This information is important when considering your keyword metrics, it can help you determine if the terms and frequency used are beneficial.
What if the best thing you could do for your SEO is something you’ve never heard of?
TF-IDF has been revolutionizing the way businesses approach SEO and marketing. Unfortunately, most businesses have never heard of TF-IDF, much less how to use it.
So, what is TF-IDF and what can it do for your own digital marketing? Keep reading to learn all about it!
What Is TF-IDF?
As terms go, “TF-IDF” is quite a mouthful. But for those asking “what is TF-IDF,” the answer is simple: it stands for term frequency-inverse document frequency.
TF-IDF is a way to quickly assess the frequency of a keyword and determine how important that word is within the document. While TF-IDF has a number of important applications, it is important for SEO because Google uses it as a ranking factor.
There is a bit of a learning curve to using TF-IDF for your own SEO. But if you can master this technique, you can leave the competition in the dust.
The Power of Inverse Document Frequency
At first glance, you might not realize why TF-IDF is so important. After all, there are plenty of other ways to assess the use of a certain keyword within the text.
However, the real secret for how this works comes from the “inverse” part of “term frequency-inverse document frequency.” Basically, TF-IDF is going to weed out really basic words (like “a” and “the”) and puts more importance on the unique words of the document.
This may sound simple, but it’s an excellent way of cutting through the SEO noise and discovering how relevant your keywords really are. This can help you play up the keywords that are performing well or go back to the drawing board as needed.
TF-IDF and Your SEO
Now you know the basics of TF-IDF and what it can do. But why is this technique so important when it comes to your SEO?
As usual, it all comes back to Google’s algorithm. While that algorithm (and its many changes over the years) can be frustrating at times, it helps Google quickly find and present the most relevant data to users without bogging them down with spam and other useless info.
Exactly what all is in the algorithm is something of a mystery, but we know that TF-IDF plays a major role in it. By mastering TF-IDF, you are one step closer to mastering the Google algorithm, which is the single best thing you can do for your SEO and digital marketing.
TF-IDF Analysis: Getting Started
The good news is that it’s not hard to conduct your own TF-IDF analysis. But while the process is not complex, getting started does require you take a few important steps ahead of time.
It all starts with identifying a keyword that you are using or wish to use. Maybe that keyword is “digital marketing.” While standard keyword research will reveal many variations of the keyword, you can go a step further and see what your competition is doing with these keywords.
The right SEO tools can help you quickly discover the top pages that rank for this keyword. You can then take that information and run it through an SEO audit to discover the TF-IDF value.
Now that you’ve taken these steps, you can see how well the competition’s use of the keyword stacks up with your own. This helps you find the “Holy Grail” of marketing: keywords with a very high search volume and very little competition.
Discovering Related Terms
One of the other great things about TF-IDF is that it lets you find out how Google “thinks.” You don’t get related keywords that are just variations of the original term. Instead, you can find other terms that users associate with the original. For example, Google relates a term like “aloe vera” with “sunburn.”
While that example is very straightforward, the whole point of the TF-IDF process is for you to discover keywords and opportunities you had not previously planned for. This helps to take your SEO to the next level!
The Next Step
By this point, you’ve got some very useful data. But you can take another important step to get the maximum value from your TF-IDF analysis.
Remember when we talked about conducting a good SEO audit? With a little help, you can take the URLs of your primary competitors and run them through the analysis. This lets you quickly see which particular keywords the competition is using and how frequently they are using them.
What you discover from this helps you formulate an SEO “game plan.” It might be as simple as finding the highest-volume keywords with the least amount of competition. Or you can make discoveries about different related keywords and how the right combination can help you land on the first page of user searches.
The Best Gets Better
As you know by now, the best part of SEO is that it is an ongoing process. And when you use TF-IDF, you can improve your SEO from month to month and year to year!
For example, this process helps you optimize your content which is going to drive more traffic to your site. This ultimately leads to more conversions and higher profits…good news for any company hoping to grow.
On top of this, mastering TF-IDF will boost your chances to be in a Google featured snippet for certain searches. And this alone will drive traffic to your site in a major way.
And you can (and should) periodically run your own content through the right SEO tools. This can help you measure performance, set up some A/B testing, and generally keep your online content as optimal as possible.
What’s Next?
Now you have an answer to “what is TF-IDF” and you know how to get started. But do you know who can help you truly master TF-IDF and get ahead of the competition?
