1. How to build your small business keyword list

2. One of the keys to having an efficient online reputation management strategy is having a set of company keywords to use both in your search engine optimization across your different web properties and also as part of your monitoring strategy.

3. Every small business should have a list of about 10-20 keywords with phrases that related to their business that they can use as an easy reference to copy and paste without wasting any time.

4. Here are some tips on how to generate your small business’s company keywords list:

5. Names

6. * Your Business Name e.g. Sam’s Tuition Center

7. * Your Personal Name e.g. Sam Matthew Hanes

8. * Your Employees Names e.g. Sarah C. Bailey

9. Local Search Keywords – this involves adding a town/city/state location to your keywords

10. * Business Name – this helps to differentiate your business if you have different branches across a state or the country e.g. Sam’s Tuition Center Cambridge Ohio

11. * Product Name – e.g. Dansko Shoes in Charlotte

12. * Services e.g. Lasik Surgery San Diego

13. * Niche e.g. Jewelry shops in New York

14. Additional resources

15. One of the best ways to get additional keywords is to use the Google Keyword Tool and the Google Suggest Tool.

16. Google Keyword tool – sign in with your Gmail account to get more variety of results.

17. Then type in your keywords, chose the exact match phrase option and make sure the country setting is set to the United States.

18. The number of searches for your keywords will appear and underneath them will be related keywords.

19. Look at the related keywords and see which keywords have larger search volume.

20. This will help you know which keywords should take priority in your list.

21. For example if you run a day care center and your keyword “day care in Atlanta” had 500 searches per month and one of the related keywords that came up was “day care center Atlanta” which has 890 searches per month, then the latter keyword would be the best choice to use in your list.

22. Google Suggest tool- using Google search engine, type in your keywords and as you enter each character Google will start suggesting words to you based on popular search queries.

23. Take note of search terms that Google Suggests to you and use them as part of your list.

24. So that your results are not skewed with your own search patterns makes sure to use the in-private or incognito browsing option.

25. You can turn this on in your tools menu.