Categorizing Queries
For your website or blog, you want to begin categorizing queries based on the following:
Below is a list of some of the possible categories
- Branded terms (navigational queries)
- Product categories (informational queries)
- Conversion-focused (transactional queries)
- Seasonal, promotional
- Reviews, user generated content
In addition, you can categorize based on whether the query is coming from a mobile device (smartphone) or desktop.
Branded Terms
Break down the queries into branded terms that you should definitely rank for. These are often navigational queries of users looking for your site. Make sure people searching specifically for your site can find it.
Categories reflecting the goals of a website
Example of website goals:
1) Communicate the latest news to site owners. 2) Pretend Query Category:
- Queries with [news] [recent],
- timely information
Another category of queries that might be useful are those strongly correlated with conversion.
If the goal of our Webmaster Central blog was to provide readers the latest in Google news for site owners,
we might start categorizing queries that match this goal. The next section contains examples of queries.
Example of queries
- SEO secrets 2019
- Google SEO 2019
- Google SEO Secrets 2019
Question: Which queries are strongly correlated with conversion?
I might also notice that users use technical terms to find our site.
Categories reflecting user intent
Pretend category: technical instruction
Examples of query terms:
[itemscope], [canonical], [rel=" next"]
I might have another category on our website that shows how our site performs with respect to technical instructions.
Investigating categorized queries
For each of these categories, I will make sure to understand the mindset of the users as they perform the query,
- where they are located and even
- whether their device might change their behavior, then
- whether my pages search results display is compelling.
- If they click on my site, does the content match their expectations?
- Is my site providing a great user experience so the searcher will recommend my site to others or become a repeat visitor?
Back at the main Search Queries page, let us now check out the Top Pages tab.