A long tail keyword is a phrase that is generally made from three to five words. Since these keywords are more specific than generic terms, they allow you to target niche demographics. These keywords are also less competitive than generic keywords because they are designed to better reflect how people make queries. With long tail keywords, you are able to attract more high-quality traffic to your website which is more likely to lead to conversions.

During the customer journey, long tail keywords become more important as their journey evolves. Typically, users begin with a simple search and as the search engines guide them to solving their pain point, their searches become more detailed. This is where long tail keywords will become important to separate your brand from your competition. 

BrightEdge Generative Parser reveals that as of January 2025, 35% of AI Overview results now handle multiple search intents simultaneously, with projections showing this could reach 65% by Q1 2025. This means users increasingly combine multiple aspects of their journey into single, detailed searches - making long tail keywords that address specific combinations of needs more valuable than ever.

Are long tail keywords important for SEO?

Over 70% of search queries are made using long tail keywords. This has become particularly prevalent with people using voice search more often. People now generally enter queries into Google using the same types of phrasing as they do when they are speaking with a friend. This is called natural language. Using long tail keywords, therefore, makes your content more likely to draw these users into your website and begin the process of the buyer’s journey. In addition, generative AI such as that found in Google’s AI Overviews are expanding the ways long tail keywords can be used to pinpoint conversational search patterns. As AI enables users to combine multiple intents, the way they use long tail keywords becomes vital in earning citations from these engines. You can learn more about Google SGE in our Ultimate Guide to AI Overviews!

Long tail keywords being comprised of a few words makes them much more specific. This means that both users and site owners generally receive better results. Brands receive traffic that is more closely aligned with their content, which will improve their ability to effectively bring new customers into the sales cycle. Customers also receive content that is more closely aligned with their objective, making them happier.

The specificity of long tail keywords also means that there is less competition for each keyword phrase. Brands can better customize their specific keywords for what they provide users.

Long Tail Keywords: Strategic Importance in AI Search

The rise of AI-powered search has fundamentally shifted how users interact with search engines, making long tail keywords more valuable than ever for SEO practitioners. According to BrightEdge Generative Parser data, search queries that trigger AI Overviews have become increasingly conversational, growing from an average of 3.1 words in June 2024 to 4.2 words by year's end. This shift reflects a growing user comfort with more natural, detailed search patterns that align perfectly with long tail keyword strategies.

For SEO practitioners, this evolution presents a unique opportunity. Rather than competing directly with major brands for broad keywords, long tail optimization allows websites to earn citations in AI search results by providing complementary, specific information. BrightEdge Generative Parser data shows that AI Overviews are now pulling from a significantly broader range of sources - up to 151% more unique websites for complex B2B queries and 108% more for detailed product searches. This means that websites optimizing for specific, detailed long tail phrases have an increased chance of being cited in comprehensive AI-generated responses.

This democratization of citations in AI search results means that digital marketers and SEO’s can focus on developing deep, specific content that answers particular aspects of user queries, rather than trying to compete for broad, highly competitive terms. By targeting the natural language patterns that users increasingly employ in their searches, websites can position themselves as valuable sources of specific information that AI systems will reference when building comprehensive responses to user queries.

Long tail keyword example

Depending on the topics your site creates content around and how many pages you have, you will want to collect a pretty large relevant list of long tail keywords that you can use throughout your site. It's not realistic, or SEO-healthy, for you to optimize your site for the same keywords on every page, therefore you'll need a running list of great keywords.

If you're a local brand looking for local foot traffic, adding "near me" to your long tail keywords is a good practice. For example, long tail keywords including "organic coffee shops near me" or "buy Guiana chestnut plant near me" are both good examples of when a user is at the final stages of their buyer journey searching via long tail queries. Using specific keywords like "organic coffee shop" and "Guiana chestnut plant" will help you to rank better as they're further from common keywords bigger brands are trying to rank for.

Researching long tail keywords

1. Build your buyer personas and map them to customer journeys.
2. Use this information to help you identify topics that your personas will want to see at each stage of their journey.
3. Leverage your own query research via search engines by typing a simple search into the search bar and see what keywords autofill into long tail keywords. These keywords are what users are searching for and you should optimize for them. You can see to the right that we typed "best seo" into Google. Long tail keywords autofilled to show us what users are most often looking for when it comes to "best seo."
4. Use keyword technology, like the BrightEdge Data Cube X, to identify the relevant keywords that you can best rank for that also have high traffic rates.
5. Monitor your success with your keywords, looking closely at your traffic and engagement rates. This will tell you how many people you are attracting and how well your content is answering the need of their query.

Long-tail keywords are valuable tools for those looking to optimize their content and attract more relevant visitors. The better you are able to better understand your users, the better you will be able to meet their needs and bring in new customers for your organization.

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In SEO management, competitive analysis means identifying the major market players who compete with your content for organic traffic. The result of your competitive analysis can be seen in BrightEdge Share of Voice and Data Cube Score.

Demo Share of Voice For A Competitive Deep Dive

Why is it important to do a competitive analysis?

It is easy to view SEO and marketing as a competition between you and the SERP – focusing your efforts on raising rank so that you attract more attention and therefore more conversions. However, it is important to remember that your real competition is the other businesses in your industry. They are the ones fighting for those same top spots and the same customers.

With your competitors publishing new content, SERP is constantly changing. Finding which competitors outrank your content in this competitive, changing landscape is critical. Tracking them as a part of your marketing strategy will offer you valuable insights such as:

• Key competitors you might have often overlooked
• Content types or keywords that are helping competitors bring in customers that you are neglecting
• SEO techniques that are helping them build their rank and authority that you are not taking advantage of, such as how your competitors content pages are structured
• Areas that your competitors are falling short, where you can come in and dominate

How do you find competitors?

There are two main techniques that you can use to start identifying industry competitors.

1. Use Google site operators. By using the related: “your website” command, you can ask Google which sites it views as being the most similar to your own website.
2. Take advantage of the state-of-the-art BrightEdge technology. Use BrightEdge’s comparative analysis tool, powered by Share of Voice, to undercover previously unknown competitors and receive a detailed analysis of how the competitor ranks for particular keywords. You can also map out competitors for each segment of your business and do competitive benchmarking to see how you measure up at the beginning and end of your campaigns.

How do you write a competitive analysis?

Once you have a good idea of who your competitors are, you then need to take the steps necessary to analyze their campaigns, compare them to yours, and find areas where you need to improve or are in a position to outmaneuver the competitor and bring in more customers.

1. Establish your current position compared to these competitors. See the areas where their site ranks higher and attracts more customers and compare it to your own to find points of weakness where you can improve.
2. Monitor your overall Share of Voice to see how it compares to your competitors.
3. Begin campaigns to fill in your gaps and improve your standings against the other sites.
4. Measure your progress in terms of rankings and Share of Voice to see how well you have met your goals.

Competitors can offer you a considerable amount of insight into areas where your site and content strategy might be lacking and where you have the potential to start to dominate the SERPs. Taking the time to do competitor analysis can help you better position your web properties and bring in more customers than others in your industry.

Why is mobile optimization important?

Customers are increasingly using their mobile devices to engage with brands. More than half of all searches are performed on mobile, and customers spend an average of 3.3 hours a day on their devices. During this time, they are reading content, watching videos and connecting with friends and brands on social media. It is easy to see why brands need to be prepared for mobile.

It is important to remember, however, that mobile customers often have different objectives than desktop ones. They often are looking for information such as a business’s contact number, directions or similar types of content.

They are also using a significantly smaller screen than desktops. When brands simply create a mobile site by shrinking their existing site, they are providing these customers with a poor user experience, which will hurt their ability to engage and convert these users.

What features do I need to think about when creating a mobile-friendly site?

You need to think about how your content is displayed and which pieces are featured and easy to find. You also need to think about navigation for customers, who are using their fingers to touch small buttons on small screens. Finally, you need to consider how your content is formatted to ensure that it will be easy to read and appreciate on the mobile screen.

How do you build a mobile-first website?

1. Use at least a 14px font to help your users on mobile easily read your content, rather than having to zoom.
2. Make sure all images are mobile-friendly, meaning they are crisp and clear, even when shrunk to fit on the small screen.
3. Monitor the types of content that your mobile users are most likely to use, and make that content easy for them to find.
4. Use an accordion-style menu or similar mobile-friendly menu option that will help users move easily around your site.
5. Minimize the use of buttons when possible, such as scrolling through articles instead of clicking through multiple pages. When they are needed, make sure they are spaced far enough apart that users can easily click them, rather than worrying about hitting the wrong one.
6. Continually test your mobile site to find new ways to help your mobile users experience your full brand.

Mobile users are increasingly becoming a significant part of the online experience. Brands need to make sure that their sites are ready for these users and they are able to give them the user experience they need.

What exactly is the robots.txt protocol?

Robots.txt protocol allows you to guide spiders on your website so they only crawl the pages you want them to crawl. Although this might seem contrary to the goals of SEO, preventing the spiders from exploring some of your content can actually be beneficial. For example, this might apply when you are building a new website, or if you have multiple versions of a page on your site and you do not want to get penalized for duplicate content.

The origins of the protocol can be traced back to the mid-1990s when early webmasters began to have concerns about what spiders visited their websites. The idea has grown to meet the needs of modern web designers and the current version will be accepted by the spiders sent from the major search engines.

Do I need robots.txt?

Since robots.txt tells search engine spiders not to crawl certain pages, some site owners might mistakenly think that this is a good way to keep certain information private. Unfortunately, although honest spiders, such as those from Google or Bing, will respect the protocol, there are plenty of malicious spiders that will not, and thus your information can still be stolen.

It is also possible for the information to end up indexed in other ways, such as another site linking to the content. If you have personal information, you should have much stronger security, such as through a firewall.

Where should robots.txt be located?

When using robots.txt, it is a good idea to be familiar with the basic symbols. A ‘*’ tells the spider that this command applies to all web crawlers. You can replace this with the name if a certain bot if you only want to prevent certain search engines from indexing a page. A ‘/’ will indicate that the rule applies to all the pages on a particular site. This symbol can be replaced with the name of a particular directory or page.

For example, if you want to tell all web crawlers to ignore all the pages on your site, then your command will look like:

If you want to tell all web crawlers to ignore a particular directory, the command will look like:

If you want to tell all web crawlers to ignore certain pages, you will write:

If you wanted to block only a particular bot from your site, then you modify the user-agent and write:

Finally, if you want to allow only one web crawler and block the rest, you will write:

The first part of the command tells Google it can explore the whole site, since there is nothing next to the disallow section. The second part of the command speaks to the rest of the bots, telling them to stay away.

It is a good idea to keep the following guidelines in mind:

• You always have to write robots.txt in lower case
• The commands must be located in the top-level directory of the web server
• You can only have one ‘disallow’ for each URL on the site
• Subdomains that have a common root domain need different robots.txt files
• Do not use spaces to separate the parameters of the command

Using the protocol is relatively straightforward, but simple typos can easily derail the commands. After you write your protocal, make sure to use the Google testing tool to see how the search engine giant will interpret your protocol.

When used wisely, robots.txt can be a valuable resource and help you control what and when search engine spiders explore your offerings.

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Google Phantom III update supposedly took place in 2015 and addressed the issue of low-quality content. It was never officially announced as an update by Google, but since the update is largely based upon the conjecture of the websites who noticed the differences in rankings and traffic, this update has been referred to as the Phantom III update.

Was Phantom III a real update?

Beginning around November 19, 2015, there were a number of reports that suggested that Google had done a search ranking update. Although the reports are unconfirmed by Google that does not necessarily mean that nothing happened. Since the update is largely based upon the conjecture of the websites who noticed the differences in rankings and traffic, this update has been referred to as the Phantom III update.

What were the past phantom updates?

In April and May 2015, there was another update that Google confirmed about two weeks after the reports of changes had been made. This update has been termed the Phantom II update, or the Quality Update. The first Phantom occurred back in 2013. Both of these updates focused heavily on penalties for poor content and unnatural link profiles. Websites that used the same anchor text, sites that continually link back and forth to each other or otherwise built a link profile that was clearly unnatural, were all hit. Sites with duplicate or poor content, designs that are not user-friendly and sites that were riddled with technical problems also saw some damage.

What did the Google Phantom update target?

Like many other updates over the past few years, Phantom III was also interested in targeting low-quality content. The key difference between Panda and the Phantom III update, according to SEO Glenn Gabe, is that the Phantom III update seemed to focus more on the user experience. Sites that had popups or modal windows that were hard to click off as you scrolled through the content were often penalized. Sites that used the sidebars and other space around the main content to promote unorganized additional information, rather than clearly relevant opportunities, also saw penalties. Finally, websites that attempted to force visitors to click through numerous pages to view an entire article, just so that each page could load new ads, also saw penalties.

How do I avoid a Google SEO Phantom III update penalty?

1. Focus on the user experience. Make sure that you plan the layout of the site to help the user to better navigate and engage with your content easily, not make things more difficult for them.
2. Do not use excessive ads on the page.
3. Monitor your backlink profile to make sure that you are building quality, organic backlinks
4. Make it easy for people to physically read your content-- so remove challenging popups and do not make people click through multiple pages to read a new paragraph of your content.
5. Do a site audit regularly to find any potential technical problems so they can be rectified right away.

The Phantom III update definitely helps to keep site owners on their toes as they are forced to focus even more on quality and the user experience. Google has made it clear that they care more about the user experience than promoting particular brands, and site owners need to follow the same path.

Google Panda update was introduced in 2011 and was designed to punish thin or poor content. The filter that came in the update was aimed at stopping poor content that had managed to rank highly for certain queries despite having little to offer readers. From 2011 through 2015, Google updated the filter periodically, which resulted in new sites being penalized. Beginning in January 2016, however, Google announced that Panda was now a core part of their algorithm. Although Google has confirmed that this does not mean the filter will be updated in real time, it is used to help measure the quality of a site when determining its rank.

How does Google Panda work?

Google Panda penalties occur when websites manage to rank highly despite thin or poor content that does not serve the end user. We have seen penalties occur for:

• Duplicate content
• Pages that have a poor-content-to-ad ratio
• Pages with excessively general information
• Content that offers little information

When we analyzed the Google Panda update 4.1 that occurred in the fall of 2014, we found that the update even impacted a number of well-known sites, such as:

• Independent.co.uk, likely for a poor content-to-ad ratio
• Answers.com, likely for generic content
• CheaperThanDirt.com, likely for thin, uninformative content

On the other hand, pages like NYTimes.com and OrganicGardening.com benefited from the update because they already focused on highly informative content with a low ad ratio.

How do I recover from a Panda penalty?

If you are hit with a Google Panda update penalty, you will notice a steady decline in traffic, followed by stabilization. It is important to note that if you are hit by Panda, it will impact your entire site. So, if you notice a drop across all of your keywords, it is likely that you were hit by Panda.

Google offers this traffic report as an example of a site that has been hit by Panda.

If you notice this drop here is how to recover.

1. Review your site for duplicate pages or extra pages that offer little to the user. Look for duplicate Title Tags as a potential indicator of duplicate content.
2. Eliminate or update these pages so they provide value for the reader
3. Use robots.txt on pages that are duplicate but needed on your page
4. Make sure your site offers a positive user experience, and does not contain excessive ads
5. When Google refreshes the algorithm, you should start to see your site’s rank improve.

What was the main purpose of the Panda update?

As you move forward with your website, you want to make sure that you produce content that the Panda filter will like and will not threaten your site in the future. Here is how to produce Panda-friendly content:

• Each page should have a purpose for the end-user, not just to rank for a particular keyword. You should have a particular buyer persona and a particular stage of the buyer’s journey in mind to help you produce the level of quality that your audience, and Google, want to see
• Regularly check for duplicate content
• Keep an eye on your ad ratio to make sure that your load time and your user experience are not hurt by excessive ads
• Use Google Webmaster tools to make sure the website is functioning optimally and providing the best possible user experience.

Since 2011, the Google Panda update has worked to provide users with high-quality content while minimizing the presence of websites that do not provide the answers the user sought. Regularly monitor your traffic to watch for any potential hits of this penalty and always focus on quality and the user experience when producing content moving forward.

What is the RankBrain Algorithm?

RankBrain is a major part of the Google algorithm that uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to learn about users and how they respond to the search results, particularly on previously unseen queries. The program watches how people respond, learns the meaning behind the query and the information that people seek.

This technology was developed to help Google process the nearly 15% of queries entered each day that the search engine has never seen before. Rankbrain was launched in October 2015 and has since then risen to be the third most important ranking signal. Now, RankBrain is involved in most queries entered into Google.

Why is RankBrain important?

Although RankBrain was developed to focus on the completely unique queries seen daily, Google has indicated that this part of the algorithm is now a critical part of organic search. According to Google senior research scientist, Greg Corrado, taking away the program would be hinder the user experience so much that it would be about the equivalent of failing to index half of the pages on Wikipedia.

How do I optimize for RankBrain?

Although Google has not explained how exactly RankBrain impacts search, it is likely that it has a role in helping the algorithm understand content to create more accurate results. To keep your content ranking well, use the following steps:

1.    Focus on creating high-value content that explores topics in depth and answers customer questions

2.    Use schema markups to make sure that it is easy for the algorithm to understand your content. Although this does not currently seem to impact ranking, it is possible it will in the future if Google introduces more AI into its algorithm.

3.    Monitor your traffic and conversion rates to watch for dips or rises that can tell you how well your efforts are succeeding.

RankBrain was an exciting development because it introduced AI into the Google algorithm. It is likely that this trend will continue in the future, as the search engine works to make their algorithm smarter to maximize the user experience. Preparing now with user-friendly content and machine-friendly markups will ensure your content is ready for any algorithm changes.

What was the updated Google algorithm for mobile?

The mobile update was launched on April 21, 2015 by Google and targeted sites that were not mobile-friendly. Unlike most other updates, marketers and site owners had a warning several weeks in advance that the update was going to take place, giving them the opportunity to make sure their site was compliant before the update went live.

Under the new mobile update, sites that are not mobile-friendly will have their rankings penalized. This ensures that mobile users receive results that will work well with their devices, improving the user experience.

Complete Your Mobile SEO Strategy

Why was the mobile update important?

The mobile update was in response to the growing prevalence of mobile in the lives of users. The year 2015 actually also saw the number of searches on mobile pass the number of searches on desktop. Customers are also increasingly using mobile for everything from searches to shopping-- mobile is now an estimated 30 percent of all U.S. e-commerce.

How do I avoid a mobile-update penalty?

The key to avoiding a mobile-update penalty is ensuring that your site complies with Google’s guidelines for mobile sites. You can test how mobile-friendly your site is by using Google’s mobile-friendly test, which will tell you if you have a compliant design.

In general, these are the points you need to cover in a mobile website:

1. Have a mobile-friendly layout. This can be achieved with either a responsive design website, which will automatically configure itself to fit the size of the device it is on, or it can be done with designated mobile website.
2. Make sure that all of the videos on your site are compatible with mobile devices.
3. If you are using a designated mobile site, make sure that you do not have any faulty redirects and that every page on your desktop site corresponds with a mobile page.
4. Make sure your pages do not appear as 404s for users on mobile
5. Do not use interstitials or overlays that cover portions of the intended content, as they can be very challenging to get rid of on mobile devices.
6. If you use a mobile version of your website, make sure that links on the pages link to other pages of the mobile site
7. Make sure the content is readable and usable for mobile users. This means not using a small font size and making sure any touch buttons are spaced far apart and easy to use with fingers.
8. Think about the purpose of your visitor on mobile and design the page for their use. If your visitors often use mobile to look up your phone number or address, make this information easy for people to find on the front page.

Creating a mobile-friendly website is critical in the age of the mobile update, but it is a valuable part of any marketing strategy. It improves your ability to engage with users on-the-go. With an increasing number of visitors using mobile devices for search and shopping, sites that are hard to use on mobile can lose you customers regardless of the update. Make sure your site is mobile-friendly today.

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What is the Google Penguin update?

Google Penguin update was designed to reduce ‘web spam’ and encourage high-quality content for users. Since its initial release in April 2012, Google Penguin has released several updates. With each Google Penguin update, the algorithm once again scans websites for potential violations, opening up the possibility that brands might be penalized.

On January 10, 2016, Google released the latest Google Penguin update, which made Penguin run in real time. This means you can recover almost immediately once you make the corrections necessary to your page.

How does Google Penguin work?

You can generally tell if your page has been hit by a Penguin penalty by looking at Google Webmaster Tools and monitoring your traffic. Since Penguin is a page-specific update, you will notice a sharp drop for specific keywords. Google offered this traffic report as an example of a page hit by Penguin.

How do I avoid a Penguin update penalty?

The Penguin penalty largely focuses on identifying poor-quality websites based upon backlinks. Google’s algorithm works on the assumption that quality sites link to other quality sites while poor sites generally link to other poor sites. In other words, when you have websites that Google already trusts linking to you, it helps to boost your rankings. On the other hand, if you are linking to spam sites, then there is a good chance that the algorithm will not trust you either.

Google particularly wanted to penalize the sites that artificially boosted their rankings by buying links from link farms or other spam sites.

The best way to avoid a Penguin update penalty is to focus on cultivating positive backlinks. You can do this by writing content that people believe will help their users. When a site links to you, they are entrusting you with their visitors, so to get high-quality sites to provide you with backlinks, you need to be producing similar quality content.

You also want to regularly review your backlink profile. Even though there is still disagreement about the ability of spam sites to lower your quality rating by linking to your site, the possibility remains. Use Google’s disavow tool to let the search engine know that you are not interested in these links to make sure you do not incur any penalties.

To review, here is how to avoid a Google Penguin update penalty:

1. Get rid of any backlinks you have purchased or otherwise illicitly gained
2. Focus on creating high-quality content and distributing it to attract the desired backlinks
3. Regularly monitor your backlink profile to quickly find undesirable links
4. Disavow any poor-quality links to protect your site’s reputation

Although Google Penguin update can look intimidating, particularly if you get hit by the penalty and see your traffic drop drastically. Taking the necessary steps to correct the problem, however, can help you quickly recover, particularly since the update is now run in real time.

Following Google, three of the most important search engines globally are:

1. Naver
2. Baidu
3. Yandex

Marketers need to become familiar with these engines if they want to successfully market to customers in those world regions where local prefered search engines have a significant market share. 

Why do I need to understand world search engines?

As brands increasingly go overseas and enter new markets, it is important to realize that Google is not the only dominant search engine in the world. Although Google is available in most countries, there are local, preferred search engines in many regions. If brands want to successfully market to customers in these areas, they will need to become familiar with these world search engines. 

Image source: Technode.com

What is Naver?

Naver is the number one search engine in South Korea, far outpacing Google locally. Naver used to be powered by Yahoo’s Overture System, but it then built and launched its own keyword advertising system. It is now a leading search engine that has a reputation for innovation. Anyone who wants to expand into South Korea will need to be familiar with this search engine.

Naver was built around the Korean language and culture. US-based sites should develop a version of their website catering to this culture, rather than just translating their text. Naver also draws heavily from user-generated content in their Knowledge IN area as well as from the social community Cafe. Brands that want to succeed in Korea should focus on building their presence in these areas.

What is Baidu?

Baidu is the number one search engine in China and the fifth most popular site in the world. There have been some controversies with Baidu in the past, including discussions about intellectual property. Regardless, it is important for those expanding into the Chinese region to familiarize themselves with this search engine.

Baidu punishes harshly for duplicate content, even more so that other major search engines. It also has a strong preference for simplified Chinese characters over traditional characters or romanized words. Baidu also strongly ranks content based on quality, so working with a native Chinese speaker will be necessary for most brands to avoid word-usage errors.

It is also important to note that Baidu is not just a search engine. It also offers a range of services, including Baidu Encyclopedia, Baidu Government Information Search and Baidu Games.

What is Yandex?

Yandex is the largest search engine in Russia and the surrounding region. It offers many similar services as Google, but there are also some key differences. For example, Yandex does not index pages as fast, forcing brands to focus more on long-term success with this search engine, rather than immediate results.

On the other hand, like Google, Yandex has a strong emphasis on quality content, quality linking and keyword relevance.

Being familiar with the other world search engines can help brands that want to expand their offerings overseas. While Google has a firm hold on search in the United States, in some other countries native search engines take priority.

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