Popular and The Best Keyword Research Tools for SEO
5.00/5The first step to a successful SEO strategy is understanding what keywords you want to rank for. To discover these keywords, you must use the best keyword research tools. These tools will help you understand search volume, domain authority, and other factors that make it easier or harder to rank for them.
In this article, we will explore the world of keyword research and introduce you to different tools (paid and free).
Key Takeaways:
- Essentials of Keyword Research:
- Crucial for SEO success and improved SERP rankings.
- Keyword Types:
- Informational, Navigational, Commercial, Transactional.
- SEO Categories:
- Seed, Long Tail, Low-Competition, Niche, Brand, Competitor.
- Tools:
- Free: Google Keyword Planner, Search Console, Trends, Soovle, Moz.
- Paid: Ahrefs, KWFinder, Keywords Everywhere, SpyFu.
- Choosing the Right Tool:
- Consider budget, ease of use, and alignment with SEO goals.
- Start Smart:
- Begin with free tools, upgrade as needed.
What is SEO Keyword Research?
Keyword research is the process of identifying and analyzing specific words or phrases (keywords) that people use in search engines when looking for information, products, or services online. This practice is crucial for various digital marketing strategies, particularly search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising.
Importance of keyword research in SEO
Let’s start by answering the question… Why are keywords important?
Simply put, they are the guiding light for search engines to understand what your website or blog post is about to match it with users’ search queries.
By optimizing your website with focus keywords, you will increase your chances of appearing in the top positions of search engine results pages (SERPs).
However, deciding which keywords to use is not a matter of faith or luck. There is hard work behind it, and you must rely on the best keyword research tools.
These tools will help you understand the search volume (or how many people use it every month) and the difficulty of ranking for it. They give you valuable insight into the queries users are inputting to find relevant content on Google and other search engines.
Plus, if you use the inbound method, your goal is creating content around what people need or want. Keyword research is the most innovative and easiest way to understand that.
Different types of keyword
However, there are different types of keywords you can use. It’s important to learn the differences between them so you can decide which ones to use for each page and article you publish on your site.
User’s search intent
You can categorize keywords based on the user’s search intent. There are 4 types of keywords:
- Informational: The user wants to find information about a specific topic.
- Navigational: the user is looking for a particular page or website.
- Commercial: The user wants to learn more about a brand, product or service.
- Transactional: The user is ready to take an action (register, download, subscribe, buy, etc.).
SEO
You can also find keywords categorized by their use in terms of SEO:
- Seed: The starting point of your keyword research. Let’s say your business sells t-shirts and you want to rank a blog post about t-shirts for runners. Your seed keyword would be “t-shirt”.
- Long Tail Keyword: These are more specific terms that are less competitive, but get smaller amounts of monthly traffic. Staying with the same example, your long tail keyword would be “t-shirt for marathon runners”.
- Low-competition keyword: It’s usually easier to rank for these because not many brands are generating content for them. An example would be “blue t-shirt for marathon runners”.
- Niche keywords: Clear and very specific topics that appeal to a relatively small portion of the market. Example: “ethical t-shirt for marathon runners”.
- Brand keyword: Refers to search terms that include your brand. For example, “branded t-shirts for marathon runners”.
- Competitor keyword: Using your competitor’s name to rank your products and services in search engines. “Competitor branded t-shirt for marathon runners”.
At Sortlist we always suggest that you start with long tail keywords. Although they don’t get as much traffic as you would expect, they are the type of keywords that are easier to rank for. So start there and then work your way up to more competitive terms.
With that in mind, let’s take a closer look at the best keyword research tools. Both paid and free.
Free Keyword Research Tools
There are several free keyword research tools that can be valuable for individuals and small businesses looking to enhance their SEO and content marketing efforts.
Google Keyword Planner
Google Keyword Planner is one of the best free keyword research tool that helps you find keywords for your Google Ad campaigns. Also, it is perfect to discover new relevant keywords related to your business or brand. It allows you to see estimated search volume data and the average cost of targeting each keyword.
That said, it’s important that while Google Keyword Planner is a free keyword research tool built for paid advertising purposes you can actually use it to gather information for SEO purposes. Keep in mind that SEO insights will be limited to search volume and related queries.
It provides you with valuable information directly from Google, such as
- Monthly and historical search volume data.
- Mobile search volume.
- Keyword ideas based on your seed keyword.
- Average organic position and impression share.
- Competition specifically on Google Ads.
- Bid recommendations for your Google search engine campaigns.
- Ad impression share.
- Forecast for impressions and clicks.
To use Keyword Planner, you need to have a Google Ads account. If you don’t already have one, you can quickly create one by clicking here. Just follow the prompts and fill in the information about you and your business. Please note that you don’t actually need to run an ad campaign to use this tool, but you do need to set one up.
Google Search Console
This is a free SEO tool that allows you to track, maintain, and improve your website’s performance and ranking on Google’s search results pages. While it was not originally designed for keyword research purposes, it still comes with a number of features that can help you in this regard.
For starters, it’s 100% free and doesn’t restrict usage or research. The interface is very intuitive, allowing your team to get up to speed quickly. And it integrates with other SEO and keyword research tools to provide your team with more in-depth information, analysis, and insights.
For SEO, it allows you to understand which search queries are driving the most traffic to your site. You can find this information by
- Signing in to your Google Search Console account.
- Clicking on search results.
- Setting the time period you want to analyze.
- Sorting queries by clicks.
Pay close attention to high performing keywords that are both branded and non-branded. You can use these to create similar or follow-up content, link to other pages, or find new content ideas.
Another option is to use the Pages tab, select the page you want to optimize, click Queries, and look for the terms that drove the most traffic to that page. Pick one and optimize the page around it.
Google Trends
Google Trends is a free keyword tool that helps you analyze search queries and trends over time to better understand what actions you need to take to increase traffic to your website.
The great thing about this tool is that its data comes from a representative sample of actual Google search data. In other words, it tends to be more accurate than any other third party.
It comes with a feature that allows you to see search trends filtered by time, location, type of search, and category (Business, Entertainment, Health, Science and Technology, Sports, Top Stories, and more).
Or you can simply look at the behavior of different keywords over a period of time. This allows you to understand whether or not users are consistently using them for searches.
All of the keyword data that you will find here is a starting point for the discovery of new keywords to target.
To access this keyword tool, click here.
Soovle
Another option is Soovle, this tool allows you to get keyword suggestions based on Google and 14 other search engines (Bing, YouTube, Wikipedia, Amazon, etc.) so you can increase the visibility of your brand on the Internet.
The biggest advantage of using this keyword research tool is that it gives you access to search queries from all over the web in a single interface. And it provides suggestions for both generic keywords and long-tail phrases.
However, you can expect an outdated interface and problems with customer support. To start using Soovle click here.
Moz Keyword Explorer (Free Version)
The last free keyword research tool we suggest you try is from Moz. It comes with features like
- Provides search volume with 95% accuracy.
- Generate and save keyword lists.
- Export keyword suggestions, analysis and lists.
- Check keyword difficulty score.
- Search keyword suggestions by country or international.
- Perform competitive analysis.
This option is actually a great idea if you want to do a quick online brainstorming and come up with different ideas for your search engine optimization efforts.
To get started, click here.
Paid Keyword Research Tools
Paid keyword research tools often provide more advanced features, extensive databases, and comprehensive analytics compared to their free counterparts.
Ahrefs
Ahrefs is a complete SEO software that comes with features for link building, keyword research, competitor analysis, site audits, and more. For the sake of this article, we will just focus on what it can help you do in terms of keywords.
- It allows you to do keyword research for Google, Bing, Yahoo, YouTube, Amazon and others.
- The Keyword Explorer gives you a high-level overview of the term you are searching for: difficulty, volume, number of clicks, traffic potential, and keyword ideas by search volume (terms match, questions, and also rank for).
- It also gives you a SERP overview with information and trends on the pages that rank in the search engine for that particular keyword. It includes a Top Keyword column that details which term brings the most organic traffic to that page.
- The Organic Keyword and Organic Search Traffic tabs are there to show you what keywords a domain is ranking for and how much traffic it’s currently getting.
- The Traffic Value feature allows you to estimate the value of the traffic a website receives. The higher the number the better, but pay close attention to the keywords that are generating the traffic and whether or not they are related to a strong buying intent.
Ahrefs has different pricing plans, they start at $99 per month and can go as high as $999. And they offer a free limited access to their Site Explorer & Site Audit features for website owners.
KWFinder
This powerful keyword research tool is one of the best value for money options out there. It comes with a user-friendly interface fueled with:
- Accurate search volume information, including historical data and long-term trends.
- Keyword difficulty.
- Competitor analysis.
- Local keyword research from over 50K locations.
- SERP analysis.
KWFinder offers a free 24 hour trial so you can have a taste of the power of this tool, or you can simply go straight to a subscription to one of their monthly plans. They start at $19.90 and can go up to $89.90. The main difference is in the amount of searches you can do per day.
Keywords Everywhere
This is a Google Chrome extension designed to quickly provide you with information about search volume, cost per click, and competition. You can use it in more than 15 sites, including Google, YouTube, Amazon and others.
It’s very easy to use. Since it is an extension, you just need to install it and start searching in any of the supported websites. Let’s say you use Google. When you type in a search query, the tool will show you information about its search volume and competitive ranking. At the same time, a column will appear with information about related keywords ideas, what people are also searching for, and more.
While the Keywords Everywhere extension is free, you will need to subscribe to one of their monthly plans. They go from $1.75 to $25 per month depending on the number of keywords you need to research.
SpyFu
Finally, we recommend that you take a close look at SpyFu, a very popular SEO tool used by marketing professionals to improve their online presence.
It comes with features such as competitor analysis, keyword research, SEO analysis, PPC research, etc. For this article we will mainly focus on its SEO Keyword tab.
This is where you will be able to analyze your keywords. Just add your domain in the search box, set your location and it will give you a list of keywords you can rank for. Each one comes with information on its search volume, rank, SEO clicks, difficulty and CPC.
Both rank and SEO clicks are key metrics that allow you to understand your current position for each keyword and the estimated number of clicks you should receive for your ranking position.
Of course, it has other interesting features such as their competitor analysis tool. Basically, as soon as you start using this tool, you need to set up who your main competitors are. Then in it;s competitors tab you can see their rankings for organic keywords, their monthly clicks and monthly value. And, it allows you to compare the trajectory of your competitors’ sites against yours.
SpyFu comes in three different monthly plans that start at $39 and go as high as $79 depening on the number of search results you want to analyze, data exports, and weekly tracked keywords.
Comparison of Key Features
Here’s a comparison of key features among some popular free and paid keyword research tools:
Choosing the Right Tool for You
Choosing the right keyword research tool is crucial for effective SEO and content marketing strategies. There are various tools available, each offering unique features and capabilities.
Key considerations when choosing a keyword research tool
Once you’re ready and have decided to invest in a keyword research tool, it’s best to understand some key considerations to help you choose the best option on the market.
Trust us here… There are hundreds of options out there, going through them all will not only be exhausting, but time consuming and confusing.
That’s why you must pay attention to the following:
- Budget: Cost is always important, you don’t want your team learning how to use a tool that you can’t afford on a monthly basis. One of the first things you need to do is look at the cost and see if it’s within your budget. If not, move on.
- Keyword database size: A key deciding factor is how big and updated a database they have. You need to work with a tool that can provide you with relevant and accurate data.
- Keyword difficulty: One of the most important pieces of information you need to look for in a tool is understanding how hard it is to tank for a certain term. Are there too many high domain authority brands using this keyword?
- Keyword suggestion and variation: Look for this feature, it’s designed to generate keyword suggestions based on your input, topics and competitors. It’s the easiest way to expand your keyword list.
- Keyword grouping and clustering: This feature comes in handy when organizing your content based on similarity, relevance, and attributes. It’s perfect if you aim to build pillar pages and work your content from there.
- Tracking and analysis: All marketing efforts, including SEO, must rely on metrics to analyze and monitor performance and actions. Make sure the tool you choose provides you with real-time analytics.
- Integrations: Your team will likely use several different tools to maximize their SEO efforts, so it’s imperative that your keyword research tool integrates with them and runs smoothly.
- Easy-to-use software and dashboard: Finally, you want your team to quickly learn how to use the system and don’t waste time trying to understand the different features. Look for an option with excellent user reviews.
Match your specific SEO goals to the tool’s strengths
We’ve introduced you to the best keyword research tools, but don’t take our word for it. The best one for your team will be the one that helps you achieve your goals. So pay close attention to their features and choose one that meets your needs.
Start with free options and upgrade as needed
Finally, we recommend starting with a free tool or plan and upgrading as needed. In most cases, if you are just beginning your SEO efforts and keyword research, the free versions will provide you with precisely the information you need. As you gain more experience and aim to rank more competitive keywords, you can invest in a more advanced tool.
Conclusion
These tools are just part of what you must consider when working with SEO. Each one will give you information, but it’s up to you to choose the right one, interpret the data, decide which keywords to use, and optimize your content and website around them.
When choosing the right keyword research tool, please remember to consider your budget, your team’s experience, ease of use, and, of course, your SEO goals. Remember, you can always start with free tools or plans and upgrade as needed.
If you want to learn more about choosing your target keyword, please take 7 minutes and dive deep into our blog article “What is a focus keyword and why is it so important?“. You can also check out our “Ultimate Guide to Google SEO“.
