money on the Internet (whether it’s from selling advertising or selling books) unless large numbers of people are coming to your site. But once you do get the bodies surfing through, you’re 95% of the way to success. (The last 5% rests in creating a web site that converts visitors to buys, and we’ll cover that too.)
I don’t claim to be an expert on viral marketing, social media, search engine optimization, etc., but I have earned enough to make a comfortable living. I’m tired of just working to further my own gains, however, so I’m creating this blog as a chance to help out a community of folks I hope to be a part of someday.
This won’t be a general book promotion blog, nor will it cover traditional (off-web) forms of marketing. I’m not in the book promoting business, and I don’t want to be.
What this blog will be is a resource for authors looking to use the power of the Internet to drive more readers to their sites and sell more books. As a bonus, we’re going to talk about ways to do it without spending a lot of money.