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.
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