The Beginner’s Guide to Keyword Research

This SEO keyword research guide will teach you how to find and select profitable keywords, as well as how to use them, in your content strategy to get the most out of your SEO efforts (and return on investment).

Keyword research is crucial for search engine optimization (SEO), which can increase conversions and income. Regardless of their experience with digital marketing, every organization needs to understand how to conduct keyword research.

With this beginner’s guide to keyword research, you will discover how to do keyword research for SEO, allowing your organization to maximize SEO performance (and return).

We will discuss the following topics:

• What is keyword research?
• Why is keyword research important?
• Step 1: How to Research Keywords
• Step 2: How to select the best keywords.
• Step 3: How to incorporate keywords.

Continue reading to learn how to conduct SEO keyword research! If you are seeking for keyword research tools, SEO.com is a free option for DIY SEO!

What is keyword research?

Keyword research is the process of identifying, assessing, and selecting search phrases for SEO. SEO employs keywords to assist search engines in appropriately ranking sites in search results and to help visitors comprehend the context of a given page.

For example, if you Google “bike shops in Harrisburg,” that would be your keyword, and here are the most relevant results:

This keyword tells Google what information you desire when you search. Keyword research for SEO can assist you inform Google (and users) what your website is about.

Why is keyword research important?

Finding keywords is essential to your SEO strategy since you are targeting people’ searches from the start and creating content around their wants.

Several stakeholders rely on keyword research for SEO, including:

Search engines:

such as Google, rank websites based on keywords. A blog post with a title tag that includes the term “best running shoes” and a list of the greatest running shoes indicates to search engines that it is a suitable page to appear for searches using that term.

People:

Searchers utilize keywords to find content online and select which content to click on from the results. Someone searching for a list of the greatest running shoes, for example, is more likely to click on a round-up blog post rather than a product page.

Companies:

Businesses that use keyword research typically gain a higher return on investment (ROI) from SEO because they target the most valuable terms. A company that conducts SEO keyword research, for example, may prioritize long-tail, low-competition terms.

When you understand how to research keywords, you can make data-driven judgments about your SEO approach. Instead of guessing what your target market searches for, you know what keywords will help them reach your company.

Step 1: How to Research Keywords

You understand why SEO keyword research is crucial, but how do you get started? Here are four stages to teach you how to locate SEO keywords:

• Identify potential keywords.
• Research competitor keyword targeting.
• Create a list of long-tail keywords.
• Use a keyword research tool.

Continue reading to learn how to research keywords for SEO.

1. Identify potential keywords

The initial stage in keyword research is to brainstorm a list of potential keywords. These keywords can be as broad as you wish, encompassing anything relevant to your industry, products, or services.

A bike store in Harrisburg may utilize keywords such as “bike shop,” “bike rack,” “bike seats,” or any other bicycle parts that it offers. You can also include location-based keywords, which are terms or phrases that describe your state, city, region, or area.

2. Research competitor keyword targeting

Examine your competitors’ websites to determine what keywords they use to describe the same items and services they offer. Investigating your competition can help you generate unique ideas and inform the rest of your keyword research.

As you search for keywords, consider which websites normally rank high in search engine results pages (SERPS). You can then use these websites as a “seed list” to generate keyword ideas.

Enter a website into SEO.com, for example, and it will display the site’s keyword rankings:

To find related ideas, you can filter by topic, URL, position, and other criteria. When researching keywords based on competitor data, make sure the themes are applicable to your target audience.

3. Create a list of long-tail keywords

Once you have created your basic list, the following step is to develop it into a more extensive list of long-tail keywords. Short-tail keywords are one or two words long and allude to general concepts, whereas long-tail keywords are three to five words long and provide more particular information.

The keywords you generated in step one may be short and generic, such as “bike stores.” However, thousands of businesses throughout the country may be competing for the same phrase.

As a local firm, you are unlikely to rank in the top ten.

Instead, you want to locate lengthier, more particular phrases that show whether a customer is seeking for the parts you sell or a bike store in your neighborhood. Instead of “bike store,” use “bike shop in Harrisburg, PA” to narrow down your search aim.

4. Use a keyword research tool

While you can use Google’s suggested searches, this method can be time-consuming. That is why we frequently propose using a keyword research tool such as KeywordsFX. This stage broadens your terms based on user search trends and data.

When you enter a keyword into KeywordsFX, you will receive an alphabetized list of all the variations that customers frequently search in Google.

If you search for “bike rack,” one of the results is “bike rack for audiq5.” This result indicates that many users have previously searched for that identical phrase on Google. It also implies that if you sell a bike rack suitable with this particular vehicle, you should target this phrase.

Depending on the keyword you typed, you may receive an astounding number of possibilities. Take note of the ones that are most important to your business. You can repeat this method for each term on your initial list to expand your keyword selections.

Step 2: How to select the best keywords

After you have created an initial list of keywords, you will need to decide which ones to target using SEO (and paid search ads). To accomplish this, you will want to examine three major elements:

Key considerations include

• Relevance
• authority
• volume

Let us look at each one below:

1. Relevance

Relevance refers to the applicability of your keyword to the user’s intent, or the purpose of the search. Your content and keywords will rank higher if they address the user’s intent.

Google does not wish to show its searchers results that do not answer their questions. So the system utilizes your keywords to determine whether your site is relevant (or not) and displays it in the results.

Keyword clustering can help you organize the keywords you choose based on intent and keep your content relevant.

2. Authority

Google rates authoritative sources higher than others. They want to provide the greatest results for users, which includes discovering websites with established domains and reputations.

So, how will you prove your authority?

Many websites accomplish this by generating high-quality, informative material that benefits users and generates backlinks. It is also beneficial to understand the impact that expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (EAT) have on your rankings.

If there are additional industry leaders (such as the New York Times or the Mayo Clinic), it may be more difficult to rank. However, you can use these sources as inspiration for ways to build your authority.

3. Volume

Keyword volume is calculated using monthly search volume (MSV), which determines how many times a keyword is searched in a given month. You may rank for keywords, but if they have a low MSV, you are less likely to reach anyone.

You want to identify keywords with a high search volume so that you can answer people’s questions. SEO.com can assist here by providing search traffic data as well as the keyword’s estimated difficulty.

Cost-per-click (CPC)

If you are employing keywords for SEO, you will just need the three metrics given below. When researching keywords for your sponsored search advertisements, you should also consider cost-per-click (CPC).

CPC is data obtained from Google advertisements or Google Ads that indicates how many advertisers are attempting to run advertisements for that keyword. The greater the CPC, the harder it will be for your company to rank for that phrase.

The optimal keyword will have a high MSV and a cheap CPC. These data indicate that many individuals are looking for this information, yet few websites are attempting to rank for it.

Step 3: How to incorporate keywords

Now that you know how to conduct SEO keyword research and narrow down your selection, it is time to take the final step: begin adding your chosen terms to your website. Here are four procedures you should take when inserting SEO keywords into your online content:

Integrate keywords across your website.

• Organize the keyword hierarchy
• Make keyword research continual.
• Let us go over each one in depth below!

1. Integrate keywords across your website

Adding keywords to your website is an important step in your study. If you have high-quality keywords but do not know how to use them, your time and effort will be wasted.

Here are some methods to ensure Google and searchers get the most out of your keywords:

• Concentrate on a single goal keyword and 3-5 supporting keywords that highlight your page’s theme.
• Include the target in the page title, title tag, and meta description.
• Include the target or main keyword in the first 100 words of your page.
• Do not include an outgoing link with your keyword anchor text.
• Aim to utilize each keyword twice naturally.

Our keyword density tool allows you to easily identify where your keywords are and whether you need to add or remove any.

2. Organize the keyword hierarchy

   Once you have a list of keywords, you can decide how to use them on your website. Connecting keywords and demonstrating their relationship can benefit Google and your users.

   If you find keywords for which you already have pages, include the term in the title tags, header tags, meta descriptions, and other critical HMTL components, as well as the body copy on each of these pages.

   During the keyword research process, you may have discovered a few keywords for which you currently do not have content. Instead of simply adding these keywords to random sites, take use of this opportunity to develop more content for your website and pages that will benefit your clients.

   From there, you can create internal links to demonstrate how your keywords relate. For example, if you have a parent page on bike parts, you may connect to pages about bike racks, wheels, chains, and so on.

   Avoid keyword stuffing, which is the practice of using terms where they are irrelevant or unnecessary. To inform potential clients, all of your site’s material should be written with them in mind.

3. Make keyword research continual

   As you enhance your site, continue to conduct keyword research as needed. This technique will eventually help you uncover even more keywords that are beneficial to your clients. It will also ensure that your keywords remain relevant to changing search traffic and trends.

   Even while the keyword “bike rack for 2024 Subaru Forester” may be quite valuable right now, users will be looking for a newer model in five years.