In order for consumers to be able to find your brand online, it’s critical that you use the right keywords for your ads and content. Keywords are the words people use to search for products or services, and they show the searcher’s intent.
For instance, say that a consumer is searching for a place to buy candy for Valentine’s Day for someone who is gluten-intolerant. They would naturally use keywords like “gluten-free candy” or “gluten-free Valentine’s Day candy.”
But there are loads of other keyword options you can use to help consumers find your brand online. The keywords you end up using will depend on a variety of different factors.
Those factors can range from the different benefits your product offers to the keywords your competitors are using. They also include things like how well keywords are performing and if your product is holiday-specific.
Location — whether you sell online, domestically, internationally or only locally through a bricks-and-mortar shop also determines the keywords you should use. Say, for example, you only sell your gluten-free Valentine’s Day candy within your shop and not online. Then you should include the name of the city your shop is in among the keywords you use.
The Benefits of Using Keyword Research Tools
Besides helping your brand to be and stay competitive, using keyword research tools delivers a range of valuable benefits. Those benefits include:
They Help New Markets Find You
When you use keyword research tools, the keywords you find can deliver diverse new markets to your door. And they can be markets you might not have even been aware of before. Just as the keywords used can vary from industry to industry, they can also differ from region to region, even within one country.
They Drive Web Traffic
Using keyword research tools helps you analyze your website traffic and find the right keywords to drive more traffic to it.
They Increase Engagement
When you use the new keywords you find for your social media content, you draw consumers who are ready to engage. They’re actively searching and ready to ask questions about your product.
They Grow Leads
Keyword research tools give you new keywords to use. Consumers engage with your brand after having found your website by using those new keywords to search. They then become qualified leads when they ask for more information about your products.
They Boost Conversions
Using keyword research tools can bring the consumers who are ready to buy to your website or social media channels.
The Tools to Use
Fortunately, there are plenty of keyword research tools you can use to make finding the right keywords easier. While some are free, others are free during a trial period, and others charge a fee, often monthly. These tools include:
- Google Tools. Google offers a suite of tools to help you do a deep dive into keyword research. They include:
- Google Analytics. In the Queries section of Google Analytics found under Search Engine Optimization, you can find the keywords that are driving traffic to your website. It breaks the keyword statistics down into categories including the volume of impressions and clicks they’re bringing.
- Google Search Console. Google Search Console offers a performance report that reveals your keywords and website pages that are receiving the most traffic from Google.
- Google Ads Keyword Planner. The Google Ads Keyword Planner helps you find new, relevant keywords that are popular with consumers. You can narrow down the results you get to fit your target market using settings like language, location, networks and date range.
- MOZ Keyword Explorer. MOZ Keyword Explorer will plow through more than 500 million keyword options to find those that will bring your brand the best results. It can tell you the keywords your site currently ranks for and show you the keywords that are delivering results for your competition. If can help you find relevant long-tail keywords and keywords in question format. If you’re targeting international markets, MOZ can rank relevant keywords by country.
- Soovle. Soovle is a keyword research tool that grabs keywords from a number of different sources, including Amazon, YouTube, Wikipedia and Google.
- Keywords Everywhere. Using the Keywords Everywhere browser extension lets you analyze any web page for keywords and their volume.
- SEMrush. SEMrush features a kit of helpful research tools for businesses and marketers to help you analyze keywords in ads or content. They include:
- The Keyword Magic Tool. Even experts who know their industry inside and out can strike out when it comes to knowing all the keywords that can deliver results. That’s where SEMrush’s Keyword Magic Tool comes to the rescue. All you have to do is enter one keyword, and the Keyword Magic Tool can find reams of keywords related to it.
- The Keyword Gap Tool. This handy tool lets you compare your brand’s keywords alongside those used by a number of your competitors at the same time. It can help you find any gaps in the ones you’re using.
- The Keyword Difficulty Tool. Say you want to knock the competition out of the top search results rankings and grab the prime positions for your brand. This tool can show you just how hard or easy it might be using specific keywords on a scale of zero to 100. It can help you decide if it’s worth it to try to climb to the top of the Google search engine results page (SERP).