Managed SEO and Internet Marketing

In order to achieve the maximum amount of traffic for minimum cost it is critical that you identify the search terms (keywords) that a user will key in to find your products and services.
Inevitably, the most popular searched for terms will be those generic ones that apply to your business. However, these terms do not represent best value for money in terms of return on capital. This is because the top positions in the search engines under generic terms are occupied either by directory listings (where achieving first page position is a lottery) or by pay-per-click type listings, where the bidding on clicks does not represent good value for money.
The secret of achieving excellent focused traffic from the search engines is to identify those popular relevant search terms that avoid the 'lemming' effect of directory listings and pay-per-click phrases.

KEYWORD FINALISATION
This section looks at choosing keywords if you're using a search engine. However, it obviously has relevance as well if you're a site owner, when it comes to deciding which keywords to choose when creating your site.
The keyword is the most crucial component of any search engine search. The correct keyword can easily provide you with the information you want, while incorrect keywords will leave you baffled. Keyword finalisation thus becomes a very important aspect. These tips work for almost all major search engines and directories.

Be Precise
Be honest and clear about what you want to ask from the search engine. For example, if you want information about 'Football World Cup 2006', do not just write 'World Cup' or 'Football'. Write the full phrase, i.e. 'Football World Cup 2006'. Even phrases like 'I want to know where David Beckham lives' can work.

Adding
If you want to make sure that the search engine finds all the keywords that you have entered then you can use the '+' sign. For example, if you want to search for David Beckham and Victoria Beckham on the same page, then enter the keywords: 'David + Beckham + Victoria + Beckham'. The search engine will display only the web pages with these keywords.

Subtracting
This is exactly the opposite of the adding function. If you do not want any other keyword with the keyword that you have entered, then the '-' sign will help you get the relevant information. For example, if you want information about Beckham without Loos (because of the alleged Beckham-Loos scandal), you would write: 'Beckham -Loos'. This would command the search engine to display links that mention Beckham but not Loos.

Exact phrase
Another useful tool is to use double quotes if you want an exact phrase to appear. For example, if you search for 'David Beckham in Madrid' on Google, you get, at time of writing, over 800,000 hits on Google - pages where those words appear in any order. But if you put it in double quotes as "David Beckham in Madrid" you get around 10,000 hits for pages where those words appear in that exact order.

Combining Symbols
Once you are acquainted with using the plus, minus and double quote symbols, you can combine them to narrow down your search still further. For example, if you want information on 'Beckham-Posh' but without Loos, you would use the keywords: "Beckham-Posh" - "Loos".

Foir more information see Boolean Search.