Leveraging keyword gaps with top competitor in a smart manner

Selected answers from the Dumb SEO Questions Facebook & G+ community.

• 
  Christine Hansen: You ought to look at Search Intent and Search intent gaps instead of keywords.
  
  6d
• 
  El Bikito: Christine Hansen I align the intent w the page and then put in KWs.
  
  So now I got all these KWs that my competitors have that I don`t, so search intent is not an issue as the intent is on the right track for me.
  
  Would appreciate any other insight you have on the matter.
  
  6d
• 
  Stockbridge Truslow: Right - seems like you are both on the same page - but let`s define a few things more clearly to make sure.
  
  Keyword Gap is technically finding keywords that would apply but that others aren`t ranking for or even targeting.
  
  Intent Gap is when you have a search term that describes a certain need and, while your competition has optimized for the keyword, they haven`t really fulfilled the search intent.
  
  So... maybe you`ve got a keyword that is almost certainly one where the person is looking for some information about something but all your competitors are hitting it with a page focused on "buying". That`s (potentially) a gap between what the searcher wants and what the pages are offering. Now... if you can create an information page that provides the info they are looking for and then bridge that page to your buy intent page (i.e. it informs them AND closes them on the sale) then you`ve filled that gap and it should, in theory, be easy for you to rank or at least get onto that first page since no one else is doing it.
  
  You can also do this where it`s an ambiguous term. If it`s unclear if the person wants to buy or learn - and most everyone else is focusing on one or the other - you focus more on the intent that is most underrepresented OR create something that meets BOTH potential intents and directs them properly.
  
  An intent gap is often the same keywords - but hitting a different aspect that everyone else is missing.
  
  5d
• 
  El Bikito: Stockbridge Truslow Oh damn, so is the intent gap any different from content gap as they compare topics?
  
  If not, then i`d appreciate it even more if you could nidge me in the right direction so i xcan research it out and learn.
  
  3d
• 
  Stockbridge Truslow: The end result is basically the same thing, but the way you come to the answers start in a different place.
  
  Content gap is looking at all the content and finding something in a subject that no one has covered - so you create something that fills that gap.
  
  Intent gap is when someone asks a question that could mean multiple things - and it`s finding the thing that hasn`t been covered in terms of the question itself.
  
  2d
• 
  Sadat Rayid Odowa: Stockbridge Truslow greetings to you sir, am confused about something, let`s assume i want to write an article around the keyword "black hen eggs". If I search the querry "black hen eggs" on google, I notice that google is showing pages which are targeting a more popular term like "eggs". However if I search intitle:"black hen eggs", I notice that the are pages on google which are directly targeting the keyword "black hen eggs" in there title and through out the the page`s content. So this makes me think that google is ignoring pages which are directly targeting the keyword "black hen eggs" and instead showing pages targeting a popular term "eggs". Is it right to go ahead and write an article about "black hen eggs" yet google is already ignoring pages targeting the keyword in the title and instead google is ranking pages targeting a popular term "eggs" for the querry "black hen eggs"?
  
  1d
• 
  Stockbridge Truslow: On my page, I`m not seeing just "eggs" - I`m seeing "eggs" that were laid by a "black hen" or a "black chicken" or even some asking if "black chickens" can lay "black eggs"
  
  It`s following the word "black" - but substituting "chicken" and "hen" because ultimately they are the same thing.
  
  It`s not ignoring them because they have the keyword in the title - it`s exactly what I`m talking about. These pages are giving information about (or pictures of) the two things people might be asking about. Either "Black Eggs" or "Eggs laid by black chickens".
  
  This is a tough term to analyze because it is ambiguous. Black hens? Black eggs? You can`t be sure what the person wants. So... all we can really learn from this is that a "hen" is a "chicken" and an egg from a hen is properly called a "chicken egg" not a "hen egg".
  
  1d