I have some friends who obsess on being the #1 result for specific search terms on Google. Recently, I acquired some number one positions and found that having the number one spot on Google has a somewhat variable value.

Using the Google webmaster tools, you can find out recent search queries that your site ranked highly for and which generated clicks. According to the tools, I have 4 number one positions and three number two positions for my insults site, InsultFinder.com.

Woo Hoo... or so I'd think. Of my top 3 click generators, only one of them is one of the number ones ("dirty insults", #2 click generator). The number one click generator is the word "insults", for which it ranks #7, and the number 3 click generator is the word "insult" for which it ranks #8.

In fact, if I put the word "insult" into Wordtracker, it shows 311 searches for those three terms combined via its search engine sources in the last 90 days. That compares to around 76000 for "Britney Spears". So being #1 for all those terms would be worth approximately 1/228th of being #1 for "Britney Spears".

Some web site owners find themselves paying SEO firms or spending inordinate amounts of their time on DIY SEO to capture a number one spot. And some SEO firms use a number one spot as proof that they're doing an amazing job for you. But let's do a little math...

Some spellcheck dictionaries boast 50,000 words. Using that as a base, let's assume those 50,000 words can combine into 2.5 billion two-word phrases (50,000 * 50,000). Even throwing out all the nonsense phrases, you can come up with millions of "worthwhile" phrases that have low competition and low search volume.

Assume you make the best sour pickles in the world. As a savvy SEO service, I promise to get you highly ranked for the term "sour pickles" and get you to #1. You think that might be worth a lot. But if you look on Wordtracker, "sour pickles" picks up 17 searches in 90 days. But eliminate "sour" and the term "pickles" is picking up 950 searches in 90 days. Being #1 for "sour pickles" has 1/55th the value that being #1 for "pickles" would be. But becoming #1 for "pickles" is a lot more difficult.

If you don't know how to determine the value of a term, you may well find yourself spending more money or time than it's worth to capture the #1 slot for it, only to have it produce neglible results in terms of how much traffic Google sends to your site.

Wordtracker is not free. But you can get a one-day membership for under $10 as of this writing. If you're planning to do SEO to try to capture a top spot for a specific keyword or keyphrase, that's going to be money well spent, because getting to the #1 spot on Google's search results isn't going to be worth much if people aren't searching for that keyword or keyphrase.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 24th, 2007 at 3:35 pm and is filed under Online Marketing And SEO, Techno Thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.