Getting a website to rank high in the search engines for a keyword that results in enough of the right kind of traffic to convert into sales requires a lot of information. Professional Internet marketers using search engine marketing tools gather this information. There are many tools that do many different things. From determining potential keywords and their search volumes to seeing what kind of links a competitor has, it is all gathered using tools designed specifically for Internet marketing.

The Role of Keywords in Internet Marketing

Internet marketing is done in many different ways. Whether through search engine optimization, pay-per-click marketing, or banner advertising, they are all based around keywords. The first step in any Internet marketing campaign is to find the best potential keywords. Different Internet marketing professionals have different viewpoints on which kind of keywords are the best to go after, but they all agree that the process begins with keywords. If the wrong keywords are utilized to base any marketing campaign on, it will struggle to be successful.  To help make sure good keywords are chosen, professionals use tools designed to tell them the different combinations of words and phrases that people have searched for before, along with the average monthly search volume of each one and the level of competitiveness of each.

Spying on the Competition

One key way to get a website to the top of the search engines is to look at the website currently in that spot and determine what is being done differently with that website compared to the one being worked on. Again, tools play a large role in that process. One key factor in ranking in Google and other search engines are links from other websites pointing to the website trying to be ranked. In order to find out where competitors are getting links from, professional online marketers use search engine marketing tools that are capable of telling them where the links to that competitor are coming from. This allows the marketer to try to get the same links, thus leveling the playing field. It takes some time to get the rankings, but the right tools can make it easier.