How Do You Choose the Right Keywords for Your Website?

You choose the right keywords by starting with the words your customers actually type into Google, not the words your industry uses. Write down the plain-English questions and phrases people use when they need what you sell, check a free tool to see which ones get searched, then match one main keyword to each page of your website. Specific phrases with your location in them usually beat big generic terms, because they are easier to rank for and the people searching them are closer to buying.

Here is how to work through it step by step.

Start with your customers, not your jargon

Most businesses guess keywords based on how they describe themselves. A physio might target “musculoskeletal therapy” when patients are searching “neck pain treatment near me”. Before you open any tool, list the questions customers ask you on the phone, in emails and in person. Those questions are keywords. So are the words they use to describe your services, even when those words are technically wrong.

A good test: ask a friend outside your industry how they would search for your business. Their answer is often closer to reality than yours.

Check what people actually search

Once you have a rough list, sanity-check it with free tools:

• Google itself. Start typing a phrase and note the autocomplete suggestions, then scroll to the “People also ask” and related searches sections. These are real queries from real people.
• Google Keyword Planner. Free with a Google Ads account. It shows rough monthly search volumes for Australia so you can see which phrases get traffic.
• Google Search Console. If your site is already live, this shows the exact queries you appear for now, including ones you never targeted on purpose.

You are not looking for perfect numbers. You are looking for the difference between a phrase nobody searches and one that gets steady, relevant traffic.

Go specific: long-tail beats popular

“Accountant” gets far more searches than “small business accountant for tradies Penrith”, but you will never outrank the big directories and franchises for it, and most people searching it are not your customer anyway. Longer, more specific phrases (often called long-tail keywords) have less competition and much clearer intent. Someone searching “WooCommerce store not syncing stock” has a problem they want solved this week.

A healthy keyword list is mostly long-tail phrases, with one or two competitive head terms you chip away at over time.

Add your location

For most Australian small businesses, location keywords do the heavy lifting. “Web designer” is a global fight. “Web designer Penrith” is a local one you can win. Include your suburb, city or region in the keywords for your key service pages, and make sure the page content backs it up by genuinely talking about the area you serve.

Match one main keyword to one page

This is the step most people skip. Every important page on your site should target one main keyword, used naturally in the page title, the heading and the opening paragraph. If two pages chase the same keyword, they compete with each other and Google gets confused about which to show. If one page chases five keywords, it usually ranks for none.

Map it out simply: home page for your brand and main service, one page per service with its own keyword, and blog posts for the question-style searches. That structure is also just good web design, which is why we bake it into every site we build. You can see how we approach this on our services page.

Check the intent before you commit

Before locking in a keyword, search it yourself. If the results are all how-to articles, Google has decided that query wants information, and a sales page will struggle to rank for it. Write a blog post instead and link it to your service page. If the results are all local businesses, your service page is the right tool. Keyword research is not a one-off job either; revisit it every few months, and be realistic about how long SEO takes to work, as we covered in our other insights. For ongoing keyword strategy and SEO campaigns, our sister agency Defyn Digital lives and breathes this work.

Need a hand?

If you would like help choosing keywords and building pages that rank for them, we are happy to talk it through. Call us on 02 9834 4119 or get in touch.