Picking the Best Keywords for Tags: Peridot and Garnet Long Necklace

Once you've generated a list of keywords to use, the next step is evaluating which ones will work the best. The idea is to get as many people to see your items as possible.

Let's look at this Bella Beads Originals necklace:

26 Inch Gold Chain Necklace With Lampwork Pendant

Some of the tags being used: statement necklace, long necklace, pendant necklace, large pendant, gold chain necklace, lampwork pendant, plum and apple green, peridot and garnet. 

There are various ways to get an idea as to how well a tag might do. If we type "statement necklace" into Etsy's search we get: 

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When Etsy's search comes up with over 228,000 hits, that's a popular tag. If you look underneath the search bar, you'll see the add on called Keywords Everywhere:

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That tells us two things. The volume/month is how many people are searching for this tag. The competition is "1" which is the highest it can be. (Competition ranks from 0 to 1. The higher the number, the more competition.) 

Here is where things get tricky. Competition can be good, because if a lot of people are searching for a tag, a lot of people are probably buying. However, it is easy to get lost in all the available listings.

Maramlead and Etsy Rank have tools to help evaluate things like competition, demand, and engagement. Competition is how many other listings are using that tag. Demand is how many people are actually searching that tag. Engagement is how many people are interacting with that tag--as in, liking listings from it and buying listings with it.

Is "statement necklace" a good tag, then? It's getting lots of hits, but it's also easy to get overlooked with it. But, there are 13 tags possible, so it can be a great tag in combination with other, more specific tags. 

Let's try "lampwork pendant":

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That's a much smaller search volume with 70/month. But the competition is still high at 0.98. It sounds like this tag has way more competition than is merited by the number of searches for it. 

So, if we check it in Etsy Rank: 

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...we find that it has very high competition, but a low demand. But... high engagement. Meaning, those who do search for it are more likely to buy. 

Is it a good keyword? Maybe. And this is where "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" comes in. Is this listing being seen? Is it getting likes? Or has no one looked at it in a while? Is this tag bringing in views? Or are other tags doing the work? 

(How do you know if the tags are working? Go into Shop Manager-->Dashboard-->View Detailed Stats, and scroll down to Search Terms.) 

Ultimately, the idea is to get found in search. These are some tools to help narrow down keywords that will help with that.