On my previous post I discussed a bit about keyword research and some mistakes to avoid. After that post I had a reader, Stephanie ask me what Moz was, as I had mentioned it in that previous post. The simple answer is Moz is one of the best website competitive analysis tools you can find.
Why should you use?
When you are trying to make an effective post it is important to know what your competition is doing in order to rank higher than them. I only use the free features on Moz. It gives me enough information to know if I should continue to pursue a set of keywords or I should move on to the next one.
How to use
If the first page of a keyword Google search shows all of the competition has high DA, domain authority, and a high PA, page authority, then you should move on to the next set of keywords you found in Jaaxy. By high I mean anything higher than 50. I prefer only to compete against domain authorities less then 30. If you can find this with a page authority less than 5 you might have a great keyword.
Where is the Keyword listed?
But wait don’t stop there. Take a look at the titles of each of the articles for the keyword you just looked up. Is the keyword in the title of the competition’s article? If so they might be harder to outrank.
Keep digging deeper! Do you see the keyword in the meta description? I guess I should say what a meta description is. It is that little summery under the title of the article in search engine results. Below you see a result from a Google Search on “Uses for Google Analytics”. I just pulled the number one result. The title is “9 Awesome things you can do with Google Analytics 5”. The https line is the actual website link. Right below that you see a little description saying “Google Analytics 5 took the best features…” Guess what? That is the meta description.
Okay, so if the keyword you are trying to rank for is in that meta description don’t worry yet, it will just be a bit harder to outrank them. The two other numbers listed under that are the Moz results. It shows that this particular page has a PA of 56 with 46 backlinks! That is a lot of backlinks and a high PA. Also if you look right next to that you see a DA of 81. The combination of these two things could mean it is a bad choice to try and rank for “Uses for Google Analytics”. The good news on it is that they keyword you are trying to rank for would not be in the title or the meta description.
The last thing I like to look at then is clicking on the links of each of the top results in the search engines. You want to check the first and last paragraph. Is the keyword you are looking at there? If not they may not be optimized for that keyword. So you still might be able to outrank a high PA and DA for that exact term, especially if the other answers are all no.
Moz
Okay I talked a bit about how I use Moz in my keyword research. Here I have to say they do have a premium feature. I do not, nor have I ever, used the premium feature. There are no affiliate links in this article. Any link I put here is solely for your benefit. I will in no way benefit, other than knowing that I have helped someone.
Okay now for the nitty, gritty. I use Chrome as my web browser. I am not sure if the same tool is available for other browsers or not. With Chrome, you can add the “Moz Bar”. The Moz Bar is added to your toolbar to the right of your website address window. To activate it you just need to click on it and your search results will appear like the ones you see in this post.
Cost of Moz Bar
It is free to download and use. They do try to sell you on their other features. Once again I have not tried their other features so I am not sure if the additional costs are worth it in the end. Even if you chose to pay for the extra features I will not have any gains from you doing so. However, if you do choose to use the premium offers, please make sure you post below your own experiences and any value or lack of value that they may have.
Conclusion
First think I want to say is thank you to my reader Stephanie for asking me the question about Moz. It inspired me to write this post.
“THANK YOU STEPHANIE!!!!”
When doing keyword research don’t just stop at the overall traffic or the number of competing websites. Make sure you also look at the competition. The good thing is now days with the internet it is very easy to see what the competition is actually doing. I think one of the bests website competitive analysis tools out there is Moz, or Moz Bar, it really allows you to dive that little bit extra to beat your competition and get higher rankings. You can download the Chrome version of Moz Bar here for free. You can see my top recommendation here or all my recommendations here. As always please leave your comments, questions, and personal experiences below.
Very interesting! I never really gave the meta description much thought when it came to the keywords. I know I have been just looking for my keyword phrases and did not really check out the competition for it that extensively. Thank you for making me aware that I need to dig deeper to be more effective with my posts for better ranking!
Cheers
Nichole
Nichole,
I am very glad you found the post useful. Meta descriptions can be a powerful SEO tool. Every little bit helps. Digging deeper into the competition is important. It doesnt take that long but will pay off in the end. You are doing the work so why not get the most out of your article.
Marc
Hello mark,
Great article, i am just new in online business and i am really excited to learn more and earn money to get the financial freedom, i found your article so informative and helped me so much, i will go through moz and check it out after your article.
Good luck & keep it up
Mark,
Thank you for the comment. I am very happy it was able to help you. Moz is just one of the tools to help you in your research. Best of luck and let me know if I can help you.
Marc
Someone might ask what jaaxy is. I know what it is but some of your readers might not. I’m not saying to do an entire post on it, but in this post maybe a short side note in parentheses as to what it is.
I didn’t know what Moz was or the other information when a search result comes up. I may take a look at it.
Why use Moz? What does it benefit if you’ve got jaaxy and other word search tools? Does it give you some kind of an edge?
Thanks.
Rawl,
I have a link in the article about a post I did on Jaaxy, you can read it here. But to help others understand it is a great keyword research tool that you can use. They allow 30 free searches to get started.
Moz helps you take a look at the competition for your keyword that you want to rank for. I think you need to use more than just one keyword tool in order to give your research the edge. Moz is just one of those tools, and as I stated in the article, I only use the free services that they have.
Marc
Boy I really needed this information I am having a difficult time with low hanging fruit keywords for my site. So compared to Jaaxy does Moz give you a limited amount of keyword research as a free member where eventually you have no choice in upgrading to the next level? I have Firefox as my Brower so I will see if it is compatible.
Troy,
It is not a keyword developer, instead it allows you to research the competition. You can see how other websites rank their keywords and their authority. Yes you can use it with Firefox.
Marc
Thank you for an informative post. I do have one query though regarding the meta description. I have read that if you have the keyword anywhere in the first paragraph then that is good for SEO. However, with some of my posts I have my keyword at the end of the paragraph. This will that the snippet of text that shows on Google search will not show the keyword, will this make any difference for me? I look forward to hearing your answer to this.
Owain,
Thank you for the comment and the question. As long as it is in the first paragraph you are good. I actually use it in my meta description as well. I make my meta descriptions customized rather than letting All in One SEO pull my snippet. You should be fine, but it is better to include your main keyword somewhere in your meta description.
Let me know if you have any other questions. Thanks again.
Marc
Very good article. I’ve always noticed how much easier it is to get indexed just by keeping all of your keywords above the fold. I have ranked on keywords just by adding keywords in the title, tags, and first paragraph. After this, I just simply start writing on the topic without thinking about keyword placement.
Thanks for the Comment and Compliment. Yes it is easier to get indexed by putting your keywords in the first paragraph. The first Paragraph is normally above the fold. So you are correct. You are also correct that you should not worry about keywords while you are writing. Just write naturally. By doing so you will avoid keyword stuffing. You should also include your keywords once more in the closing paragraph.
Marc