A Review of Using Wordtracker for Keyword Research

A Bird’s Eye View of Wordtracker
Keyword Research is considered one of the most important tasks in optimizing a website. A website’s keywords can affect its placement in the major search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Live Search. Wordtracker, an online keyword generator, is one of the keyword research tools available today for webmasters.

Useful Features of Wordtracker
Wordtracker has databases that contain over 300 million searches drawn from meta-search sites like Dogpile and Metacrawler. Meta-search sites are compiled searches from major search engines Google, Yahoo and Ask.

Wordtracker then compares the keyword you entered with its database and from which you discover which words or phrases millions of people are actually entering into search engines. It also shows how many times a keyword or phrase has been entered into a particular search engine and how many websites are competing for that particular keyword phrase. The result: a list of specific keywords with statistics based on number of actual searches and the number of competing pages for each.

More than the keyword list it generates, Wordtracker also computes for you the KEI, or the Keyword Efficiency Index, score for each key word or phrase. This number will indicate how well a certain key word or phrase will perform when optimized. It is calculated based on the number of searches and the number of competitors for the keyword or keyphrase. This, in effect, takes the guesswork out of the keyword research, making sure the results are as objective and accurate as possible.

SEO specialists use keyword research tools before optimizing a site to make it easier for them to identify the most likely to be effective keywords. The list generated will be based on general one- or two-word terms and they will work their way down to three to four word combinations related to each keyword. These keyword combinations are generally referred to as Long Tail keywords.

Long Tail Keywords belong to the “long” end of the keyword search graph where the keywords that dominate the market are found at the top and Long Tail keywords populate the bottom stretching towards the tail-end. This means a greater number of competing sites scramble for highly competitive keywords on top while ignoring the Long Tail where a sizable amount also receive sufficient traffic. Optimizing for a hundred Long Tail keyword phrases is similar, if not equivalent, to optimizing for one or two dominant keywords.

Any Internet savvy user can use Wordtracker because of the user-friendly features enhanced by the ease of following the step-by-step guide provided for. Wordtracker also presents clear analyses for each of its keyword search reports. It also sends to the user an email report of the result of the query and suggests ideas on which keywords or phrases from among the selected ones are most likely to be profitable and can be effectively optimized for.

Negative Features of Wordtracker
One factor that places Wordtracker in the negative light is that one can not access its full range of features without paying, although many would still consider this spending as an essential investment. Many users have given testimonials that justify the handsome price for the value Wordtracker brings to their business’ online success.

Those who are just beginning with their SEO efforts may not have enough funds to finance their SEO activities. Wordtracker provides a free keyword search service, but the report it gives is also limited. It allows a limited number of keywords to be added to your basket. Also, keyword competition analysis is only done in Altavista, not in any of the major search engines which should have given more substantial results. Another thing seen as a defect of Wordtracker is that it only uses two meta-search engines (Metacrawler and Dogpile) which are not enough to represent the larger user community.

Wordtracker Compared with its Competition
Another keyword search tool that strives to compete with Wordtracker is Keyword Discovery. It works much the same way as the former. Keyword Discovery has databases with larger searches (20 billion vs. 300 million+). It also gives data that goes back for 12 months, while that of Wordtracker is only 2 months old. This data is useful in searching for seasonal keywords as this shows the real trend of the words or phrases. However, because of such extensive data, its keyword search service costs more than Wordtracker.

Many sites offer keyword suggestion tools for free but nevertheless only suggest words and phrases and don’t work like Wordtracker. One thing to note is that there are websites with keyword suggestion tool that use Wordtracker data. Here is a list of some of websites that offer free keyword suggestion tools:

To Buy or Not To Buy? That is the Question…
Considering the things that Wordtracker can do for anyone who is wishing to optimize his site, I prefer using this tool. But it is not always necessary to use a single tool. One situation I would consider using other tools is when I am searching for seasonal keywords. Yes, Wordtracker is the leading keyword research tool. Many has benefited from it. For those who haven’t tried using it, maybe it won’t hurt you to try it out. Try to visit Wordtracker.

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