Learn why a blogger who has been in the business for 14 years uses RankIQ to gain more traffic that generate more ad revenue. Find out why he will continue to use this tool into 2024.
This post includes affiliate links. This means that, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. These are products and services I recommend because I use or trust them. Cookies will be used to track the affiliate links you click.
Why I Use RankIQ - It's a tool that helps me discover posts I never thought about writing on topics that I already do well with. It gives me ideas of what to add to old posts to make them better. RankIQ helps me to create titles for my blog posts that are the perfect length with the right amount of information to encourage more clicks.
14 years is a long time for a blog. Or really anything on the internet.
I have seen many things come and go. When I started there was no Instagram or TikTok. Resources to help out bloggers were hard to find. I never heard of a conference for food bloggers until I went to one in 2019.
Today, we are have so much more available to us. There is also a lot more of us bloggers out there. I mean a lot!!! It becomes harder and harder as time goes on to snag the coveted number 1 position on Google search. You need every advantage you can get.
This is why I love a tool like RankIQ, that helps give me a better chance of ranking. It's like when Biff in Back to the Future took the sports almanac back in time to his younger self so he could bet on games and become rich. Well maybe not as much of a guaranteed win as that, but comes as close to it as anything in real life can get.
Let me tell you what RankIQ is and how I utilize it. I will share some real results with you as well and let the numbers do the talking.
Jump to:
❓ What is RankIQ?
The best words I could use to describe RankIQ is a tool for content optimization. Let's break down the different aspects of what that means.
Keyword Research
RankIQ contains a huge library of keywords. And not just a list of keywords, but shows you how easy or hard it is to rank well on Google for each keyword.
Let's say you were interested in writing on the topic of "bread". You do a search for the word "bread" in their keyword library. Now of course you aren't going to just try a post with the title of "bread" explaining what bread is - that is what Wikipedia is for. What RankIQ does is give you ideas of what posts you can write on that topic such as:
- How to Tell if Sourdough Bread is Bad
- Can You Microwave Garlic Bread
- Is Lavash Bread Gluten Free?
- Korean Tapioca Bread Recipe
So those are way more narrow topics than just "bread". For each of these keywords, RankIQ gives a score for competition and time to rank. It also shares how many visits this topic gets per year.
My goal is to find the keywords that have the low competition score with the quickest time to rank as well as factoring in how many visits that topic gets a year.
When you find the keywords that meet all those criteria the likelihood that you will write this post and it will be high in Google search is pretty good.
My best practice is to choose topics that I already do well with. If I wrote a few posts with bread recipes but Google never ranks them high, then I may still have trouble ranking well for that keyword. However if it's a topic that I do rank well for, like Costco, then I will probably rank high.
Post Optimization
Each month RankIQ gives you 16 reports to run. You type in the keywords you are looking for and it generates for you
- A list of topics Google likes for these keywords,
- An analysis of what words you should have in your blog post title
- A list of the top ranking posts,
- A list of what posts have the most comprehensive coverage of that topic.
You can then use the Content Optimizer to copy and paste your text from your blog post into. It will then give you a score and word count. Most importantly it give you a list of keywords you can add to your post in the order of importance.
✍️Sign Up for RankIQ
Get started optimizing your content better today with RankIQ. Head over to their page by clicking/tapping the button below and learn more about all the features before you sign up.
🔎 What Features Do I Use
I don't necessarily utilize all the features RankIQ offers. What I use the most is:
- Run reports on blog posts I am updating (I don't do it for new blog posts)
- Search the keyword library for new ideas
- Look at my keyword library of keywords I saved to write about
- Title Grader - to see if my post title is the right length and contains the most keywords Google likes that naturally fit.
- Content optimizer - to look for new words to add to my already written posts
There is also a Ranking Audit you can run by connecting your Google Search Console. I haven't explored that much because I use Google Search Console on my own all the time and am very familiar with how it works and how to get the data I want.
One of the newest features is a Content Planner so you can keep track of what new blog post you are writing each month and what posts you are updating. This is super helpful if you don't have something already established, which I have a Google sheets for.
If you are a goal oriented person you can also create goals for yourself to keep track of. For example if you want to write 10 new blog posts in a month, you can put that in there and track your progress.
🍤 Real Examples
I am pretty good with coming up with my own ideas of what to write about, but I still can't think of everything. That is where RankIQ is a huge asset. Let me give you an example.
I rank well for topics on foods from Costco. I have guides on how to pick out beef, chicken, turkey, fish, etc that all do really well. Kirkland is the store brand name you find there. So I decided to see what would happen if I searched for keywords containing the word "Kirkland". I came across the keyword "kirkland panko shrimp air fryer".
I thought that would be an easy blog post to write. It's not a hard recipe, it's a matter of putting the frozen panko fried shrimp into my air fryer and cook it until the shrimp is done. It's not a complicated recipe with multiple parts and lots of ingredients. I wrote the blog post giving my air fryer instructions along with some serving tips.
I published this post on June 16, 2022. Within a month the post was getting over 1,000 pageviews a month and by December 2022 it was over 4000 pageviews a month.
Now what really matters is how much money I have earned from that post. I am a part of the Mediavine ad program. I am able to look up how much avenue this blog post has made.
Since I published it has brought in $1,868.38 in revenue. As of the writing of this post, that blog post is now 16 months old. In that time period I have been paying $49 a month for RankIQ. That adds up to $784. From this one blog post that I never would have written without RankIQ giving me the idea, I have basically paid for my membership and have over $1,000 leftover. That is testimony right there that RankIQ is worth it.
And this is just one example. Another one is the post I wrote in May 2022 on Substitues for McIntosh apples. I review lots of varieties of apples on the blog. For this post I already had all the photos I needed and there was no need to write a recipe. So this was easy and fast to put together. It doesn't get as much traffic as the Kirkland Fried Shrimp post but it still has added $287 to my bank account.
You do enough of these posts and then you get to be a full time food blogger, traveling the country full time in your RV, enjoying life with these kinds of sunsets on the Mississippi River, like me.
If you are interested in getting 1 on 1 coaching with me, check out my coaching page for Q4 to learn more. I can teach you how to use RankIQ and how to update old blog posts and discover what new posts to write that will bring you success.
📅 For 2024
This tool has been very valuable to me that I plan to continue to use it into 2024. Each year it's good to see what tools are helping your blogging business and what ones aren't. If I am only paying $10 a month for a tool but I am not using it or it's not helping me increase my income, I will cancel it.
My goal is to run a mean, lean operation that puts as much profit into my bank account as I can. You don't need to spend a fortune to run a successful blog. RankIQ is one of the few things I will spend money on. I have proven financial results.
📧 Sign Up for Emails
Want to see a live demonstration of how I update content and use RankIQ? Or you want to keep update to do on other services I am offering to support my fellow bloggers? Sign up for my emails below.
Leave a Reply