10 tips and tricks for easy keyword research

Keyword research is fundamental to any successful SEO campaign, ensuring you are targeting relevant terms which your audience are using to search for your service or product. Of course, our experts can work alongside you to identify and target these when starting any new project, but it’s nice to understand the process.

Here are our 10 tips to help you successfully identify and target those keywords.

1. Make the most of a simple Google search

Start simple, search for your service on Google. Review the results that appear for the term, which content is ranking and whether your content is also relevant for that term.

Keep an eye on the suggested and related searches, these are terms and phrases which are similar to what you searched and can be great long tail targets.

2. User generated content

Any user generated content available to you is a great place to start finding potential keywords. Take a look at what phrases your current customers use to describe your service or products – usually these will also be the terms new users are searching for.

Here are some examples of user content to review for keywords:

• Reviews
• Submitted FAQs
• Email correspondence
• Social Media comments and engagement
• Internal search data

3. Google keyword planner

Once you have identified some potential keywords, Google Keyword Plannercan be used to analyse the monthly search volume and difficulty of the terms. You can use this data to target keywords based on these metrics. Be aware, while a search volume of 10,000 may look enticing, usually these are the terms with very high difficulties and more competition. A great strategy is to target both high volumes and lower volumes with lower difficulties. The lower search volumes often have more chance of converting as the search is more specific and niche, so find these terms and make sure they are relevant to you.

4. Don’t fear long tail keywords

This moves us on nicely to long tail keywords. These are longer, more specific terms that have a relatively low search volume. A head keyword is a more generic term with a greater search volume. The important thing to note here is that long tail keyword users often have a stronger intent to buy and are looking for a specific product or service, therefore are more likely to convert successfully.

5. Make use of Google Analytics

Tucked away under the acquisition tab is Google Search Console. If not already, you will need to set this up by following the link within this tab of Analytics. Once integrated, you can view Queries your customers are already using to get to your content. This can help you optimise existing content, as well as target variations with new pieces of content.

Another great place for inspiration is your top viewed pages, found under the site content tab within analytics. Usually, the top URL for most sites will be their homepage, but which other pieces of content are driving traffic? Reviewing these and considering surrounding topics can help identify content gaps and potential keywords.

6. Research competitor keywords

Understanding your competitors is key to many areas of business, and researching keywords is no exception. Evaluate what they are ranking well for, what they are not, and what content they have which is being linked to. Using tools like the free Google Keyword Planneror the more advanced ahrefscan help provide details on keywords your competitors are targeting. Whether you compare this to your own lists to confirm your direction or find new keywords to target, the information is vital for both avoiding common mistakes and understanding your market. Of course, you first need to be clear on who those competitors are – at times different areas of your services may have different competitors. Identifying these successfully is vital for keyword research success.

7. Optimise older content

As exciting as it is to plan lots of new landing pages and blogs, these take time to create. Use existing content which is relevant for newly identified keywords and optimise it for these terms. This can be a great way to give some old content which is no longer driving traffic a breath of life and put it to some use. Use data of which pages are driving the least traffic and see if there is a better keyword to target which can drive more conversions.

8. Phrase matching and PPC

PPC (pay per click)or search advertising is another area to use your research. When setting up these ads, it is important to pay close attention to the match types. While there are uses for all of them, Phrase Match is great for gaining relevant traffic. It will show your ads on searches which include the meaning of your term. For example, as an online cake retailer your phrase match term could be ‘homemade cakes’, with phrase match your ads can appear for ‘buy homemade cakes’ or ‘homemade cakes delivered’ but wouldn’t appear for ‘how to make homemade cakes’ or ‘are homemade cakes better than shop bought’. This helps direct traffic from users who are likely to convert or engage – what we are all aiming for.

Our PPC expertscan help plan any ad campaigns you have coming up, whether Google Shopping ads, TikTok or Pinterest.

9. Use negative keywords

Also vital for setting up ads are negative keywords. This means keywords which are driving traffic which is looking for something you don’t offer. ‘Buy Laptops’ for a specialist online TV retailer for example. This helps stop your ads being shown to the wrong users and wasting valuable ad spend.

10. Use AI tools – ahrefs, answer the public etc

Why re-invent the wheel? Lots of powerful AI tools have already been created to help you sort data and predict results – so use them. Try ahrefsor SEMrushfor keyword, link and general SEO tracking. Next Chapter have access to these, among others, and can use them to provide support when you start a project.

As well as being free, AnswerThePublicis another great resource for keyword research. It helps discover what people are talking about regarding a topic.

Google’s Keyword Planner and Google Analytics are other examples of AI tools you can use, but we have already been through how these can help with your keyword research, so we won’t go on. And of course, there are many others we haven’t mentioned, and we apologise, but there are too many to list here.

Need more advice?

Still a bit baffled? Get in touch with Next Chapter, a new breed of SEO marketing agency. We offer Keyword research services to analyse your existing targets and suggest the ideal next steps for optimum rankings. Our SEO and content experts can also suggest content strategies to successfully convert this research into traffic and conversions.

Take a look at our range of expertiseand see if we can help with your next campaign.