I have blathered about keyword research a lot in previous posts, SO I’m going to use this post to illustrate how keyword research can help you to effectively develop your website information architecture (IA).

• Yes, branding is important.


• Yes, your users are more important, and the usability and logical structure of your site is vital.


• Yes, you may have legal issues to consider.


• No, those do not pose a problem as you begin to develop you IA – though they might in the refinement stages.

First, let’s settle on a business type… say our ‘client’ is an online gift shop (www.UniqueGifts4YouOnline.com - not taken as of posting according to GoDaddy)

Starting with Wordtracker, let’s see what we get - I’m not pulling all the data for this illustration for somewhat obvious reasons J:

Keyword

WT Searches

Graduation gifts

11,991

Holiday gifts

7,158

Gifts

4,517

Gift cards

3,935

Gift baskets

3,166

Unique baby gifts

2,056

Visa gift cards

1,965

Gifts for dads to be

1,816

Gift ideas

1,772

Newborn gift idea

1,593

Unique gift children

1,588

Unique gift idea

1,586

Baby shower gift

1,579

Birthday gift

1,5