We all know the importance of finding those great keywords for our articles but do you know how to check your keyword ranking? Its not something to get hung up on but checking how your work is ranking on Google, Bing and Yahoo is a good indication on the health of your website. Being able to monitor what your articles are doing, where they have got to.. are they going up or down.. indicates whether you are reaching your audience or not. Clearly if you have a new website, your keywords will take time to rank, so checking once a week is good enough at that stage.
Let’s look first at what you need to have in place to get good keyword rankings…
Pre-requisites For Good Ranking
- Healthy Website – Good ranking for a website takes time, so the age of your website will have a bearing on how your keywords are ranking. The longer your website has been in action, the better your authority will be, your links, your presence.
- SEO Good Practices – Search engine optimising on every article is a good plan. Have a check list of on-page SEO so you carry it out routinely on every article. Its a good routine to get into, knowing all your articles are optimised for ranking.
- A Following – Ranking quickly for keywords is easier if you have a following to share your content with, either through your blogging or Facebook or email.
What Else Can You Do To Rank Well?
Many of us cannot afford to pay for clicks, to ‘pay’ for traffic to come to our sites, me included, so we rely on keywords to attract ‘organic’ traffic. It’s a slower process but at the start of a new website, its not probably not the time to be paying for traffic when there isn’t a lot of content so getting the keywords ranking is key to getting the process going. I won’t go into how to find the keywords here as I have already written an article on ‘How To Find Keywords For Your Business’, so follow the link to get that sorted out. Optimising your keywords is a great way to get ahead of the crowd, so don’t skimp on the process.
Once your content is published, and you have a website that is starting to get traffic, you can start checking how the keywords are ranking. You aren’t going to rank 100% of the time for every article you write, but its wise to see how your work is ranking. So how do you do this?
How To Check For Keyword Ranking.
So this can be easy or it can be time-consuming and frustrating. There are many free keyword checkers online that you can use to check out your keywords and there are also many that offer a free week for you to try it out first, which is always a good plan.
Many of these keyword checkers will rank your keywords in Google, Bing, and Yahoo so you get three hits all in one. Whilst Bing and Yahoo cover only around 1/10th of the total rankings on the web, it still equates to 10% of all internet users and as there are over 4,000,000,000 internet users in the world, 10% of that is still a huge number of users! We all know Google, Bing, Yahoo, there are others – Baidu ( Chinese Market) and DuckDuckGo that are increasing their position in the market.
The most straightforward way to check how your keywords are ranking is to use a keyword tool.. If you are serious about ranking, then you might want to consider, after you have tried a few keyword tools, to subscribe to one that you can then track your rankings month by month.
Tools For Keyword Ranking
Many of the keyword tools will offer you alternatives to your search so you can see how the alteration to one or two words can dramatically change the ranking of your keywords. They also will give you misspelt alternatives and keyword phrases that may not make absolute sense, but they’re ones that people are searching.
I have one that I use which you can try for free for 30 searches. Its called Jaaxy and I have written a review on it so go check that out and follow the links to the free trial, or you can click on the link to the right of this blog to go straight over to Jaaxy to try it out, bu the review does explain how it works, so you will get more from the 30 free searches if you know what each facet of the platform is about. I pay for the pro version on a monthly rate, which is very reasonable. I am also a member of Wealthy Affiliate – a platform that supports entrepreneurs, and as such they offer me a discount. You can do this too if you want.
I haven’t tried out Rank Tracker but it offers a free keyword tool. It is limited but for a startup, it offers quite enough to get going and once you are moving forward with your site, you can decide whether to upgrade.
Rank Tracker has similar different keyword tools as Jaaxy, including suggestions from Google, Bing, Yahoo and Amazon and it integrates with Google keyword planner if you want to start and adword campaign and Google search console.
Your best SEO keywords are often not the most obvious ones. To find real keyword gems, you need to dig out all the possible variations from multiple data sources. As you can see from the image above, you are limited with the free version but it does allow you unlimited keyword searches, and the ability to see how your keywords would rank.
This is a rather characterful display of keywords… with tons of choice.. Its entertaining in how they have displayed the information for sure !
They have designed this from a different angle, in that when you search you aren’t actually searching for one word but for a string of words – a keyword phrase. Its not unique in this as the other keyword search tools does that but they don’t present them in this way.
I don’t think they do it any better than any of the others but it shows you the threads in a very intuitive format, so you can quickly find the things that people are searching for, and as we know, when asking a question, Google and other search engines, like questions, they are closer to natural language and may well get better ranked.
You can search by letter, so a kind of ‘alphabet soup’ style search. This is a free keyword search tool so something I will use !
This a really cute keyword search tool.. Completely free which is awesome ! So its an extension that you add to your browser, that as you search on Google, it comes up with various metrics relating to the keywords you are searching for, once you’re done, a box of similar keywords comes up at the side!
You can see the little words and numbers below the google search box. I was looking for Wealthy Affiliate Review just for an example, then to the right a whole host of relate keywords… awesome tool… I will be using this one too.
Sum Up
There are lots more keyword tools out there, but the drawback is that you only get a limited trial of say a week or two weeks, then you have to sign up. The thinking behind this is that by that time you have got so use to the tool that you cannot manage without it. Try out the free ones first, always the best thing with a start up website, don’t outlay any money on your site until you are far enough along that you need more metrics. Try out Jaaxy … I’m biased because this is the keyword tool of choice for me.
Hello there, thanks for this really wonderful review, I must say one key things every site owner looks out for is a good ranking on good and I’m pleased you have taken your time to help with checking ones keyword ranking. My little man at home just opened his page and I believe this post would do well to help him develop when dealing with keywords and how to go about checking his ranking. Thanks for sharing.
Hi,
Great article about how to check keywords ranking. You explained everything very well in this article not only about the importance of keywords but you showed us some keywords tools which are very helpful. I am sure everyone gonna like ll if those tools because they are free. But personally, I like Jaaxy as a keyword tool because it is very easy to use. Thanks for letting us know about all those tools.
Very nice, thorough and educative article about how to check your keyword rankings. Keyword ranking and research are one of the most fundamental but important principles behind every good website and online business I would say. I have been using jaxy lite but this rank tracker sounds pretty interesting. One-time license fee, thats a better concept in my opinion. Do you know how these “competitors per project” works in Rank Tracker? is it one small tool or setup of tools to monitor your competitors? However, thanks for your great article I will take a further look at your website.
Thanks Jesse for your comments. The competitors per project allows you to check how your competitors are doing as you progress. Allows you to keep track and improve your website.
SEO is the key to getting your site ranked. Without the proper search term, your article will just get buried. Jaxxy is my favourite tool as well. It has many features to make your life easier. It gives you the average number of searches for the term, the amount of traffic each gets and the QSR. It even gives a brainstorming panel for similar terms. If you are ever stuck for a good SEO phrase, Jaxxy is definitely the place to go!
If we start our blogging journey blindly, we will end up wasting time and loosing a lot of opportunities that are brought about with the use of keywords. SEO practice on articles is a great way to start and I can attest to this.
Thank you for the reminder that it is not a good idea to buy traffic when you are still a newbie. It would be very awkward to have lots of visitors only for them to find a few articles on your site. I am currently using Jaaxy keyword tool and it is serving me very well. I get to know where I rank and I am able to improve my Keyword skills to even rank better. Jaaxy is such a great tool that I believe every online entrepreneur must have.
Thank you for these useful suggestions. Great article!
Hi Quinn,
Thanks a lot for the helpful and informative article.
As you mentioned, I am also on a budget and I can’t afford paid traffic. So I am totally focused on organic traffic and writing quality content is the main part of my blogging career. I must say I found your post highly uplifting and educational.
Very recently I started to check how my keywords are performing and I am shocked when I see the results on Google Search Console (nearly 75% keywords are not ranking at all). So decided to update my old contents.
I am using Jaaxy and it’s an awesome keyword research tool I came across online. I can tell you I have taken some great insights from this article. This was very insightful.
Thanks Paul, pleased to hear that my article has helped, I think frequently with organic traffic, we have to be patient, they will start ranking but its a slow business.
Wow thanks a lot for this article I have been trying to find new ways of finding new or more relevant keywords for my website that I am doing right now. This has some useful tips and tools that I can use in the future and probably will help me to get better rankings on my site. Thanks again
Checking the keyword ranking is essential for any website. When I started with affiliate marketing, i never knew about all this. I thought that once you decided to own a website, you need to hire people to make it work for you. I found out that you can do it by yourself during my training. Jaaxy is the one that I also use and I was surprised how easy it was to explore it. It can really give you results that you can incorporate to your blog post. I am satisfied with Jaaxy but it won’t give a harm to just try out Rank Tracker, Answer the Public and Keyword Everywhere just to compare how it works. Thanks for covering up this important topic. Keyword ranking shouldn’t be neglected to do once in a while.
Really enjoyed this list of keyword trackers. I use Jaxxy and get great value with it. Ranking high on the search engines is a blogger’s dream. Thanks for the insight on the different ways to keep up with how our keywords are working. I really like the idea of an extension too. Keep up the good work!
Goldroad
Thanks Jay!
You have a good article, I really like the visual elements that you have.
I am a blogger and it took me a while before I started to understand keyword research. The part that was the most difficult for me was the tool I used when I did my research.
Most research tools out there free or paid for I have used both, aren’t very accurate with the results. I use Jaaxy now exclusively I have found the results to be the most accurate consistently. I checked out your Jaaxy review, I liked it as well.
The picture with all of the keywords broke down “outstanding”
I feel like I get keywords now and I learned a little more about how to check your keyword ranking from reading your article thanks for putting it out there
Thanks Michael, Im pleased that you liked it, and Jaaxy has got to be the best keyword tool, but good to know there are free ones to choose from too.
Excellent post. As an affiliate marketer I can attest to the importance of keywords. Your post shows that ranking in the SERPs requires some knowledge on the use of keywords. I know this post will help start-ups in marketing for sure, And the links you provided will make the marketer to lay a strong foundation f or their content. Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for taking the time to read and comment.
Thanks for this informative and comprehensive review on how to check keyword ranking. Getting a keyword for posting has always been a major priority as a blogger and much effort is been inserted always to yield a better result and connect to the right audience but check and balancing this process to know how effective our work has been in trying to apply this keyword is also important and that is why I have come here. After reading these I am noe educated why the right tools and right way to know my ranking.
Thanks.
Thats great Willy, if you have taken all the time in sorting out the keywords in the first place, its reasonable that checking theyre working well is a good idea.
Hello Quinn,
As you explain very well if we plan to rank our site in Google, Bing or Yahoo, find relevant keywords that will be fundamental.
Being also a member of Wealthy Affiliate I use your keyword search a lot. I can obtain through this magnificent tool many features such as your demand and your level of competence among others.
The distribution of the words in our content will be very important, trying not to repeat the same keyword too many times. I enjoyed reading such an interesting post.
Greetings. Claudio
When you use a keyword in your content, you should ideally, use it in the title, and then in the first 160 words of the article but then after that you can write freely. You do not need to continue using it. Clearly you also put it into your meta title and description. But after that you do not need to keep using it through the article.
Thanks for this informative article, I am a big fan of trying all sorts of keyword tools until you find one that you love. Jaaxy has all the things one needs to find the perfect keywords great search tools, lots of data to check competition and some other cool tools to help you rank in Google. it helps me to keep organised and not lose track of those great keywords I find.
Hi, I couldn’t find your name on your website or under your post, so I will ask my question like this. You talk about keywords, but do you just search for one word or do you search for a sentence? What is it actually that makes a good keyword, just the amount of people searching for that word? Can you please explain it a bit more. Thanks
Hi Eric, Thanks for your question, we talk about keywords, but what we really mean is a ‘keyword phrase’, this was something that tripped me up when I first started out. So say you were looking for keywords to do with backpacking, you can search backpacking but for us to rank well just using one keyword, we will be up against thousands of other websites wanting to rank for that same word and probably up against another thousand or so that are paying for clicks, so by looking for a ‘long tail keyword’ or a ‘keyword phrase’ such as ‘ best backpacking equipment’ or ‘ how to backpack the traditional way’ so whilst backpacking is really where you want to be, you can get your website ranked on the first page of the search engine using ‘ low hanging fruit’ as its called. I have another blog on this if you are interested.