Travel Keywords: SEO for Travel Websites & Blogs

In order to be successful online, you need to have the right keywords. In this blog post, we will go over six places where you can find good travel SEO keywords.

You’ll learn how they’re different from regular search engine optimisation (SEO) and why it’s important to get them right when working on a website related to travelling.

These are often overlooked by many people causing the wrong targetting, wasted money and time, but if you want your site or article on the first page of Google for relevant searches, then read this post!

Tip: Need help with your travel keywords? Check out our keyword SEO services.

What Are SEO Keywords?

SEO keywords are the words, phrases, or queries that people enter when using search engines. These are important components in your SEO strategy for your travel website or blog as it gives you an idea of what to base your content around.

For example: If your target audience is searching “where to stay in Hawaii” and you decide to target this keyword, then you should ensure that your content adequately meets the intent of this query.

Types of SEO Keywords

There are two main types of keywords in SEO—namely, broad and long tail. A broad search might be “hotels in Hawaii”. These can be challenging to rank for as they are generally taken up by various booking sites on the Search Engine Results Page (shown below).

Long tail keywords are more specific. These tend to include more modifiers and are easier to rank for. An example would be “all-inclusive beach hotels in Honolulu Hawaii”. This is especially powerful given the high volume of content and competition within the travel industry.

How to Use SEO Keywords for Travel and Tourism?

SEO keywords need to be strategically placed within a title, meta description, and content. These are three of the most important elements displayed in the SERPs, so optimising this is essential for your travel website or blog.

Title

The page title is important as it tells users and search engines what your website or posts are about. For this reason, you should ensure that your page title is SEO-friendly to both people and bots.

For an SEO-friendly page title, keep the following in mind:

• Humans decide whether or not they should click, so make sure your page title is catchy and enticing.
• Ensure that your target keyword appears in your page title, preferably near the beginning.
• Keep your page title between 50 and 60 characters.
• Include strong modifiers in your page title. These are words that will help your page rank for related search terms. In the image above, a strong modifier is “cities”, which can help the post rank for a query like “best cities to live in South Africa”.

Meta Description

The meta description, along with the page title and URL, appears in the SERPs as a snippet. As such, optimising this can greatly influence your click-through rate.

Here are some tips for an SEO-friendly meta description:

• Include the target keyword or synonomyms in the meta description.
• Your meta description should be between 50 and 160 characters, as search engines generally cut off anything past this.
• Ensure that it includes catchy travel words—you could pose a question or call to action.

URL

The URL of your web page is also essential for ensuring your travel content is seen. To optimise this, follow these steps:

• Your URL should contain your target keyword, as this tells users and search engines what the page is about.
• Ensure that your URL is short, clear, and easy to understand—avoid additional words, symbols, or numbers.

The image above shows an optimised snippet (the top snippet). The target keyword (best tropical vacation spots) appears in the URL, meta description, and page title. Additionally, both the page title and meta description are catchy and an ideal length.

Text

Based on your keyword research, you will want to include various keywords throughout your content. These should relate to your topic or main keyword. For example, if you’re writing on hotels in Hawaii on the beach, you’ll likely find plenty of other keywords similar to this that will also help you rank.

In the following section, we will highlight some ways that you can find strong topics and keywords for your travel blog or website.

How to Find the Best Travel Searches and SEO Keywords

The first place to find good travel SEO keywords is through your own expertise. If you’re an expert and know about specific destinations, then use that knowledge by writing articles based on where you’ve been or things in the industry that interest you.

To take it a step further, ensure that the phrase or query that you’re targeting is actually being searched for. There are several keyword research tools you can use to help with this. Popular picks include Ahrefs, Google Keyword Planner, SEO Surfer, and Ubersuggest.

These tools will provide you with a wide range of useful insights to validate targeting a given keyword. Some useful data provided include the amount of traction a keyword receives each month (as it pertains to traffic and volume), whether or not the keyword will be easy to rank for and plenty more.

By considering these insights, you will be able to create content that best aligns with your target audience’s intent.

Social media platforms like Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter can also provide you with a number of useful insights surrounding your target audience and the queries they’re after.

Below is a detailed guide on how to leverage each of these to find strong keywords and opportunities for your travel site or blog.

1.    Ahrefs

Ahrefs is an SEO software suite containing a variety of tools that are great for keyword research, link building, rank tracking, and more. The keyword research tool is useful for identifying topics for your travel website and the keywords that you should include and priorities in your content.

By leveraging Ahrefs data, many marketers and SEOs have been able to achieve higher Google rankings.

Note: Ahrefs is a premium tool, but it has some great features for finding more traffic. So, if SEO is your thing, then I would highly recommend taking the time and signing up for this monthly service.

2.    Google Keywords Planner

If you’re not looking to pay a monthly subscription fee, then do not worry—there are plenty of ways to find strong keywords and topics without spending a cent.

One of the most powerful tools is Google. You can type the query you wish to target into the search engine and see what comes up in the SERPs. It also helps to look at the “people also ask” section, as this includes additional information that users may be looking for based on their initial query.

Apart from this, you can also use Google Keyword Planner. This is a free tool (but Google nowadays expects you to pay or have a Adwords budget to use it)  that helps you perform your keyword research and identify possible search campaigns. Like Ahrefs, this will provide you with estimates on how many searches a keyword is getting.

As Google Keyword Planner is primarily targeted at those running Google Ads, you can also expect additional information, like the estimated cost of targeting a given keyword.

3.    Social Media

Another free tool that is often overlooked when considering keyword research and SEO for travel blogs is social media. While it is not necessarily a keyword research tool, it is a great source for finding medium and long-tail keywords that are receiving high volumes of traffic.

Social media platforms are constantly gathering information on people—including what they do, what they like, where they go, and what might prompt them to click. And given that the average user spends nearly 3 hours a day on these platforms, you can expect some good, reliable data.

Various social media platforms can be leveraged in different ways. Here is a look a brief look at how to use each for keyword research:

• Instagram: You can make use of hashtags to identify relevant topics. For example, if you want to post travel content, search #travel and see what other hashtags recent posts are using.
• Facebook: Use Facebook targeting options to learn about your audience or search travel-related Facebook groups for popular topics.
• Twitter: Use Twitter’s Explore function and see what topics appear under “trending” and “for you”—this will highlight various topics that people in your industry are talking about.
• Pinterest: Pinterest predicts what content users interact with and provides related content. By searching for travel, you’re sure to find plenty of topics through pins, boards, and hashtags.
• YouTube: Use the auto-complete function to find related terms. This can be done using Google and Pinterest too. You can also check out the various travel YouTube tags.

Note that some social media platforms like Twitter will require you to be more active to reap the rewards.

4.    Keysearch

Like Ahrefs, Keysearch is a premium tool used for finding keywords. It allows you to effectively track your SEO efforts, identify keywords that you’re likely to rank for, and more.

The free version of this tool will give you some basic information, but the paid version ($12/month) has more features and really helps with all your SEO campaigns.

It’s not too expensive to be able to get access to it, so I would recommend signing up for the paid version.

5.    Ubersuggest

Ubersuggest is another great tool for finding keywords. It’s not as robust of a program as Ahrefs, but it has some really good features and can be helpful if you’re just getting started in SEO or have an existing website that needs help.

Ubersuggest is a free Chrome extension that provides you with a variety of insights, including keywords, monthly search volume, and cost per click and competition data. Simply enter the keyword or phrase you’re after, and it will bring up all the most popular pages for that term.

It’s also not limited to keywords specific to Google, but sites like Amazon and YouTube, too. As such, you can expect to find a variety of topics and long-tail travel or holiday keywords using this free tool.

6.    SEO Surfer Chrome Extension

Like Ahrefs, Surfer SEO provides us with keywords to be used in our content. It takes the main keyword you enter, scans the web for competitors who are already ranking for that main keyword, and combines the keywords those competitors are using.

You will be able to see these keywords on the SEO Surfer site or by using the SEO Surfer Chrome extension. This will show you your keyword usage on the page you’re writing on and how much more of a keyword to add.

In addition to words and phrases, Surfer SEO also provides several other metrics that can help you write and optimise your content. These include the average word count that the post should be, how many headings the post should have, what keywords to include in those headings and more.

What Are the Best Travel Keywords?

Wondering, “what are the best travel keywords?” Well, there are plenty of tools mentioned in this guide that will help with finding good keywords for search engine optimisation campaigns. Whether you use Ahrefs, SEO Surfer, Google, or social media, you’re sure to find some of the most searched queries within the travel space.

So what are you waiting for? Begin with effective keyword research to find high-traffic topics and keywords relating to various destinations, activities, and attractions and start growing your travel blog!

What’s the next step? Content strategy—this will help your travel site or blog reach all the right people.