Blue Sky Keywords, the Wild Search Frontier

Blue Sky Keywords are keywords with little to no current search volume, but which you predict and hope will increase in volume in the future.

When it comes to Google, everyone wants to be #1. Depending on who you are and what industry you’re in, getting to that top spot might be kind of hard or, if we’re being honest, pretty much impossible. But what if you could hit the top spot for a keyword before it was even a keyword?

We’re not talking time machines. Some organizations have the chance to do the next best thing: Build foundational SEO behind proprietary keywords before they’ve gone to market, priming their site for dominance when the time is right. We call these Blue Sky Keywords. And while they’re a little niche — not everyone will be able to create and define their own terms and search phrases — there are certain markets and certain players where this strategy can be devastatingly effective.

What Are Blue Sky Keywords?

Blue Sky Keywords are keywords with little to no current search volume, but which you predict and hope will increase in volume in the future. The playing field is empty, so your website can have this keyword or key phrase all to itself (for now). 

As of this writing, “blue sky keywords” is a blue sky keyword.

Let’s say you’re a chef with a hot new bakery item: the scragel. Cross a scone with bagel, and add some cream cheese frosting on top. No one else has ever made a scragel before (if they did, they didn’t put it on the internet), and you’ve discovered they’re delicious. Scragels are such a surefire hit, in fact, that you’ve already bought the business license for the Scragels and Sons bakery, and you’re launching in a few months.

There’s no search volume for scragel right now — no one even knows it’s a word. But when you launch, you know people are going to start rolling out their own scragel recipes, eating into your market share and search position. What can you do to stake your claim?

SEO is a tough game, and algorithms can be capricious. But if you start from the best foundation possible, you’re primed for long-term success. Let’s say you’ve already put some work into a basic SEO strategy that includes good technical basics, site copy optimized for appropriate core and longtail keywords, and you’ve got a few basic pieces of content ready to go.

The next step is to leverage your biggest advantage: You know about the magic of scragels, and no one else does. There’s no competition for terms associated with your scragels, meaning you have a chance to own the space. There’s also no volume for the term right now, sure. But you know that’s going to change as soon as people bite into their first scone-bagel hybrid and love it. In other words, the sky is blue.

So you work ahead to gather as much coverage and authority as possible. You populate your site with information like “What is a scragel?” “Best place to buy scragels” “Best scragel recipe” “Do scragels taste good?” With the right content in place, ideally deployed as part of a hub-and-spoke strategy that includes appropriate longtail, you’re set up for success before the competition even starts. After all, your scragels are the best.

How Lunaris Uses Blue Sky Keywords

We’ve never worked with a scragel company before (though we would! Email us!). But a number of our clients, typically startups, have been in similar positions. They have a great, world-changing product that’s almost ready for the limelight. And because their product is so novel, talking about it involves processes and terms that aren’t in the public vernacular right now. Other times, they’re in a field that is itself new enough that, though potential keywords exist, they’re barely seeing any search volume.

The most impactful thing we can do for a client in this situation is to set them up for success by establishing a deep and broad SEO foundation for these Blue Sky Keywords. We do that in large part by treating them like we would any other keywords and applying SEO best practices: hub-and-spoke architectures, targeted keyword placement, ongoing research and analysis, and more.

The other part of the equation, of course, is visibility. These keywords need to actually have volume someday. Much of that is out of our hands, and comes down to the broader product rollout and evolution of the market. Still, we see ourselves playing a role in increasing search volume as well. Using Blue Sky Keywords intelligently on social, in gated and shared content, and elsewhere, and getting them in front of the right people, establishes awareness and starts the snowball rolling.

Have questions about how we think about SEO, and what Lunaris can do for your organization? Get in touch with us today.