Why am i not ranking in the top 50 for the keyword 'cocktails' even though all my other cocktail related keywords are in the first 2 pages of Google???

[cocktailboss]

I have checked the first 50 pages of google for my website www.socialandcocktail.co.uk using the keyword 'cocktails'.  It is NOT to be found.  However, if I search for other keyword combinations eg cocktail recipes, cocktail bars etc  they are all in the first 2 pages!  What is going on????????

[MoosaHemani]

There can be many reasons why you are not ranking for a generic one word key phrase in Google!

1. May be you don’t have enough links or/and on-page SEO pointing to the website that supports your website to appear in the top 50 pages in Google for the desired term.
2. This can be the result of over optimization, Just be looking in to your home page’s title I can say that there is an over use of the desired key term there!

I think if you re analyse your SEO strategies that you are currently implementing on the blog probably you will find out what exactly is the probably and I hope fixing that will allow the website to appear in first 50 pages and then you can optimize accordingly to hit the first few pages of Google!

[the_timallen]

I would also question if a user was searching for just "cocktails" what their intent is? I would focus on slightly longer tail phrases and make the content very relative to those phrases.

So after having a quick look around your site the sort of phrases I would perhaps focus on would be, "non alcoholic cocktails", "how to make cocktails"

Try to think like the user and build pages for them.