Often times when I run research on keywords I will see a really long convuluted phrase with a high search number such as:

book dip little quit stick teaches that when when

Overature says this phrase was searched for 2,354 times. I find it hard to believe that more than one person would search for that exact phrase. So how can that be?

The second thing I'm curious about is how much we (internet marketers) skew the search numbers. For example when I find a keyword that looks promising I search it to double check results and which websites are coming up for that keyword. If all of us are doing that wouldn't it skew the numbers? Or maybe there aren't that many of us.

So that is what I'm curious about. Maybe I have just had too much coffee this morning and my mind is on overdrive. Does anyone have any insight or should I just switch to decaf?

Karen

I hate decaf! I mean really...what good is it?

About the search phrase. I'm not really sure what's up with this, but it happens to me too. I don't think anyone searched that exact phrase. Have you ever noticed it is always in alphabetical order? I hope someone can answer this. I have been curious about it too.

ali

Hi Ali,

You know, I never noticed the alphabetical order until you mentioned it. But you're right they are almost always in alphabetical order.

And I totally agree about the decaf - why bother.

Karen

I read, I think in wordtracker somewhere, that overture results are becoming more inaccurate due to their Panama update. So, I wouldn't rely on overture too much. Wordtracker says they solve the (skew) problem by using meta search engines.

Invest in a paid research tool. There would be nothing worse than building a website around questionable results. Also, you're right to think that there is a skew when SEO'er are researching certain keywords, that's why there's a minimum search volume to look for to hedge against the inflation of results.

Just stick to common sense. I've seen phrases on overture that were repeating words with high results as well. There's no one in their right mind that would do this, I hope. I've also seen 10 letter keyword phrases and I found out that it was the title of a book.

I've received completely senseless results from Wordtracker. Now that Nichebot has gone commercial, it seems to yield pretty good results.

It gives you Wordtracker, Overture, Keyword Discovery and google Keyword Cruncher results without having to invest in each tool independently.

I haven't tried Zoomtracker (that apparently is good) since I don't want to throw more money after bad before sorting out what's on my plate now.

http://www.nichebot.com (not affiliate link)

There's also a REALLY cool free keyword tool at http://www.kwbrowse.com/

Markus