Displacement vs. Keyword Competition Model
A reasonable measurement for how difficult a certain keyphrase is to rank in search engines is the “Keyword Effectiveness Index” or the keyword competition model. Simply put, you take the number of searches in a given month for the target keyphrase and divide it by the number of estimated results that appear where the engine says “Showing 1-10 of [5,000,000] websites for [keyphrase]“.
# of searches / total estimated results = KEI
(Some SEOs like to square the number of searches to make for an easier number.)
One of my qualms with this measurement is that it pulls in all the junk web sites out there into it. For instance, one keyphrase may bring up 200 million results and another will pull up 50 million. The KEI for each will be much different, yet when there are that many sites, you’ll inevitably have to optimize your site and actively campaign for it to rank higher. Another reservation I have to making the KEI value a major measurement is the fact that users can’t even go past 1,000 results if they wanted to. Indeed, most users stick to the top ten results, and the vast majority concern themselves with the number one spot, period.
The Displacement Model
How difficult is it to enter the top ten? Now this seems to be a more worthwhile measurement. The Displacement Model is built on the assumption that the top ten is the main target goal for sites outside the main results. To grab a spot in those rankings, one of the current top ten will have to leave, in other words, must be displaced to make room for you.
While Google’s algorithm is built on quality links and page relevance, I felt that comparitive analysis of random samples and the top ten for any given keyphrase would yield some possibilities. After over a thousand data sets obtained from vigorous querying, I pored over the statistics and developed what I can the Displacement Score: a measurement that attempts to explain the difficulty of displacing a site from the top ten.
The Tool
I’ve made the Displacement Score available to all! I recently read that Google has stopped issuing new API keys, so I’ve made mine available for 3 queries a day. I hope you all won’t run on the bank here and deprive me of my alotted 1,000 queries a day, but I don’t use them up, so feel free to use the tool to your heart’s content with your own API keys if you have one.
Honestly, I’ve run this score through as much statistical analysis as I possibly can and now launch it with the hopes that you can give any peer reviews, feedback, and what not. In the end, it ought to help you at least sift through your keywords and identify target markets with effectiveness.
Making Important Decisions the Marketer’s Way
So I’ve been researching some pretty important data to make what I feel is a life-changing decision. The words of respected marketing scholar Bill Swinyard ran through my head and I remembered a lecture he gave about consumer behavior. Using what he called the “behavior matrix,” he went through a graphical approach to practical problem solving situations. Applying it to my current circumstances proved wonderfully effective.
I also sat down with my brother-in-law who is considering what to study in college and we discussed which major to choose. Like I had done, he was simply weighing the possibilities in his mind and trying to form a decision based on his gut feelings. We tried out using the behavior matrix, and it provided so much direction that he now feels like he has identified the major that will satisfy him the most.
Here’s a walkthrough of that encounter, and hopefully your application of it in your own business decisions may prove useful.
First of all, we listed all the factors that were important to my brother-in-law of the decision itself, namely:
- Ease of comprehending content
- Interest in subject material
- Future job possibilities
- Hands-on experience
Second, he figured a relative value for each factor on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being essential to the decision and 1 being absolutely unimportant. Then, it was a matter of researching each option and assigning a value representing how well the option fulfilled the factor. The result was a matrix like so:
| Factor | Importance | Communications | Biology | Business Marketing |
| Ease of Content | 7 | 7 | 3 | 5 |
| Interest | 9 | 8 | 4 | 7 |
| Future Jobs | 10 | 7 | 5 | 9 |
| Hands-On | 6 | 7 | 10 | 7 |
Finally, we multipled the importance factor by each major and added them up:
- Communications: 233 total points
- Biology: 167
- Business Marketing: 216
Based on these figures, and the research we did, it appears that Communications would be the major that most closely matches up with my brother-in-law’s interests. Again, it doesn’t necessarily take into account everything, but it sure helped him identify what was important and which decision gets closest. In a marketing sense, one could apply this behavior matrix to factors of a website to try to align the site to what is important to the user. But that, in detail, is for another day. :)
Search Engines, the Answer?
In response to many online marketing constraints, many webmasters favor search engines for these reasons:
- Getting listed usually is free.
- Search engines are almost always the starting point for most users.
- Organic results (results obtained from non-paid sources) are more trusted than paid ads.
- Search engines are major thoroughfares for the bulk of internet activity, and as such, can refer high amounts of traffic.
- Users spend more time on sites referred by search engines.
Yes, search engines are highly effective at producing targeted traffic. And, they are all of those things. No web site can expect moderate or better success without passing through search engines at some point. But the door swings both ways:
- Search engines are not perfectly relevant and are updated frequently without notice to improve relevance, necessitating sometimes drastic changes to web sites to maintain ranking position.
- Search engines often take weeks to months to even list your site. For exceptional results, on average, they require years of consistent modifications.
- Algorithms that determine relevance are highly safeguarded by search engine companies. Thus, no one outside the company knows positively every factor that will improve rank.
- Sites compete over search engines more easily than offline. For most keywords, small businesses are unable to segment themselves away from bigger companies without incurring substantial expenses that they are unable to afford.
Search engines are definitely one answer to improving marketing strategy online, but clearly not the answer.
