Do you speak your target market’s language?  If you don’t, you are missing out on an essential component of keyword research and implementation.  There are many powerful uses for keyword research, from selecting lists of keywords for PPC campaigns, to using keywords effectively in press releases, articles, blog posts and website copy.  But in order for the work to be effective, you’ve got to select and use the words that lead to the highest conversion levels.

Wondering where to find these mystical words?  According to a recent survey of marketers, the most highly rated keyword research tactics use site log files.  Analyzing site log files for highly converting search words and for frequent keywords were ranked as the two most  effective tactics. Keyword experts know how to use the art and science of their research by mining the data found in site log files for the most effective keywords.

Site logs contain vital data such as the number of visitors to your site, where they live, what time they visited, and if they are new or return visitors.  They also show how people got to your site: Did they type in the address directly? Did they come from a referrer page such as an article or industry listing? How much traffic are you getting from individual search engines?  In addition to that wealth of information, you will also find the keywords used on the search engines by your site visitors.  Clearly this is a great source of keyword data that represents the interests of the real visitors to your website.

Other tactics chosen as “highly effective” by lower percentages of survey participants include analysis of internal site search (once visitors are on your site, what are they hoping to find?), competitors’ sites and competitive tools such as SpyFu.

Your target market’s language is waiting to be uncovered in your site log files, and an experienced keyword researcher can serve as the translator that allows you to implement the most effective keywords.

Joan Risdon, Founder and CEO of Smart Image Media shares a few simple steps to help you successfully market your business at the 2010 Kingdom Economic Yearly Summit in Denver, CO!(Video 4 of 5)at the 2010 Kingdom Economic Yearly Summit in Denver, CO.

1) Keyword Stuffing

In the past search engines were unsophisticated.  Adding a ton of keywords to your content was all you needed in order to rank with the search engines.  Search engines have matured significantly since then using sophisticated algorithms to achieve search rankings.

INSTEAD – Create your content for people not search engines.  Use keywords in your headers, sub headers and title tags.

2) Blog SPAM Commenting

Before spammers would aggressively drop links into blog comments and consider that link building.

INSTEAD – Produce something of value.  Create well written content.  This will attract quality links such as links from other blogs and news sources.  Search engines value this more often than blog comments.

3) Search Engine Submission

It is amazing that SEO companies continue to offer search engine submission services, and still believe that submitting to search engines is necessary.  It is not! Search engines these days (Google) are so advanced in indexing new content that this service has become obsolete.

INSTEAD – To get your website discovered you can drop links to your site in social media platforms such as Twitter,Facebook  and You Tube.  For example, if you have a Twitter account, tweet a link to your website or add the website link to your profile.  Social media platforms are consistently crawled by search engines so these links will be discovered quickly.

4) Link Exchanges

Reciprocal linking is not really an issue in moderation.  The problem occurs when webmasters actively engage in link exchange schemes to influence rankings intentionally.  By the way Google considers this a violation.

INSTEAD – Offer genuine quality testimonials to businesses you work with.  A testimonial is an easy and polite way to get a link to your website in a favorable light.

SEO changes constantly sometimes daily.  Avoid outdated methods.  If you are unsure always seek out the expertise of a professional.  After all you don’t want your website penalized for using banned SEO methods.

I recently attended a very informative seminar put on by Social Media Management Company . They gave an overview of the many ways to bring awareness to a business brand by using Social Media.  We covered everything from Twitter and Facebook to Blogging and Keywords.  To many this can be a very intimidating and daunting task, since we don’t know what we don’t know!  The folks at Social Media Management Company really did a great job explaining the different ways to use all of the tools that are out there.

I really feel that at our company, SmartImage Media, we have all of the wheels in motion when it comes to Social Media.  SmartImage Media has a Facebook fan page, Twitter and this great blog that we add new information to several times a week on a variety of topics.  We are lucky in that we have a great team and as our boss says “The aces are in their places.”  We, as team members, have our own jobs when it comes to managing all the aspects of our social media campaign.  For those smaller companies Social Media Management Company can handle all of the details for them working behind the scenes to write blog articles, handle link building and even manage their Twitter and Facebook pages! The team at SmartImage Media works in tandem with them to program blogs and implement keywords and meta tags. That way business owners can work on their businesses instead of in them.  Social Media may not be as daunting a task as you thought, we are all here to help,  our clients get the attention they need and deserve.  After all your brand is only as successful as your marketing plan.  Social Media should be a major part of that plan, it is the fastest most cost effective way to get your name out there!  Stay tuned and keep tweeting.