Today, I'm going to show you some of the best keyword research tips to find revenue-generating
topics for your affiliate site.
Stay tuned.
[music]
Not all traffic to your website is going to lead to affiliate commissions.
Some pages will go on to generate hundreds of dollars, others tens of thousands of dollars,
and some won't even generate a dime in commissions.
Now, the thing with affiliate marketing is that you shouldn't forcefully plug products
just for the sake of getting a commission.
People aren't going to click a link just because it's there.
You need to find topics that a) get searched in Google, YouTube or whatever search engine
you're optimizing for;
and b) topics where it's natural to plug product recommendations.
So before we get into the tactics, it's important you understand the concept of "searcher intent."
Search intent tells us about the purpose of a searcher's query and it'll determine whether
you can organically recommend products.
For example, if someone searches for "best protein powder," chances are they're in
the market to purchase a product but they want to weigh out the pros and cons,
look at different brands, and assess variables like price, quality, and so on.
As a result, these searchers are more likely to click an affiliate link in that post
and possibly make a purchase.
Whereas a topic like "what is protein powder" is more informational in nature.
So based on the keyword alone, we don't know whether the searcher is writing a research paper,
is exploring the world of supplements, or wants to know which type of protein powder to buy.
Simply put, this topic probably wouldn't generate many clicks to protein powder products because
the majority of people aren't in the market to buy it.
So with that in mind, we'll talk about four different types of affiliate keywords and
how they fit into an affiliate marketing site.
And these are:
general comparisons; branded comparisons;
product reviews; and T&A keywords.
Let's go through the value of each type and I'll show you how to find tons of opportunities
in virtually any affiliate niche.
Now, for the purposes of this tutorial, let's say we're working on a site that promotes products for babies.
Alright, the first type of keywords are general comparisons.
These are your typical "best [product name]" keywords.
For example, "best strollers," "best carriers," "best baby bottles," etc.
These types of keywords are super-easy to recommend products because that's essentially
what the post is about.
The keyword "best" implies that there are comparisons that need to be made.
On top of that, people searching for these "best [product name]" keywords are likely
in the market to purchase something in the near future.
Why else would they be looking for product comparisons?
So to find these keywords, you'll need a keyword research tool.
And obviously, I'll be using Ahrefs' Keywords Explorer.
So I'll start off by searching for a broad keyword like "baby."
Next, I'll go to the Phrase match report since we want to generate keyword ideas.
And since we're looking for general comparison keywords, I'll click the Include filter and type in
"best," which will show us keywords that include the words "best" and our seed keyword "baby."
And right away, we have a massive list of great comparison topics.
Now, since there are over 110,000 keyword ideas, we can narrow down the list to just
low-competition topics using the Keyword Difficulty filter.
So let's set a maximum Keyword Difficulty score to something low like 10.
And there are some great topics here that are worth considering.
Now, it's important to note that you shouldn't just go after keywords with low KD scores.
As you may have noticed, our set of low-difficulty topics are reviewing cheaper products like
"baby bath tubs," "lotions," and "wraps."
So while these can help you generate revenue, it'll be very much a volume's game.
Whereas products with a higher price tag, like "best car seats," will usually be more competitive.
But there's a way to actually find keywords that target higher ticket items while still
being relatively low-competition.
And these are topics that target a specific person or need.
And the general format for these keywords will be "best [product name] for [user]."
For example, "best car seat for small car" or "best carrier for newborn."
So let's go back to Keywords Explorer and this time, I'll enter a few higher-priced items
like "car seat," "stroller," and "crib."
Again, I'll go to the Phrase match report.
And finally, I'll click the Include filter and type in "best," "for."
Now, since the "All words" tab is chosen, it's going to show us keywords that include
one of our high-ticket products, and both of our included words.
And now you'll see keywords like "best convertible car seat for small cars," "best car seat for 5-year-old,"
and so on.
Now, a KD of 28 isn't exactly "low."
But if you click on the SERP button, you'll see that some pages are specifically targeting
"convertible seats for small cars."
And despite having lower website authority and fewer referring domains, they're still outranking
some of the more authoritative generic pages.
So this could potentially be a great keyword opportunity for our baby site.
Alright, the next type of keywords are branded comparisons.
These are keywords where a searcher wants to compare the differences between
two branded products.
For example, that might be "beats studio wireless vs bose qc35."
These types of keywords usually have lower search demand, but they convert very well
because the searcher has likely narrowed down their purchasing decision to a few products.
The easiest way to find these keywords is to create your own list of brands and put
it into a keyword research tool.
So assuming I wanted to find stroller comparisons, I could search for "bugaboo,"
"city select," and "uppababy."
Next, I'll go to the Phrase match report.
And again, I'll go to the Include search box,
and this time, I'll type in "vs.," since we're looking for comparison keywords for any
of these brands.
So something like "uppababy cruz vs. vista" would seem like a really low-hanging topic
seeing as these strollers retail for $500 to over $1,000!
And looking at the SERP, you'll see that the top ranking pages come from low DR sites
and have few referring domains.
So it looks like they can be beaten quite easily.
Now, if the company you've inputted makes multiple types of products like strollers,
car seats, and bottles, then it may be better to input model names as your seed keywords,
like "uppababy cruz," "uppababy vista," and so on.
Alright, the next type of keywords are detailed product reviews.
These would be keywords like "bose qc35 review" or "uppababy vista review."
Searchers that are looking for reviews on these topics are probably very close to
making a purchase.
They've researched multiple products, something caught their attention about a specific model,
and now they want a more in-depth review on it.
Now, just like the branded comparison keywords, search volumes will be lackluster to say the least.
So, if you're going to buy these products and actually review them, you'll want to make sure
you're reviewing products that people are actually searching for.
A simple way to find brands and models worth reviewing is to go to a popular Ecommerce site
and look through the different categories and brand names in their navigation.
So right now, I'm on buybuybaby.com and I'm looking at their "Shop all car seats" page.
Now, if I click on the dropdown for Brand, you'll see a list of brand names that you
can jot down.
So I've already gone ahead and done that and saved a list to my clipboard.
So I'll paste 10 of those into Keywords Explorer and run the search.
And let's head over to the Phrase match report and we'll hit the Include filter again, but this time
we'll search for "review" with an asterisk, which will act as a wildcard.
And now we know exactly which brands we'd want to review, and some specific models
which you now have keyword metrics for.
So by this point, you should have enough topics where it's easy to include product recommendations.
Now, the last type of keyword probably won't directly contribute to revenue, but it serves
an important purpose.
And these are T&A keywords, which stands for Trust and Authority.
In order to rank your pages, you need to have some kind of page-level and/or website authority.
Meaning, you need backlinks.
But unfortunately, all of the keyword types we've discussed so far are commercial in nature,
making it tougher to get links to these pages.
I mean, would you rather link to a post of 10 random kitchen knives or one on how to
sharpen a kitchen knife?
Probably the latter, right, seeing as it's non-commercial and provides more
objective value for your audience.
So creating non-commercial content with the intent to educate and inform your visitors is
helpful in two ways.
#1. You build trust with your audience;
and #2. You build authority through links.
And that's where T&A topics come into play.
The purpose of these topics are to provide useful information to your audience and
a linkable resource for bloggers.
So to find these keywords, let's search for a few seeds that are related to our baby site.
So I'll type in "parenting," "toddler," and "newborn."
Next, I'll go to the Questions report since these will all be informational topics.
Finally, I'll set a minimum Keyword Difficulty filter to something high like 40.
And the reason why I'm setting a high minimum KD is because Ahrefs' Keyword Difficulty metric
is based on unique websites linking to the top 10 pages.
And now we have a list of topics where we know the top 10 pages have lots of links
pointing at them.
You just need to decide whether the topics would be useful to your target audience, look
at the SERP, and then analyze some of the backlink profiles of the top-ranking pages.
Now, even though visitors to these pages may not be ready to make a purchase right then
and there, you can link internally to relevant money pages, which should give your revenue-
generating posts a boost in rankings.
And we have a full video on this SEO strategy, called "the middleman method," so I'll link
that up in the description.
So by now, you should be able to find more than enough topics to fill up your affiliate
site's content calendar.
But before you do that, I strongly recommend watching our full keyword research tutorial
where you'll learn how to assess ranking difficulty and choose topics based on traffic potential.
Which are two things you should be doing for every topic you target.
Now, if you enjoyed this video, then make sure to like, share, and subscribe for more
actionable SEO and marketing tutorials.
I'll see you in the next one.