Having trouble getting your content to rank high and reach the right audience? Many websites have missed out on valuable traffic by not optimizing for informational keywords. Thus, this blog will show you how to identify and use them effectively to boost rankings, drive organic traffic, and establish authority in your niche!
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What Are Informational Keywords?
Informational keywords are words or phrases that a person types in search engines to learn about a topic, follow a solution to a problem, or gain expert opinion.
Such keywords are often used in the early stage of the customer journey. At this point, a person is not thinking about buying but rather expanding knowledge. For example, someone querying “What is a digital camera?” seeks an explanation rather than a product recommendation.
Why Are Informational Keywords Important?
Informational intent keywords help attract users in the early stages of their search journey, building trust and boosting site visibility. Here’s why they matter for SEO:
1. Increase Search Visibility
Most searches people do online are informational keywords. Approximately 80% of all searches are identified as informational. Thus, they will help you connect and bring a wide range of audiences to your website.
Moreover, since informational keywords are less competitive than transactional ones, they were even easier to rank high.
2. Attract Top-Of-Funnel Traffic
People often seek information rather than products when initiating a buying journey. Targeting those keywords, therefore, allows businesses to introduce their brand to potential customers early in the decision-making process.
Even if these visitors are not ready to buy right away, engaging them with useful content helps develop trust, which increases their chances of coming back later.
3. Build Niche Authority And Expertise
Informational keywords are vital to develop credibility. If your site provides good answers, it then becomes a reliable source for visitors.
This can enhance experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (E-E-A-T Scores) tremendously and improve rank on search engines.
4. Bring Link Juice
You can attract backlinks to your sites with informational keywords. Other sites, bloggers, and industry experts tend to refer to informational pages compared to commercial or transactional pages because people like linking to content that offers real value.
The backlinks will, in turn, increase your website’s authority. This growth in authority can further propel your key SEO pages to a higher ranking, optimizing their visibility in search results.
What Can You Use Informational Keywords For?
Using informational intent keywords effectively can help you attract the right audience, build credibility, and increase engagement. Here are some key ways to leverage them:
1. Blog Posts and Articles
Informational keywords work best in blog posts and articles. Most companies use this type of content to educate their audiences. Besides written forms, posts can also include infographics, videos, and podcasts.
The keywords included will vary by your industries, products, and the interests or challenges your audience may have. For example, a skincare brand might write a blog titled “How to Reduce Acne Naturally?” using “reduce acne” and “reduce acne naturally” as the main keywords.
2. Media Content
Informational searches are not limited to text. Hence, to attract more organic traffic, you can use keywords to enhance other types of media.
Well-optimized media has a higher chance of appearing in search features like video and image carousels. You can also add keywords to image alt text, video transcripts, and other multimedia elements.
Suppose an e-commerce store wants its shoes to appear in Google image searches. Then, they should use alt text for the image with a key phrase like “best running shoes for beginners”.
3. Featured Snippets
Using informational keywords can improve your chances of appearing in featured snippets. Although many informational searches result in zero clicks, being featured can still boost brand recognition. Content that explains definitions, outlines steps, or answers common questions is more likely to be selected for this feature.
For instance, you should answer questions like “What is local keyword research?” directly with a concise paragraph within 50-60 words at the top of a blog post. This makes it easy for Google to detect and extract the information to put on the snippet.
4. Web Pages
You can informational keywords to optimize your web pages. Instead of forcing keywords into your content, you should integrate them naturally into key sections of your site.
Some of the best places to include informational keywords are title tags, meta descriptions, URLs, and headlines. Search engines will match your content with the right search queries based on those elements.
For example, a travel website targeting “best places to visit in Japan” should ensure this phrase appears in its meta description and URL (e.g., example.com/best-places-to-visit-in-japan).
What Are The Main Types of Informational Keywords?
Informational keywords vary based on user search intent, shaping how people search for answers online. By recognizing these types listed below, you can craft content that meets their needs:
1. Advice Keywords
For advice, people usually look for specific answers or step-by-step guidance. Commonly used words include “tips”, “hacks”, “advice”, or “help”, with phrases such as “sleeping tips” or “things to help you sleep”, clearly indicating a demand for practical advice.
2. Comparison Keywords
People may want to evaluate different options before making a choice. Hence, they often search for specific comparisons or recommendations with words like “vs”, “alternative”, “compare”, or “comparison”. Superlative terms such as “best”, “most”, and “least” are also common in these searches.
3. Example and Inspiration Keywords
Keywords like “example”, “list”, or “ideas” indicate users are looking for inspiration or specific options. These searches like “protein foods list” and “bathroom ideas” fit well in top-of-funnel content strategies, attracting those in the early research phase.
4. Image Keywords
Keywords like “images”, “photos”, or “diagram” indicate users are searching for visual content. These terms are useful for creating pre-purchase content.
Tools like Google Trends’ Image Search filter can help identify trending queries. Examples include “iPad Mini size” and “garden images”.
5. Instructional Keywords
To signal a need for learning, people use keywords like “how to”, “guide”, and “step by step”. These work well for tutorial-based content. Examples are “step-by-step eyeshadow” and “ways to cook eggs”.
6. Interactive Keywords
Interactive Keywords may include terms like “tool”, “quiz”, or “calculator”. This type of informational keyword also has high volumes, for example, “mortgage calculator” with 673,000 searches/month.
7. Question Keywords
Many searches are framed as questions. Using keywords with question words like “which iPad should I buy” and “are Samsung phones water resistant” can help identify valuable queries. Free tools like AnswerThePublic can uncover common questions in your niche.
8. Video Keywords
Video-related searches often indicate informational intent. Look for queries that include “video” or trigger video carousels on search results. Tools like Google Trends’ YouTube Search filter can help identify popular video queries.
9. Benefit Analysis Keywords
Uncertain about a product or service, people tend to list its advantages and disadvantages. Words like “benefit”, “pros”, “cons”, “advantage”, and “disadvantage” usually indicate this intent. The terms would then be “benefits of yoga” or “pros and cons of digital camera”.
How To Find Informational Keywords?
Finding the right informational keywords is key to attracting search traffic and answering user queries effectively. Check out the best methods to discover them!
1. Leverage Google Autocomplete
Start by entering a basic keyword or question into Google and checking the autocomplete suggestions. These provide insights into what users commonly search for.
For instance, typing “how to use a CRM for” brings up various related queries. Refining searches based on your industry can generate more relevant ideas.
By studying autocomplete results, you can discover key topics that align with your audience’s interests and create content that meets their informational needs.
2. Analyze Related Searches
To get more keyword ideas, look through the “Related Searches” section at the end of Google’s results page and the “People Also Search For” boxes.
These relevant queries are basically words or phrases that users are currently using to search. Hence, incorporating such keywords within your content increases the chances of your content showing up on other search engines.
3. Use Keyword Research Tools
Keyword research tools present informational keywords and enhance your content strategy. They provide insights into search trends, user intent, and content opportunities.
These tools expose widely searched questions, measure keyword difficulty, find low-competition terms, and uncover long-tail keywords that support targeted content. They facilitate setting up topic clusters to cover everything and analyze competitors to find any content gaps.
Popular research tools include Ahrefs, Semrush, Google Keyword Planner, Moz Keyword Explorer, and Ubersuggest.
>>> Read more: PPC Keyword Research: A Step-by-Step Guide For More Traffic
4. Explore Q&A Sites And Forums
Check out platforms like Quora, Reddit, and niche forums to find commonly asked questions and key phrases. These discussions reflect real user concerns and can uncover valuable long-tail keywords.
Pay attention to recurring themes, the language used, and specific pain points. Engaging in discussions can also provide insights into your audience’s interests, making your content more relevant and impactful.
5. Use Google Trends
Start your keyword research with Google Trends by entering a core term, such as “best CRM software”, to analyze its search interest over time.
To identify more specific trends, you can add related keywords like “top CRM tools” or “best free CRM”. Besides, you should narrow your results using filters like region (United States), timeframe (past 12 months), or category. Comparing different keywords and reviewing suggested terms will help you uncover more opportunities.
Remember to look at rising search terms for additional content ideas, such as “CRM for small businesses” or “best CRM for startups”.
How To Use Informational Keywords For Higher SEO Rankings?
Using informational keywords strategically can boost your SEO rankings and drive more organic traffic. Here’s how to incorporate them effectively into your content!
1. Optimize Your URL
Since URL helps search engines and users instantly understand the page’s topic, clear URLs stand a better chance of earning higher rankings. Therefore, you should include their main keyword to keep your URL short and relevant.
If the target keyword is “how to prioritize tasks”, your optimized URL could be yourwebsite.com/how-to-prioritize-tasks. This keeps attention on your content while ensuring easy findability and comprehension.
2. Integrate Keywords Frequently
Add informative and keyword-rich titles to headings, subheadings, and body text to get your content relevant to the search.
For example, if you are targeting an exact keyword like “how to boost CTR”, you can write the title as “10 Proven Ways to Boost CTR” and the subheading as “Best Tools to Boost Your CTR”.
3. Refine Content Structure
The proper structure ensures an article’s readability, captures users’ attention and gives the article an edge to appear in SERPs. Each section of the article should be navigable by the headers.
An example would be “How have AI Overviews changed during the latest studies” as an H2 title and “How are AI Overviews appearing in SERPs over time” as an H3 title.
Furthermore, highlight bullet points so they can be scanned easily. Besides, keep paragraphs short between 2 and 4 sentences, emphasizing one idea per paragraph. This may improve user experience and further search optimization.
4. Improve Content Quality
Make your content substantial and deep so that readers will have clear and understandable paths to relevant answers. Increase interactivity through images, photos, infographics, and/or videos. These media not only break up the text blocks but also facilitate understanding of complex subjects, ultimately increasing retention.
If the keyword is “how to have a good sleep”, for example, you should make infographics featuring “10 Tips for Better Sleep” or an explainer video on sleep cycles, thereby making the content digestible.
5. Understand User Intent
A strong SEO strategy can identify user intent and satisfy it. So when optimizing for informational searches, you need to find out what the users really want to know. Are they searching for a step-by-step guide, definition, or piece of advice from an expert?
For example, a search query of “best ad formats for e-commerce” means that users want information for ad types that drive sales. Then your article could touch on native ads, dynamic product ads, and video ads, describing the benefits and when to use them.
Wrap Up
Informational keywords are essential for driving organic traffic and improving SEO rankings. Before creating content, you should understand their types, find the right ones, and use them strategically. Then, you could meet user needs more easily and boost your site’s visibility. Start optimizing today to establish authority and attract more visitors!
