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The Secret To Choosing The Right Keywords For Your Pet Sitting Business Website

keyword-researchI hear plenty of chatter about keyword this and keyword that when it comes to building the perfect pet sitting website. Sure, you need to be keyword-conscious but the trick is knowing which keywords you should be targeting in the first place.

I can tell you one thing for sure. The keywords that I target will not be the same ones you should target. How do I know? Our location is different, for one thing.

If I target ‘pet sitting in New York,’ there is no guarantee that ‘pet sitting in [your town]’ is even worth it for you to target.


What do I mean by ‘worth it?’

Well, a good, targeted keyword is one that is not too competitive and one that is actually being searched for by people online.

Going after keywords as broad as “pet sitter, pet sitting and dog walking” are never going to get you anywhere. They are way too broad and way too competitive.

What would your clients search for to find you?

When considering the proper keywords to target for your site, you must first think about what search terms your ideal client would use to find you.

In my case, for example, my wife and I run a pet sitting business in New York City. So when creating our pet sitting business website, I sat down and made a list thinking about things from my potential client’s perspective.

First, I came up with keywords like “pet sitting in ny, dog boarding new york and cat sitting nyc…”

Now once you have a list of these keywords, your job is not quite done. How can you be sure that a phrase like “pet sitting in ny” is searched for enough times in a given month to target it?

After all, I don’t want to be targeting keywords and phrases that people aren’t even searching for, right?

So, let’s find out what people are actually searching for.

To help identify the most appropriate and utilized search terms for your pet sitting business website, we turn to Google’s keyword research tool.

If you’re not familiar, Google has one of the best. All you do is type in a keyword or phrase, and the search giant graciously lets you know exactly how popular it is.

You’ll discover how many times in a given month your terms are actually being searched for. How cool is that – no more guesswork!

At times, you’ll try a term like “Ocean County pet sitting” and see that there’s “not enough data.” This basically means not enough people are using that phrase to find you.

But this is a good thing. You now know not to waste your time targeting that term. Move down the list you created earlier and get a handful of search terms that are actively being searched for online.

Be careful not to target keywords that are too competitive or broad. If a term has been searched in a given month at least a few hundred times, you’re in good shape and can go ahead with that keyword.

If, on the other hand, it’s being searched for 110,000 times in a given month, you’d be better off targeting a more specific term that’s appropriate to your website so you don’t get lost in the crowd.

google-keywords

What do you do with all that keyword information?

I’m sure you know about adding your keywords to your meta tags. Perhaps you also know about including your keywords in your title tag, which is one of the most important places to put your keywords.

But even more to the point than all that is this… You must make sure to include your best keywords and phrases in the content of your website pages. The more relevant pages you have on your website, the better search engine-ready they will be.

You don’t have to be a master wordsmith to create a handful of good, conversational and informative pages for your pet sitting clients to enjoy that include your targeted keywords.

Make sure your code is clean and try to add content to your site on a regular basis. Add reviews, testimonials, specials, stories and photos. Google loves a site that is active and updated on a regular basis.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

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Josh Cary is a respected and well sought-after speaker and business consultant within the professional pet care industry. Since 2009, having grown his own pet sitting business, Josh provides his industry with the tools, support, and resources to build and maintain a thriving and respected pet business.

With a strong focus on digital marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), and website development, Josh’s one mission is to help you Get Found First through a professional and effective website.

This Post Has 5 Comments

  1. Thanks for sharing your expertise on this site. Can I ask a few questions? Is it okay to target a keyword phrase like “dog boarding+ a city/area” if the facility is not technically part of that city? Here’s my situation… Our mailing address city is Granada Hills (which is in the north San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles). I figure there is too much competition to try to target “dog boarding Los Angeles” so I’ve been focusing on the phrase, “dog boarding san fernando valley” and have gotten pretty good results. Now ideally I’d like to come up in search results for Santa Clarita as well. We are on the border of the San Fernando Valley just outside of Santa Clarita so a lot of our clients are Santa Clarita residents. I’m using Wix for my site and they make you keep the same title tag throughout the entire site. Currently mine says, “cage free dog boarding san fernando valley | my business name” Do you think I’m losing out on potential Santa Clarita clients with this title tag on all my pages? Would it be better to omit my business name and use something like, “cage free dog boarding san fernando valley & santa clarita” Would I need to put the service right next to “santa clarita” to increase my chances of ranking well? Should I create a page specifically for dog boarding santa clarita? Sorry so many questions. Any advice would be much appreciated. Thanks!

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