Quick Steps to Accurate Keyword Research
The following guest tip is by Eric Gesinski
Most SEOs and internet marketers are already quite aware of Google’s free keyword tool. However, there are some details that you should pay attention to when you use this tool to get the best results when doing your keyword research here.
1) Make sure to show all columns. To do this, select the “Show/hide columns” drop down list, and choose “Show all”. The reason to do this is to check trending and to see what the average CPC (cost per click) is for top ranking on the paid results for these keywords.
2) Under “Match Type” in the right-most column, select “Exact”. This will show a much more accurate count for the keywords you are researching, since it gives a monthly count for that exact keyword (as opposed to all phrases containing that keyword in addition to phrases Google considers related to that keyword).
When you’ve done these things in this tool, you’ll get a better idea of the number of times these phrases are searched for, in addition to how much people are willing to spend to rank highly in the paid search listings. This can often indicate the higher quality keywords that may not get as much traffic but have good conversion value.
Ann Smarty
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40 Responses to “Quick Steps to Accurate Keyword Research”
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Also take a good look at the keywords themselves. Often when you see keywords as:
“buy keyword”, “keyword review” or “keyword cost”
You know exactly what the person is searching for and if you target those keywords you’ll often see less competition and very targeted visitors who convert very good.
is gogole keyword tool is accurate? I hav seem an article some where that dont use google Keyword tool for your keyword selection he suggested for wordtracker, which is the most accurate keyword research tool according to you?
Tom Demers Reply:
September 11th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Hey There,
Every keyword tool has a certain degree of inaccuracy baked in. Google’s is pretty good because they actually use their own data (and subsequently have access to way more than WT or other tools), but even Google’s data is subject to automation inflating numbers, and the numbers G gives you are aggressively rounded/estimated.
Basically with any keyword tool you want to look at the keywords as suggestions and the estimates as just that: estimates. Even if you rank #1 for a term you won’t get all the traffic, and it’s often difficult to extrapolate what sort of volume to expect from a number 3 or 7 ranking, etc. so it’s best to use keyword tools to give you some direction as to relative volume.
Hope that helps!
Rohit Reply:
September 14th, 2009 at 9:36 am
wow, thank you so much for the perfect details.
now I would like to say something to ANN, Ann when I tries to open your blog in Internet explorer it gets 403 error and working fine in firefox, pls check
Ann Smarty Reply:
September 14th, 2009 at 9:55 pm
Seems to work in both for me. Which IE version are you using?
Software Outsourcing Reply:
September 15th, 2009 at 10:45 am
I think I am using IE8 and when I tries to open your blog it says
Error 403
We’re sorry, but we could not fulfill your request for /quick-steps-to-accurate-keyword-research/363/ on this server.
You do not have permission to access this server.
Your technical support key is: 7aa0-858e-17f4-e8c8
You can use this key to fix this problem yourself.
If you are unable to fix the problem yourself, please contact lorenmichaelbaker at gmail.com and be sure to provide the technical support key shown above.
I’m starting to get to grips with Googles free keyword tool. I didn’t know about all these options though, or that when I search on a keyword unless I say exact I’m getting data about all searches related to it as well.
Thanks for this, good tips for me!
I’ve used Google keyword tool a few times but never noticed these other options. I will have to look at these properly and hopefully they will help me find better keywords. Thanks for these tips.
Nice tip Ann. Another idea is to leverage the “broad” or “phrase” match option to get an idea of volume for a “bucket” or “portfolio” of related keywords (if I built out a whole section of themed content around this, what sorts of traffic could I expect type of thing).
Tom
….and don’t forget to discount the count by @ 40% to account for the bloat caused by SEO’s obsessed with checking rankings multiple times a day
Nice tip Eric / Ann
-AD
very informative post One of the biggest mistakes you can make is to rely on free keyword research tools. In addition to our own keyword analysis tools and techniques, we use the Word tracker service to obtain the most accurate information available on the popularity of your keywords.
I’ve used Google keyword tool a few times but never noticed these other options very nice post thanks a lot.
I didn’t know about all these options though, or that when I search on a keyword unless I say exact I’m getting data about all searches related to it as well.thanks.
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I am little bit confused on 2nd point… that we should use “Exact” inteade of Phrase.
In addition to our own keyword analysis tools and techniques, we use the Word tracker service to obtain the most accurate information available on the popularity of your keywords.thanks.
Google’s is pretty good because they actually use their own data (and subsequently have access to way more than WT or other tools), but even Google’s data is subject to automation inflating numbers thanks for sharing this useful post with us.
I will have to look at these properly and hopefully they will help me find better keywords thanks for sharing this useful post with us.
I search on a keyword unless I say exact I’m getting data about all searches related to it as well very nice post thanks for sharing.
Good tricks of keyword researching. I don’t know about this functions. Thanks for information.
I found three sources on the web that I’ve found to work best for comparative numbers research. These are:
1. Google Adwords: Keyword Tool
2. MSN AdCenter: Research Keywords Tool
3. Wordtracker: Keyword Tool
The points you have specified are very much interesting.
Thanks for the great tip. I am in the process of doing keyword analysis and this is valuable info
Nice tip! It’s also good to note that instead of just looking at the search volume take note of the Advertiser Competition. This shows you how popular the keyword is with people running Google Ad campaigns and they’re paying money to bid on that keyword!
I’ve had some excellent results from keywords that have had quite low search volume, say 500 exacts, but their advertiser competition is 80-100%. These can be really good keywords to done some seo work on as they’re very often ‘buying keywords’
Finding the right keyword is important.Also finding out what your competitors is doing is even more important.
This is where you can get an edge by adding long tail keywords to your list.
As people become more savvy with sarch engines you find long tailed keywords are used by people willing to buy.
One word keywords tend to be random searches for people researching a specific subject.
Good steps to accurate keyword research. I will try myself now keyword research.
Sometimes you can get really excited by a keyword showing tens of thousands of searches, until you show exact searches and it’s just a fraction of that number!
I’m with 125cc Motorbikes. I never used exact match before but now the figures are actually more like what my analytics account is telling me, less but more realistic.
The tools are also great for providing UK specific data.
Good post about find accurate keyword research. Thanks for informative post.
I use seo book keyword tool and google adword external tool for keyword researching.
Hi Ann, thanks for the tip, never really know that there is this option, well better late then never.
Perfect tips for accurate keyword research. Now i’ll follow this tip for keyword researching.
Thanks alot for sharing such a nice post, I use Google Adwords keyword tool or iSponiage free service for keyword research, rest i fill on gut feelings.
nice post,it is helpful for me
Thanks for the Keyword advice i will implement this now
Is the local search in Googles adword keyword tool accurate ?
Thanks for the advice, particularly on doing an exact search as I have not been doing that and was getting very high search figures.
I have also use google insights for search, but it doesnt give figures, just trends.
This is amazing. I am really interested on knowing more on this keyword research topic. Been wondering what to use on mine.
Hi ! thanks a lot for sharing this post . the links are indeed very useful.