Businesses looking to drive organic SEO should consider that sometimes less is more when it comes to SEO keyword selection. Contrary to what many marketers may believe, the most popular phrases can hinder the odds of succeeding with SEO copy.

Tapping into the search tail – the less competitive queries that offer more achievable results – is often a sound keyword strategy. While search tail phrases often generate less traffic, marketers may well drive more revenue from achieving prominent rankings on these less competitive phrases. For instance, many major incorporation firms use the phrase "business incorporation" to catch the attention of entrepreneurs in need of filing services, but some savvy smaller businesses jump closer to the top of search results with "business formations."

Google’s Keyword Tool – which is useful for finding less competitive, frequently searched keywords – reveals that "business incorporation" receives 40,500 searches around the globe each month while "business formations" accounts for 1,600 global monthly searches. Searching the former phrase tends to brings up government pages and large firms, while the latter query often directs browsers to smaller companies.

The search tail route may also help marketers capitalize on consumers’ trend toward more specific queries. Recent data from Hitwise indicates two words seem to be the sweet spot for searchers as a slim majority of U.S. clicks – 23.06 percent – were garnered by pages with a string of two keywords.

Remember, any keyword strategy should be part of a carefully constructed content strategy. Professional copywriter Marty Lamers told Small Biz Trends it’s most important to write for humans, and the search engines will fall into place.

Katherine Griwert is Brafton's Marketing Director. She's practiced content marketing, SEO and social marketing for over five years, and her enthusiasm for new media has even deeper roots. Katherine holds a degree in American Studies from Boston College, and her writing is featured in a number of web publications.