This is a complete guide to Keyword Research in SEO.
In this article, we are going to discuss everything concerning keyword research in SEO. We are going to define keyword research, discuss its importance, and how to find keyword ideas.
Table of Contents
What is a Keyword?
A keyword is a phrase or word that people enter into the search engines to find content.
Keyword research is an aspect of a business. It helps in the online market campaign and has proven a successful method of campaigning. The keywords help to rank your site higher among the top searches, every time people search for them. A keyword is anything someone puts on Google to search.
In this article, we will discuss everything that involves keyword research, its advantages, and more.
What is Keyword Research?
Keyword Research is the process of searching for the relevant words or phrases that people use in search engines to improve the content and rank higher in the search engines. Keyword research helps to find the keywords that are mostly searched by potential customers. The results help in deciding on what terms of marketing to employ.
During the keyword research process, you can come up with keywords that you can use to suede your target audience to your website and also to get keywords that you can use to rank best in the search engines.
You are also able to know the exact words/phrases to use. You can then use the keywords to come up with content that will attract more traffic to your website and increase your Google search volume.
Keyword research is a continuous process that never ends. A business needs to do keyword research regularly to keep up with trends and continue ranking high in the search engines.
Importance of Keyword Research in SEO
Keyword research is essential because it impacts every other SEO task you perform. It helps in finding content topics, on-page SEO, and content marketing.
Keyword research helps a website to rank high in search engines. Using keyword variations helps your website to rank high on search engines because you use keywords that are already having high traffic.
Keyword research helps you to target the phrases that are beneficial to the website. It guides you through optimizing keywords that can help people to find your business online.
Proper keyword research helps you to do search engine optimization and pay per click campaign. It also creates content that will be helpful for your visitors. You can determine the type of information people are searching for. While doing this, don’t target the most popular keywords as they are competitive. They sometimes are difficult to rank.
You should improve your site and create valuable and useful content. Doing this helps you to gain leads by driving relevant visitors to your website.
Keyword research helps you to know what your competitors are doing to attract visitors. It serves as a guide for you, and, by following their lead, you can also attract visitors to your website.
How to Find Keyword Ideas?
The next step is to find keyword ideas. You can find keyword ideas by;
Brainstorming. You can find ideas by taking your time and think about your topics. After coming up with the list, you can then derive keyword ideas from there.
Wikipedia table of contents. You can get keyword ideas from the listed subtopics on Wikipedia.
Study your Niche
Studying your niche involves researching your market extensively and discovering new keyword ideas that do not exist and improving on them. You can know the needs and preferences of your customers (both potential and existing customers). You study your niche by;
- Talking to your existing customers. By talking to them, you can know them better and, you are also able to find their needs.
- Participating in all your niche communities and network.
Studying your niche helps you to find things that your potential customers are struggling with that you did not discover when using keyword tools. You are also able to find new trends in topics that you would otherwise not have discovered initially.
Your customers are also a basis for providing you with keyword ideas. Using the findings after dealing with them, you can serve them well and attract new potential customers.
Define Goals
After studying your niche, you need to come up with goals. The goals will guide your decision on the topics and the keywords you are going to create. Defining your goals helps to derive many keywords and, this informs you to know which keywords to choose and the keywords to ignore.
Your goals should help you improve your brand awareness, convert leads, attract new clients and website visitors, and help you make sales.
Different keywords have different results. Popular keywords have a high search volume and high traffic, while less popular keywords have less traffic but have more conversions (their conversion rate is high).
Therefore, it is nice to know your goals to find the keywords to focus on and emphasize. Doing this ensures that at no time you’ll have a conflict on keywords or have misguided agendas when dealing with keywords.
Prepare a List of Topics
The next step is to prepare a list of topics. To create a topic list, you either use google sheets or Microsoft excel. To build your topic list, we are going to use two tools; Google keyword planner and Ubersuggest.
You prepare your topic list by using a Google search bar. Google search suggestions help you to get topic ideas.
You can also use YouTube Autocomplete as a source of topic ideas. YouTube is a subsidiary of Google and can, therefore, be used to see what people are searching for in search engines. The only disclaimer with using YouTube as a source of topic ideas is that it will not work for all businesses. YouTube helps you to get unique and different topics that you can use to get the content you need.
You can also use the Google Search console. Google search console helps you to see the keywords that are already ranking.
Another one could be Ahrefs. It provides information on the topics your competitors are using and the keywords they are already ranking.
After gathering all this information, proceed to make a list. You can use Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel to achieve this. While preparing the keyword list, make sure you consider the needs of your target audience. From the list, derive keywords that are important to your target market.
Identifying Seed Keywords
Seed keywords are short words comprising of one or two phrases describing primary words that describe your product or service. When used in a keyword explorer tool, they generate a long list of keyword phrases. Seed keywords generate words that help us better understand the topics important to our business.
Seed keywords define your niche and also help you to identify your competitors. Seed keywords also help you know the phrases people might use on the search engines to find the product.
You can identify the seed keywords using different ways. Namely;
- Consider all the terms that are directly associated with your product or service. You should do research and get to know all the keywords associated directly with your products or service and, then you can generate seed keywords.
- Examine the search intent. You should find the reason for giving rise to the search engines’ queries and find seed keywords.
- Study your competitor’s keywords. Go through your competitor’s sites to see the keywords they are ranking for and then prepare a list of long-tail keywords with low competition and high conversion rates.
- Research on the related search terms on Google. You should search for keywords that people search on the search engines and which come from parent keywords. Doing this helps you to unlock new sources for traffic to your website.
Seed keywords are the foundation for your keyword research and need to be related to your topics and should term your target audience might be looking for or searching on the search engines.
Generate Keyword Ideas
The next step is to generate keyword ideas. You can find keyword ideas using different approaches. Namely;
- Finding low competition keywords with high search volume. These keywords have a high probability of ranking high on Google. You can find low competition keywords by setting a low keyword difficulty score and a minimum required search volume.
- You should find keywords that are having SERP features. You should look for keywords that have features like ads, videos, and questions.
- You should find commercial keywords with low competition. To find low competition keywords with buyer intent, you can set the maximum difficulty (a bit high) like 10-20 and set the minimum cost per click value between two to five (half the previous amount).
- You should find bottom-funnel keywords. Bottom funnel keywords help you to come up with the right keywords. They also help you to find content ideas that can easily convert leads to clients.
Keyword Research Tools
You can generate keyword ideas using different research tools by;
- SEMrush: Studying your competitor Research. For this step, you should use SEMrush. Keying in your competitor’s URL in SEMrush shows you the most popular pages that are ranking for your competitors. Doing this helps you to come up with the right keywords to use. It also tells you what your competitors are doing differently from you.
- Ahrefs: Key in the information on popular pages that you had derived from your competitors on Ahrefs. The links will provide you with information on all the keywords your competitors are ranking for and their backlinks. Doing this helps you to decide on the keywords to use to drive traffic to your site.
- Google search console: Google search console is a free research tool that helps you know the keywords with high traffic and those with a high conversion rate. You can find lots of keywords in the Google Search Console that may be relevant for you.
- From your customer’s feedback: You can generate keyword ideas from the feedback you get from your customers and the questions they ask. The information they give contains information on your products and, from there, it gives rise to new ideas. The new ideas could be something your customers need improvement on or something that was not available previously. You should, therefore, take your customers seriously and not ignore their compliments, complaints, or questions.
Competitor Research
The first step into competitor research is identifying your competitors. You can find your competitors by searching for one of your seed keywords and checking all the sites that rank on the seed keywords’ first page. All those sites automatically become your competitors.
Identifying the keywords, your competitors are ranking for is essential. From that initial list, you can build your keyword list.
You also do competitor research by identifying the links of your competitor’s ranking pages. The links provide useful information that you can use to find meaningful content.
To conduct keyword research, you add seed keywords to the Keyword Explorer. You are then able to get new ideas. You can then build up a list of the keyword ideas, filter the keywords, and pick those with a high conversion rate. While selecting the keywords to use, consider the search intent, and also check for relevance.
After finding the keywords, the next step is to create a keyword strategy. In this step, you evaluate your keywords, check the competition, and the volume, and compare their performance to that of your competitors. You also gauge their profitability and finally select the keywords to use.
Find Keyword Gaps
The next step is to find keyword gaps. In the process of conducting keyword gap analysis, you discover keyword gaps in your competitor’s website and optimize them for your website.
To do a keyword gap analysis, we are going to use the SEMrush keyword gap. It offers a comparison for keyword profiles for up to 5 competitors. It has unique features that are so essential and helpful. The features include;
Keyword type. Doing this helps to compare different types of keywords.
Top opportunities. This feature provides the best keyword opportunities for the site in the first field.
Keyword overlap. Keyword overlap shows the overlap of keywords among different competitors.
Keyword table. The keyword table shows weak, missing, untapped, unique, shared, strong keywords, and all keywords between the competitors.
Finding keyword gaps helps you to come up with unique content for your site. It also helps you to discover the keywords your competitors are ranking for and you are not. Keyword gaps are also a source of fresh/new keyword ideas.
Find Low Competition Keywords
Low competition keywords are keywords that have no link building and, also mostly they lack domain authority
To find low competition keywords;
- Target long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are keywords with three or more words in a phrase. The keywords are specific, have a low search volume, and a high conversion rate.
- Expand your keyword list. You should expand your keyword list and filter it to keywords that you want to use for your target audience. Increasing your keyword list helps you find some of the keywords you had ignored and which could be important to your audience.
- Use Ahrefs content explorer. The content explorer filters pages that are not ranking and also filters sites with low traffic.
- Competitor research. You can also find low competition keywords by looking at your competitor keyword list and seeing the ranking competitor’s keywords. From there, you can pick keywords that align with your business and target audience.
- You should talk to your customer care department. You can generate new keyword ideas by talking to your customer care team and, from the feedback and questions, they receive keyword ideas. You should improve the keyword ideas from them and filter them out. Doing this helps you to know the information missing from your site that is crucial.
Find Long Tail Keywords
Long-tail keywords are keywords with three or more words in a phrase. The keywords are specific, have a low search volume, and a high conversion rate.
Long-tail keywords are used in Google ads campaigns & SEO to improve the content to rank high in search engines. To find long-tail keywords, you can use the following tools;
- Google Ads (Google keyword planner). The tool helps you to find any keyword you need for your business. To find long-tail keywords, you can use landing pages and then filter. You are then able to fetch the long-tail keywords related to the landing pages. To find top searches, you should rank the pages by average monthly searches.
- SEMrush: You can search for a keyword and get a long list of keywords. Filter out the long-tail keywords with low competition and you’re good to go.
- Ubersuggest is an SEO tool that digs for keywords. It provides long variations of seed keywords.
- Browse the Q&A site. Another good source of long-tail keywords is browsing through the Q&A site. Questions mostly consist of more than three words, therefore, making them long-tail keywords. Prepare a list of sites before you start using one.
- Google suggest. It will give many ideas and solutions for keyword ideas. Google suggests is a good source for long-tail keywords. To find the keywords, just key in a primary keyword, and google provides many suggestions for you to choose.
Find Related Keywords
Related keywords are phrases that are similar to primary keywords. Finding these keywords unlocks new sources of traffic to your site. Keyword research expands the breadth of the web content coverage of your niche topics. It also determines which variations have the most relative search volume. It captures traffic from searchers who may be using less popular keywords.
You should not only improve your site around keywords that are closely related to your keywords. You do this because your potential customers search for other keywords when not searching for your products or selling.
Google is also a good source for related keywords. It provides suggestions for the related keywords to the seed keyword people are searching for. Check the suggestions in Google autocomplete, people may ask, related searches at the bottom of the page, and related videos.
Identify Keywords based on Intent
The next step is to identify keywords based on intent. Search intent is the queries that people search in search engines to find webpages.
Reasons for search intent.
- To boost time on site and engagement. We use the intent to improve both on-site engagement and time-on-site numbers.
- To show that you understand your visitors and that you are fulfilling their needs.
- To stand out from search engine SPAM. You should create your content for your visitor’s needs and, this helps you to stand out.
- To build trust. Intent builds trust because you fulfill all your customer’s needs. They are then able to trust you and your content because it is to their needs.
You can classify into four keywords;
- Informational keywords. These are queries whose goal is to find specific information or answers.
- Commercial keywords. These are queries whose goal is to influence purchasing decisions. These queries are not for conversions but often involve comparisons. Commercial keywords are essential to the business because they bring traffic to the website.
- Navigational keywords. These are queries that mostly involve brands. Customers use navigational keywords when they are looking for a specific company.
- Transactional keywords. These are used by customers when buying a product. They contain words like for sale and purchase.
There are four types of intent. Namely;
- Information intent. Informational intent is when users are looking for information.
- Consideration intent. Consideration intent is when users are thinking about whether to buy a product or service.
- Transactional intent. Transaction intent is when the users are ready to buy the product or service. The customers will always look or words like buy, discount, and product name.
- Location intent. Location intent is the search to find where the seller’s location is.
Benefits of intent
- Users love your content more and spent a lot of time on your site. Google will also display your content more.
- You will build trust.
- Your recommendations will be received well. Users will receive your information well because they trust you.
- Intent reduces bounce rate, has audience reach, and receives a lot of questions and feedback from users.
To rank in organic search, make sure your content and page match the search intent. Doing this ensures that your pages rank high in the search engines.
Find already Ranking Keywords and Improve them
The next step is to find keywords that you rank for and improving them. You can find keywords that you rank for by using a Keyword explorer. The keyword explorer has a ranking keyword table that shows you your domain page, ranking in the top ranking positions, page authority, and domain authority.
You can also track your ranking keywords to see how they are performing alongside your competitors. You can know your site URL ranking.
The next step after finding the keywords you are ranking for, you then improve them. You can rank keywords by;
- Publishing relevant content. By publishing quality and relevant content, you can increase the traffic of your site. Relevant content improves your site’s authority.
- You should update your content regularly. If you use the same content always, your users will be bored by the monotonous content. To change this, you need to regularly update your site content and always ensure you have fresh content.
- You should have a link-worthy site. Ensure you create relevant links in the text. The links should be direct. Use descriptive links to add value to your readers and to improve your search engine optimization.
- Give page titles to your pages. Giving page titles to your pages helps search engines and users. The page is what people see on the search engine result page. By adding a title to your page, you get more clicks.
- Have a mobile-friendly design and a page speed. You should ensure that your page is mobile-friendly and adhere to the current technology improvements because many people will access the pages using a mobile device. Therefore, it is wise to ensure your page speed is ok and you should put a lot of focus on images and content.
- Use alt tags with your images. You should ensure that your pages have content with pictures and ensure that they use alt descriptive tags for those images.
What are the Different Types of Keywords?
They are different types of keywords that are very useful. The keywords include;
- Short-tail keywords. Short-tail keywords are keywords with two or fewer phrases. They have a high search volume, short-tail keywords also have low conversion rates and broad search intent.
- Long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are keywords comprising three or more phrases.
- Long-tail keywords have a less monthly search and have a specific search intent. The keywords also have a high conversion rate.
- Evergreen keywords. Evergreen keywords are keywords that are always relevant. Their search volume is always fluctuating, and hard to predict their search volume. The keywords have a specific search intent, a high conversion rate, and a moderate search volume.
- Product defining keywords. Product defining keywords are keywords that describe your products. Product-defining keywords have a low search volume, low competition rate, specific search intent, and a high conversion rate.
- Generic keywords. Generic keywords are keywords that have a general intent. The keywords have a high search volume, low search intent, and a low conversion rate. They are hard to rank.
- Customer defining keywords. Customer-defining keywords are keywords that address your target audience. Customer-defining keywords have a low search volume, low competition rate, specific search intent, and a high conversion rate.
- LSI keywords. LSI keywords are thematic keywords. They are thematic because they are closely related to the main keyword. LSI keywords have a low search volume, low competition rate, specific search intent, and a high conversion rate.
- Short-term fresh keywords. Short-term fresh keywords are keywords that are up-to-date and recent. We use keywords to create up-to-date content.
- Geo-targeting keywords. Geo-targeting keywords are keywords that target a specific place (neighborhood, city, state, country). The keywords are mostly used by local businesses to target clients in a geographical area. The keywords have a specific search intent, low search volume, low competition rate, and a high conversion rate. The keywords are important to the local business that want to establish a good local SEO.
Keyword Research Tools Overview
Keyword research tools are tools used to research the keywords. Before doing any keyword research, you will need to have tools to facilitate the keyword research. The choice for the tools to use depends on the needs and the budget available.
They are two types of research tools, namely;
Free keyword tools. These are keyword tools that are available for free. One does not pay anything to use them. The tools include, but are not limited to; google keyword planner, keyword.io, keyword everywhere.
Paid keyword tools. Paid keyword tools are keyword tools that you purchase before using them. They include but are not limited to SEMrush, Ubersuggest, Ahrefs.
Semrush
SEMrush is a paid SEO tool that facilitates keyword research. SEMrush tells you the exact keywords your site already ranks. Before using SEMrush, you have to purchase it.
SEMrush facilitates search engine optimization. SEMrush helps you to focus on the keywords, improve them, and make them better for them to rank high in the search engines.
We use SEMrush for content marketing. We do this through the use of the SEMrush Content Marketing Platform that provides solutions for developing a content strategy. Content marketing also creates content for your site.
SEMrush conducts keyword research, tracks the competitors’ keyword strategy, runs the SEO audit for your blog post, and looks for backlinking opportunities. SEMrush takes the organic position for a domain and the Landing URL on Google Search Engine Result Page.
SEMrush collects its data from Google Ad works and search results. The data provides you with information on your online traffic.
Advantages of SEMrush
SEMrush builds a content strategy that is based on competition understanding and targeting traffic. SEMrush is a research tool that we use to create a content strategy after carefully evaluating the competitor
SEMrush identifies new keyword opportunities. SEMrush identifies keywords that we later use as keywords for your business.
SEMrush provides information on competitors. SEMrush provides competitor information such as the keywords they use for their Ads, the traffic generated by the Ads, the cost of running the Ads, and the competitors’ domain.
Better marketing strategy. SEMrush provides information about your competitor’s marketing strategy. You can then use the information to compare your marketing strategy to theirs and improving on areas where they are ahead of you.
Ahrefs
Ahrefs is an SEO tool that helps you grow your website traffic, research competitors, and dominate your niche. We use Ahrefs in many different ways. You can use Ahrefs to;
Find content opportunities based on your competitors’ pages to get the most search traffic. Ahrefs finds the domain of your competitors. You also know the top page ranking based on the organic search traffic they get.
Research the quality of your competitor’s backlinks and understand how they got them.
Find low competition topics with high traffic potential.
Find keyword data from 10 different search engines. Using keyword content explorer, you will find the keyword difficulty, search volume clicks, and more keyword information.
Find many relevant guest blogging sites. You can find this information by the use of content explorer.
Scan your website for over 100 SEO technical issues. Use Technical SEO to find these issues. Click on the overview report >>> click on the table at the bottom. The table will show you all the SEO technical issues. There are also links on your page pointing at them.
Conduct Rank tracking. Using Ahrefs, you can see where your pages rank in google. The rank tracker shows your competitors ‘ reports. There is also a SERP (search engine result page) feature tracking that shows features visible in SERP and their history.
Google Keyword Planner
Google keyword planner is a free keyword research tool available for anyone with a Google Ads Account. Google keyword planner is used to build your search networks campaigns. Google keyword planner is the most preferred keyword research tool by most people.
Google keyword planner finds new ideas for a keyword campaign. It expands the existing Ad campaign. Google keyword planner gives you an idea of how keywords will perform when you target them in an account.
Google keyword planner sets a budget, project CPC bids, shows conversion rates, average conversion value, and finds information to use in the monthly projections for the campaign.
Google keyword planner conducts historical statistics & forecasts. It gives you an understanding of how often people are searching and the exact keywords people search.
Set up process
To set up google keyword planner;
Go to Ads.com and click on the sign-in option to log in to your google account. Enter your email and website and skip the guided setup. Confirm the settings and click Save and continue. Save creates an account for you. Click on the Tools>>>Keyword planner. The Find keywords tab gives you keyword ideas, and the Get search volume and forecast tab we use when you have keywords that you want to study.
UberSuggest
UberSuggest is an SEO tool that generates ideas based on popularity. UberSuggest gives you keywords that are not in the Google keyword planner. UberSuggest also generates revenue. It has both a paid version and the free version. UberSuggest analyses your website SEO status and keyword positioning.
UberSuggest also tracks your competitors and their top-ranking pages. It tracts your competitors and gathers information on their ranking pages and all the keywords they are ranking.
UberSuggest generates ideas and gives you data on each keyword. It discovers new keywords and finds search volume, SEO difficulty, paid difficulty, and cost per click(CPC).
Keyword Metrics Overview
Keyword metrics are also known as key performance indicators we use to measure your keyword rankings to understand how your SEO efforts drive traffic to your site.
Keyword metrics improve your click-through rates(CTR) for your keywords. It also improves the rankings for keywords. It is good to know what each of the keyword metrics means to focus and decide on which keyword metrics to use.
Keyword metrics include but are not limited to; the search volume, difficulty, cost per click(CPC), estimated click.
Keyword metrics are an essential part of keyword research, you should not ignore them.
Search Volume
Search volume is the number of times someone keys in a phrase or word on the search engines in a month. It is the number of times that keyword phrase is searched on Google every month for the last year.
Knowing the searches a keyword phrase has in a month, you can know how much traffic that keyword has. The higher the search volume, the better it is.
If your business has a local market, then your focus should be on local search volume. Misguided keyword research may ignore a global market. You should focus on the global search volume.
Google keyword planner is a tool you use when searching or conducting the search volume. Although google keyword planner is good, it has a disclaimer. Google keyword planner does not show the search volume for keywords that you cannot run in the Addons in Google Adon Program. If your business line is a business that we cannot find in the Google Ads, you cannot find any volume data for your keywords.
Search volume is not a good predictor of traffic. When searching for a site’s traffic, you should not use search volume as your base because it provides incorrect findings.
Difficulty
The difficulty is a metric that measures competition levels. It has both the on-page difficulty score and the off-page difficulty score.
The on-page difficulty score tells you how the top 10 searches are for the specified keyword. You use Google to find the top ten results scored and then analyze these sites to see whether they have keywords in their title, description, heading tags, and HTML content. From the results, you get each site’s total score. You then normalize the total between zero and a hundred. This number helps us to know whether your keyword will rank. If the number is low, you may rank by putting the keywords in the right places.
Off-page difficulty tells you the backlinks for the top 10 results in google research. We use them to show domain authority, page authority, and referring authority. You should come up with a score for each of the top 10 results and total up the score and normalize it between 0 and 100. Doing this will tell you how many quality links you will need to rank on the first page. This information tells you how easy or tough it is to rank for a specific keyword.
An ideal keyword difficulty will use both on-page difficulty and off-page difficulty to calculate its ranking factors.
Cost Per Click (CPC)
Cost per click tells you whether other companies in your industry are running Ads on keyword phrases and whether it’s profitable to run those keywords.
You should know all the CPCs of all the main keywords of your industry. If you find a keyword with a low CPC, you should research more information on the keyword to know why someone is not advertising. Sometimes, the keyword might have a small issue that is solved. This might also turn out to be a golden opportunity for you, and if you optimize the keyword, you can yield great results.
Cost per click finds the probability of your leads converting to customers. The advantage of using CPC is that you only pay per click, but the disadvantage is that some clicks can be misleading. Some people click on anything they find in advertisements even when they are not interested in it. You then pay for clicks that will not yield anything.
You can calculate CPC by dividing the cost of paid advertising by the number of clicks.
CPC = Advertisement costs/ Number of clicks
Average Cost Per Click. Average Cost Per Click is the average advert cost an advertiser spends for every Ad click. We calculate the average by dividing the total cost of clicks by the number of clicks.
Average Cost Per Click = Total cost of clicks/ Number of clicks
Estimated Clicks
An estimated click is an essential keyword metric when conducting keyword research. A click is when someone comes to your site and clicks on your Ads. Estimated clicks are the number of clicks you are projecting to find on your website.
Clicks help you to know how people are receiving your brand. They show their thoughts to your brands and how they perceive them. If you want to improve your brand awareness, you need to focus on clicks and impressions.
If clicks rise, there may be an opportunity to increase the search volume by increasing your budget and getting increasing your keyword bids. An increase in the search volume shows that your content reaches the target audience with the right keywords. If the clicks are down, there could be an issue with your Ads. Maybe your Ads are not appealing to your customers and, there’s a need to improve and pump them up to get more clicks.
The number of clicks you get on your Ads depends on the amount of money you spend on advertising and the Ad’s persuasiveness.
To calculate your clicks, you use CTR. CTR evaluates the user reach and the effectiveness of your Ad campaign.
Keyword Research Terms(Glossary)
The glossary defines terms found in this article.
Search Volume. The total number of searches the keyword has in a month.
Cost Per Click(CPC). The average cost per click charged on a Google Ad.
Global monthly searches. The average user queries for the searches in the search engines for the whole country in 12 months.
Search Intent. The reason behind a query in the search engines.
Seed Keywords. Seed keywords are keywords describing primary words that describe your product or service.
Long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords are keywords comprising three or more phrases.
Short-tail keywords. Short-tail keywords are keywords comprising of two or fewer phrases.
Search Query. The questions that people search in search engines to find the webpages.
Related keywords. Related keywords are keywords that are similar to your primary keywords.
Keyword Cannibalization. Keyword cannibalization is when we use the same keywords to optimize multiple pages.
Search Engine Result Page(SERP). The phrase we see after searching.
Blue links. The format used by search engines to display search results often appearing in the same format.
The average cost per click. The average advertisement cost an advertiser spends on every Ad click.
On-page difficulty. The score that tells you how the top 10 searches are for the specified keyword
Off-page difficulty. The difficulty that tells you the backlinks for the top 10 results in google research
Start your Keyword Research
We define Keyword research as the process of finding words and phrases that people use in search engines. Keyword research provides a base for you to rank better in the search engines.
After doing your keyword research and finding all the content you need, the next step is to start your keyword research. In this step, you analyze all the keywords your site ranks for and also the potential opportunities.
The information available guides you in choosing the best keywords for each topic. You filter The long keyword list and divide it into specific topics. You will group your keywords according to your target audience and the search intent. You will also group them depending on the needs you want to satisfy.
In this step, you will also know how your keywords are performing.
Keyword Research FAQ
Many people ask very many questions on keyword research. We are going to list some of the most asked questions. These questions are;
What is a keyword?
The answer to this question is:
A keyword is a phrase or word that people enter into the search engines to find content.
What is keyword research?
The answer to this question is:
Keyword Research is the process of searching for the relevant words or phrases that people use in search engines to optimize content and rank high in search engines.
What are long-tail keywords?
The answer to this question is:
A long-tail keyword is keyword comprising three or more phrases.
What are the short-tail keywords?
The answer to this question is:
Short tail keywords are keywords comprising of one or two phrases.
What are the different types of keywords?
The answer to this question is:
- Long-tail keywords
- Short tail keywords
- LSI keywords
- Seed keywords
- Generic keywords
What is SERP?
The answer to this question is:
Search Engine Result Page(SERP). The phrase we see after searching.
What are the sources of keyword ideas?
The answer to this question is:
- Competitor research
- Studying your niche
- Defining your goals
- Finding already ranking keywords
What is the Click-Through Rate?
The answer to this question is:
Click-Through Rate is the number of clicks an advertiser receives as per impressions.
What is Cost Per Click?
The answer to this question is:
Cost Per Click(CPC). The average cost per click charged on a Google Ad.
What is PPC?
The answer to this question is:
Pay Per Click is the amount an advertiser pays every time someone clicks on their Ad.
These are some of the questions people ask. Above are the answers to some of those favorite questions that people ask. The list does not include all the questions people ask because they are numerous and inexhaustible.
Pro Tip #1: Prioritize your Keyword List
When conducting keyword research, prioritize your keywords. Ensure that you do not overstuff the keywords. Make sure when you are composing your keyword list, the keywords are not overstuffed as they can lead to boredom.
Use just enough. Use enough keywords to show your content. The keywords should not exceed a maximum of 1000 words. Using enough keywords ensures that your content is enjoyable and does not have repetition.
Prioritizing your keywords ensures you have quality content that ranks high in search engines, driving traffic to your website. Prioritizing your keyword list is an important tip that should not be side-lined.
Pro Tip #2: Avoid Keyword Cannibalization
A key phrase is a search term you use so that your page can rank for it. The main reason for using a key phrase is to ensure that people search in the search engines they see you every time. The key phrase is a single word that consists of a few words.
When creating your content, use a keyphrase once in your website. Using a key phrase avoids keyword cannibalization. Keyword Cannibalization. Keyword cannibalization is when we use the same keywords to optimize multiple pages.
This tip is essential to the research in that, the tip ensures your content is not repetitive and also that your content is engaging to your users. Users can enjoy the content that you give them.
Pro Tip #3: Get to the Bottom of User Intent
When doing keyword research, make sure to get to the bottom of the user intent. Search Intent is the reason behind a query in the search engines.
While doing keyword research, focus on the intent as it is the driving force for keyword research. Customers will always search for the things they need and, therefore, doing this comes a long way in ensuring that you have traffic on your site.
You should also focus on the search volume. Although search volume is essential, your main focus should be getting to the bottom of the user intent.
These three tips should be followed to achieve good content.
MISTAKES TO AVOID.
When doing keyword research, there mistakes to avoid. Namely;
1. Avoid overstuffing. When you overstuff your keywords, you may get a penalty for it. Overstuffing also becomes very boring for your visitors to read the same keywords or loads of keywords on all pages, and they lose interest quickly.
2. Keyword cannibalization. Keyword cannibalization is when we use the same keywords to optimize multiple pages. Doing this makes your pages compete with each other.
3. Avoid not doing research. You should not assume to know keywords and then avoid researching the keywords. This mistake leads you to miss keyword opportunities and often causes you traffic on your website.
4. Avoid the use of irrelevant keywords. Lack of proper keyword research or not researching at all may lead to you focusing on words that potential customers are not going to need.
5. You should not aim at unrealistic keywords. When doing keyword research, focus on long-tail keywords that have a high conversion rate. Avoid unrealistic keywords.
Wrapping Up
This article provides us with useful information. This article gives a step-by-step guide on how to conduct keyword research. The article discusses keyword research in SEO. It also defines keyword research and discusses its importance and how to find keyword ideas.
The information in this article simplifies keyword research for everyone. This article also warns us about the mistakes to avoid when we are doing keyword research. This article also contains information on the different research tools available and how to use them.
If you follow the guide, you will be able to conduct keyword research and enjoy the benefits that come with good keyword research. One of the best advantage is you will gain traffic for your website. Please follow the guide and enjoy the benefits of Keyword research in SEO.