There are some things in affiliate marketing that are kept to our own or that are talked about and we should automatically know. While at Affiliate Summit when describing to some users how I do keyword research, I usually say I keyword blast most of the time to find profitable keywords for any offer. A lot of users did not know the main concept of keyword blasting or heard of blasting keywords. It is a quick way to find a lot of profitable keywords (deep and wide). It stops you from wasting time on less searchable keywords or non converting keywords and even those keyword research services.

With paid search you want to find keywords that are being clicked on and ofcourse converts. The basis of keyword blasting is to overload an adgroup with tons of keywords, have a high bid, and let it run. This allows you to find what keywords are profitable and what keywords maybe profitable later on. Blasting keywords is a risk though and a lost. It also requires 2 Google Adwords account or using other sources of paid search, such as Yahoo. This is a good risk though, later on with your campaign you can have a successful campaign base on your keywords.

There are many ways to keyword blast a campaign base on keyword search types (broad, phrase, exact). Each provides different results and can be beneficial, you just need to analyze the data that is being given and provided to you.

With keyword blasting each search types provides different results (Google Adwords):

• Broad Search:
  This is a really good way to find profitable keywords fast as it only requires several general keywords. BUT you can do it with a ton of keywords as well to find more variations of a long tail. Blasting Broad search terms provides you a wider variety of keywords deep and wide! With broad you do not want to add any negative keywords, since you want to see all variations of keywords that are generated and clicked on. Again you can just blast 10 general keywords or blast a thousand variations of a specific keyword. The problem I find with broad keyword research is a general keyword can be too broad, but you can find a lot of negatives to use for your successful campaigns.
• Phrase Search:
  This is another way to blast keywords as you know specifically your niche, especially if it is niche specific (a niche within a niche). You want a lot of keywords in this adgroup as it is more specific. But you do not want to add negatives in this as well because you want to see the variations of the keywords outside of your phrase. For example your keyword is “basketballs shoes”, some variations maybe ‘red “basketball shoes” for summer’. So you do not want to ad negatives as you may see some clicks on new keywords you would have not think of. Problem with phrase is it may skip some variations of keywords that maybe be profitable.
• Exact Search:
  There is really no point to blast keywords in exact match because it is the EXACT search or keyword a user is searching for and you have already done your research to get these exact keywords. BUT if you just want to find popular exact terms, blasting a ton of keywords for phrase and see what is being clicked on can be beneficial. But you should be able to get set search terms via phrase or broad.

The basis of blasting keywords is to quickly throw a bunch of keywords at the search engines and see what triggers your ads base on clicks. From this you can elaborate more on your keywords and find keywords you would not have thought of while doing your keyword research. Keyword research is time consuming, why not risk some money and find what keywords are being clicked on and if some convert then either move it to an adgroup with exact or phrase.

There are users that use Yahoo Search Marketing to blast their keywords but YSM has a keyword limit – but you can have multiple accounts with YSM. If you do it with Google you will need 2 Adwords account just because you want a good standing Adwords account. I haven’t blasted with MSN before but if you have let us know.

Looking at the data

There are many ways to look at the blasted data and how to even re blast your newly found keywords. But it depends on how you are going to blast your keywords from the start. There are ways to bid or standard ways to bid. A lot of the data that is being proposed to you after blasting can benefit you a lot with your campaign. I will maybe create a series on keyword blasting, since I blast differently base on offers. In general the best way to blast is either broad or phraase, both (1 campaign 2 adgroups), or all three! In the end it is how you are looking at that data and how you are going to separate your newly found keywords.

Do you blast keywords, if so how do you look at your data?