What is a long-tail keyword?

Long-tail keyword is a keyword that is specific and consists of three or more words. The opposite is a short-tail keyword.

What are the long-tail keywords?

They are specific search terms that consist of several words. The opposite of this are short tail keywords. These keywords often contain one or two keywords. With a long-tail keyword, visitors come in very specifically looking for your product/service.

The search volume of long keywords is lower than short keywords. However, you can sometimes expect more visitors and it will lead to a higher conversion. It is therefore important to conduct keyword research before creating content. In this way you can have the keywords in your texts to be found better in the search engines. In general, there is a 70/30 ratio. This means that on average there are 70% long-tail keywords and 30% short-tail keywords. This concerns the keywords that visitors enter in the search engines.

To show the difference between long-tail and short-tail keywords, we will give an example. For example, a short-tail keyword could be ‘vacuum cleaner’. A long-tail keyword is, for example, ‘Miele vacuum cleaner black’. The second keyword is much more specific and therefore more relevant for showing the right results. The search intent of the user is in fact much more concrete.

Advantages

Long-tail keywords have the following advantages:

• There is less competition on a long keyword;
• Higher conversions;
• Higher CTR.