Why Should I Bother With Keyword Research?

I bumped into a very thought-provoking forum post earlier today. The guy questioning if there was any point in keyword research. He just wanted to go ahead and write his articles about his topic. He said that this will naturally lead to him using good keywords as they would naturally come up in his blog. Although this would no doubt make for a very nice blog to read, he would definitely not just naturally use hot keywords all by himself. He would be losing a lot of good keywords and as a result, some good traffic.Missing Profitable KeywordsWhen writing about a topic, you cannot expect to just naturally stumble upon every keyword in your niche. Just because you can write a lot about certain topics doesn’t mean you use the entire range of terminology as it relates to your niche. Being human, you will have a few basic ways to say something while somebody else will phrase it completely different.This is where thinking like your prospective clients come in. And also the realization, you simply can’t! Your visitors use an extensive range of keywords to find what you are offering, some terms I can promise you that you have never even thought about before. One person types a question in one way, another person does it another way. I can absolutely vouch for this from own personal experience. On my own I can easily think of a few great keywords but they usually end up being too broad and almost impossible to rank for in Google.If you do not bother with any keyword research, you will only be targeting people that think the same way than you. Needless to say this is only a very small fraction of everybody interested in your niche.Missing Related Search TermsBesides searching with different terms, your target visitors might also be searching for things closely related to your niche. Some people may only want information and are not interested in buying. Others might be looking for something very specific in one of your subniches. If the person is a potential buyer, they might be looking for information on specific product names to compare them before making a buying decision. Without proper keyword research it’s quite obvious that you are missing out on a multitude of income streams that is now just passing you by.Missing TrendsTrends are another thing that changes the keywords being entered into the search engines. While you most likely do your best to stay on top and current, the search engines do an equal if not better job. Google’s Trends tool does a great job on showing you what terms are on the rise and this can make for a great way for you to target up and coming money streams.ConclusionThe next time you write a new article or blog post, be sure to have done your homework as far as keyword research is concerned. By doing this, you target the perfect visitors that can lead to sales and you also stand a great chance to rank highly in Google! This in itself is a huge bonus as this really makes the traffic to your site so much easier.