What are keywords? In the context of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) keywords are words or phrases that you would put on your web pages in order to generate traffic (attract visitors) to your website. Not any random bunch of words though, but words (or phrases) people use when searching for information on the internet.
SEO explained briefly:
Search engine optimization is the use of various techniques (on-page and off-page) to improve a website's ranking in the search engines and thus receive more traffic (visitors) from the search engines. SEO, in a nutshell, is making your web pages search engine friendly.
Keywords are the one most important factor when it comes to on-page SEO. If you don't get the keyword matter right, you won't receive much traffic from the search engines. Finding the 'right' keywords is therefore crucial to any website.
So what are keywords, and where do they come from?
Keywords are "created" by people searching for something on the internet. When people search for information on the internet, they type one or more words (a search query) into the search box of Google or another search engine and click on the search button.
The search term they use is now a keyword in regards of SEO. A keyword can consist of just one word, or multiple words; in the latter case it's also called a 'key phrase' or 'keyword phrase'.
So, when you make a search for, say, "what are keywords" on Google or another search engine, Google will use that search term to find relevant information to bring back to you. And, as I am using what are keywords as the main key phrase on this very page, chances are that you arrived here because you typed those three words into Google's search box!
Search Engines keep records of keywords
The search engines will always do their best to return as good content as possible to a question asked, because delivering useful, relevant information to people is how they make a "livelihood".
Google and other search engines register all keywords that are put into their search boxes, and also keep records of how many times each keyword is being used. This information is available to anybody in f.ex. Google's Keyword Research Tool , where you get search numbers for a given keyword (search term) and also lots of related keywords.
Most search queries are covered by numerous websites, so the search engines have to take into consideration a lot of SEO factors to find the best and most relevant pages. These factors are weighted differently, but one thing is for sure - having the right keywords is crucial for a page's chance to be displayed on the SE's result pages.
So, what are keywords you should use?
Obviously, you want the 'best' keywords on your pages in order to attract as many visitors as possible to your website. Good keywords must respond to two criteria in addition to being closely related to the information being searched for and the content on your pages:
1.The keyword must have some demand, meaning that there must be a reasonable number of people searching for that term (the more the better).
2.There must not be too many competing web pages for that keyword (or else you might be struggling to reach Google's first page).
If your website is new, it will normally take some time and effort to get the pages ranked and start seeing some traffic. And of course, the stronger the competition (the more websites ranking for the same keyword), the harder it will be to get to the first page of the search engines.
So the 'best' keywords are those with high demand (search volume) and low competition (not found on too many web pages), and are closely related to the content (information) provided on the actual web page.
Use multiple, related keywords on each page
It's most important that the keywords you use on your website are related to the content of your pages. For example, if your website is about "acoustic guitar music", the term 'acoustic guitar music' obviously would be a highly related keyword. And so might 'sheet music for acoustic guitar' be, but only if you have one of your web pages cover that specific topic (i.e. having content about 'sheet music' for acoustic guitar).
Use more than one keyword on each page. Find several related keywords that you implement in the text. Use the best keyword (phrase) in the title tag of the page and in the file name, and also in the meta description and meta keywords tags. Include the main keyword in the headline of the page as well.
Find the keywords you will use on a page before writing the content, and try to write the text around the keywords.
Each page of your site must have their own keywords. However, they don't need to be unique for each page; several pages can have some of the same keywords as long as they are closely related to the content of the pages and flows naturally into the text.
How and where to find good keywords?
In order to dig up the 'right' keywords for your web pages, you will have to do some proper keyword research. Please refer to our Finding Keywords For Your Website to learn how to do this extremely important task.
Important NOTE: Keywords alone on a web page won't bring you any traffic. Original, useful content on your website is of utmost importance to attract free, natural ("organic") traffic from the search engines. The reason is that good, helpful content is what the engines want to provide their users with. Therefore, without sufficient good content, your site will never receive much free traffic from search engines.
So what are keywords? They are the most important element on your web pages - along with the content.