If we place the term targeted marketing under a microscope to get a snapshot of its DNA, we’ll likely find a string of keywords linked together in a cohesive chain. Increasing the magnification a few degrees further, we see that the real building blocks of SEO are words that are key designators. To help explain this, you need only to look at a book on your desk. If you have a book of non-fiction handy, flip to the back. Chances are, the book you’re holding has an index at the rear of the text. What you see before you is a list of keywords, that is to say, words that are essential for the definition of the material in the book. If you think of a book as a living thing, the key words are the DNA used to build the book.
The funny thing about us humans is that when we invented the car we didn’t re-invent the wheel – we as a species tend to build on what came before. And that’s why websites are in some respects no different than books. Websites that have been properly crafted, and at the grave risk of offending some of my many graphic artists friends, I should be clear that being properly crafted has nothing to do with color palettes or strategic patches of white space balanced with a dash of negative space, rather, the accolade of properly crafted is all about the words. Simply put, properly crafted means well-crafted content, and you achieve this vaulted status by conducting Keyword Research. A book on a subject like The Battle of Vimy Ridge will have topics such as Artillery and Infantry that help construct the breadth of the subject, and if a text on the battle of Vimy Ridge is to be considered well crafted, it will not have topics like Sponge Bob and Fender Guitars.
How does this transcend to SEO? Let’s say you’ve just started a new online business. Before you can expect a binary tidal wave of interest, the most important step at the beginning of your venture should have been the keywords research, because if you employ the wrong set of keywords, all your good intentions and hard work will likely provide foggy search results of the See Also variety, or at the very worst, result in a complete no show.
So, there’s the first step – set an initial index of keywords. It’s your business; this should be a no brainer. Up next, we’ll track down the exact phraseology used by searchers.
Have a question and need quick answers? 
