SEO and Keywords for Health Coach Websites

How do you choose keywords for your health coach website? If youʼre like most health coaches, search engine optimization (SEO) and keyword research is a big mystery.  You know itʼs important if you want your website to get found and ranked well in the search engines. But you donʼt know where to begin.

In this article, Iʼm going to show you how to get started with SEO and keywords for your health coach website. It really can be as simple as a few steps.

Step 1 – Googleʼs Keyword Tool

The first step in choosing a good keyword phrase is to see if anyone is actually typing that phrase in the search engines. And to find that out, we use a free tool called Google Keyword Tool.

The key to using Googleʼs Keyword Tool is to keep it simple. If youʼve found Google Keyword Tool confusing in the past, you probably tried to use too many of its features.

Hereʼs how to keep it simple:

1. Go to Google.com and search for Google Keyword Tool. Click on the first result listed.
2. In the box titled “word or phrase,” type in the keywords or phrase you want information on.
3. Click the Search button.
4. Look at the results.

Youʼll see a listing of how many searches Google got last month for that keyword phrase, plus a lot of other related phrases. From these numbers, you can see what people are looking for and how most people word their searches.

For instance, you might want to write an article about the benefits of health coaching.  Which is a better keyword phrase: “health coach” or “health and wellness” or “health and fitness”?

Here are the results:
• health and fitness: 6.1 Million searches per month with low competition
• health and wellness: 301,000 searches per month with low competition
• health coach: 49,500 searches per month with high competition

Step 2 – Choose the Right Keyword

This is where most health coaches get stuck. Do you go after the keyword with the highest number of searches per month? Or the one with the lowest competition? Or is there another secret to choosing the right one?

Hereʼs how to keep it simple:

1. First, you want to consider the other keywords that are suggested by Google that are related to your search. You will typically get information on 100 additional keywords.  I usually find some really great suggestions here.
2. Always pick a keyword that is most related to the content you will use it with. If your article wonʼt focus on fitness, then “health and fitness” isnʼt a good keyword for you to use.
3. Use a localized version whenever it makes sense. That means use the name of your town, city, state, or province. For instance, it would be really hard to get a high ranking in the search engines for the keyword “health coach.” But it would be a lot easier to rank well for the keyword “health coach Atlanta” or “health coach Ontario”.

Once youʼve done the three steps above, thereʼs one more thing to consider.

The easiest way to rank high in the search engines is to choose a keyword phrase that has a low number of searches per month. Generally speaking, the lower the number of searches, the less competition there is.

So in the example above, I looked at the other 100 recommended keywords from Google. From that list, I came up with “natural health coach” and “natural health coach Chattanooga TN.”

“Natural health coach” only got 73 searches last month in Google. But itʼs extremely relevant, and has a lot less competition. So I have a much better chance of ranking well in the search engines with it.

Step 3 – Use Your Keywords

To keep this article non-technical and easy to use, we are going to assume that your web designer will do the technical SEO part to optimize your website with your chosen keywords. All you need to do it give those keywords to them.

If you are writing an article for your blog, you simply need to use the keyword phrase you chose in your article title, URL, page title, and within the content of your text. If you are using WordPress, you might also use the keyword in the category or tag you assign to the article.

Summary

Spending 5 minutes researching phrases in Google Keyword Tool can make the difference between ranking well in the search engines or not getting ranked at all. The steps above are the same ones I use regularly for my own site when writing web copy or articles.

SEO and keywords for health coach websites can be easy with just a few simple steps. Try it, keep it simple, and see your website ranking rise in the search engines.