One of the most important parts of search engine results is the search intent, and some search engines, like Google, developed it to approximate perfection. Why it’s important to create intent-based content, how search engines behave with search intent and how you can target your audience using search intent – is what this article is all about. But before starting there is one thing you should know about content in general: Internal Results may help you & your business to promote your business thru content syndication.
#1 What is Search Intent?
The search intent represents your online behavior analyzed and used by search engines to provide you the best result. You may have searched for different things lately, either it was information, types of products or services, news, or brands – you were offered to pre-select some results before you even ended the search query.
At this moment, there are four different types of search intents:
- Informational
- Navigational
- Commercial
- Transactional
This means that interrogating the search engines, we look for approximately something in the frames of the four above-mentioned types of actions. Now, based on these four different types of search intent, the search engines will try to predict what exactly you are searching for and guess your intention based on your previous online behavior.
Of course, there is a lot of space when the search engine tries to guess your thoughts and release results matching your intention, but on the other hand, Google at least succeeds in providing a series of results that actually match your intention. And this is at least one good reason to create intent-based content and make it relevant for users that search your products or services without using the regular keywords that they usually would do.
But before creating intent-based content, we need to understand how does search intent work for different types of queries
#2 Types of Search Terms
Another important thing that needs to be mentioned and specified here, refers to the types of search terms.
Generally, we distinguish three types:
- Search Terms With Dominant Intent
- Search Terms Without Dominant Intent
- Search Terms Referring to Multiple Entities
Search Terms With Dominant Intent refer to cases when the users are seeking a specific product or service, or the search query can be interpreted more in one way than in any other way.
If we are searching /Domino pizza delivery California/ or /malaria symptoms/ you will get results concerning strictly the two search queries. In the first case, you will be provided with all results of Domino Pizza in California that provide delivery, and in the second case, you will see all articles, statements, and news related to malaria symptoms.
Google also has a better understanding of the context of the intent, so when typing /Black Hole/ you will be displayed the results related to the scientific explanation rather than a hole painted in black.
Search Terms Without a Dominant Intent are unspecified queries, that leave room to the search engine guessing what exactly the search is about. So if searching for the simple term /design/, Google will give you results based on your online behaviors/previous search interactions & location. These results may contain
- Places related to this term near you
- Related Recommendations
- Related Images
- Related Videos
- Related Ads
- Tutorials
- Instructions
- News/Blog Posts
The results may move from one type of result to another depending again, on your location and previous search interactions. Also, based on this type of search terms, the ranking could be more difficult as you have to prove why your content is more relevant than others.
Search Terms Referring to Multiple Entities stands for words or combination of words that can be used to search for different things. In this case, Google will give you the most popular but at the same time customized results. This means that we are going to search for /sun/ on Google, we might have results related to the star, and, results related to “The Sun” British tabloid. Again, the results may be placed differently based on your preferences & location.
#3 How to Create, Research & Publish Intent-Based Content
We recommend a 3-step process in creating and publishing intent-based content for organic SEO growth and ranking possibilities. Even though it will look abstract you can use and adapt the guidelines to your needs.
- Check the keywords related to your content in a separate window. Use the focus-keywords or the ones you want to rank.
- After you have selected and inserted them, analyze the results you get for each keyword, separate the types of search intent and the types of search terms. At this stage, you will be able to evaluate if your content is related to the keywords you want to focus on and if it worths being published, or modified.
- Once you have the analysis done, you will also be able to discover new keywords that could help you rank and make your content popular. In case you still find incompatibilities, there’s still a window open for you to rank due to the search terms without dominant intent. However, the search terms with dominant intent may help you to rank locally or regionally, and develop on a smaller scale your online presence.
Between these three steps there are business particularities and difficult moments that could influence the entire process, but, roughly this short guide could help you get your content in a better position on the web.
#4 Conclusion
These are the basic things you should now so far about search intent and creating intent-based content. Either it’s for personal use or business use, the search intent is getting more and more important, and it impacts directly to search results, ranking and gives other opportunities to explore new and not-so-popular keywords and combinations of words.
Keep in mind, that doing the intent-based content can be difficult, but can give unexpected results. If you need intent-based content, SEO or digital marketing services – Mobiteam is the top web agency from Berlin that can help you and your business increase the web visibility.
