Identifying keywords for organic search rankings is easier now than a decade ago owing to advanced tools. A key factor in choosing a keyword is competition — the number and quality of sites already ranking for that term.
How can we know if a keyword is worth the effort?
I’ll address that question in this post.
Keyword Difficulty
All leading search-engine-optimization platforms offer a competition metric — a method of filtering keyword lists according to the difficulty of ranking on page 1 of Google.
Semrush suggests selecting keywords with difficulty below “14” as they are the easiest to rank for. Semrush uses multiple factors for that metric but most are likely related to backlinks — the number and authority of linking pages.
Moreover, Semrush includes “SERP-related qualities” for each keyword when calculating its difficulty. For example, a keyword that generates a featured snippet is relatively more difficult, per Semrush.
Click image to enlarge.
Ahrefs, another platform, recommends keywords with a difficulty below “10.”
To calculate, Ahrefs counts the number of referring domains linking to the top-ranking pages. No other calculation is needed, Ahrefs asserts.
On SE Ranking, keywords below a “9” difficulty are “Surefire” and “10-19” are “Effortless.” Hence both should be doable for newer sites. SE Ranking relies on its internal evaluation of ranking pages’ domain authority when calculating keyword difficulty.
WebCEO has a more transparent approach for identifying...
Read Full Story: https://www.practicalecommerce.com/seo-how-to-assess-keyword-difficulty
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