The most common error I observe when it comes to keyword research is the failure to conduct it. With Google's evolution and the provision of search results based on the search query's intent, keyword research has become more critical than ever.

We are no longer just matching keywords. It is now necessary to comprehend how potential customers search, particularly the intention behind their search query, to create and optimize content that appears prominently in those searches. This cannot be achieved without conducting keyword research.

Advantages of Keyword Research

Ultimately, it enables you to determine precisely what content to produce to help you achieve your business objectives and target relevant traffic.

There are billions of possible keyword combinations in every language, making it impossible to target all of them. Fortunately, people often search for the same or similar things, allowing you to group keywords together. Effective keyword research helps you identify the most suitable keywords for your website.

Successful keyword research enables you to identify phrases and topics that:

• Are highly relevant to your business
• Have significant search volume
• Have low competition and are rankable

The interplay between these factors is illustrated in the diagram below.

Long-tail Keywords Benefits in Keyword Research

The first benefit of conducting keyword research is discovering valuable keyword phrases and topics. While you may have an idea of what you want to rank for, it's crucial to be certain and explore all the ways people may search for your website.

For instance, if you sell "wholesale wine glasses," it may be a good term to target. However, keyword research can help you identify other relevant terms, such as

• wholesale wine glasses bulk
• cheap wine glasses
• 8 oz wine glasses bulk

and so on. As a wine glass business owner, ranking on the first page of Google for each of these terms would be valuable.

While you may have guessed some of these keywords, a smart keyword research strategy can help you uncover thousands of relevant keyword opportunities at scale.

Finding Keywords with Sufficient Search Volume

While there are billions of potential keyword combinations out there, not all of them are worth pursuing.

Using the wine glass example, is it worth creating content for each of the identified keywords? To determine this, it's helpful to assign a search volume to each keyword phrase.

Search volume refers to the approximate number of times these phrases are searched for in Google each month, and we will cover this in greater detail later.

Finding Keywords You Can Actually Rank For

While finding popular keywords is beneficial, it can also pose a challenge because the more popular and valuable a keyword is, the more competition there is to rank at the top.

The key is to identify valuable keywords for your business that have a manageable level of competition, enabling you to rank for them.

For example, "cheap wine glasses" may be an excellent keyword phrase, but its high monthly search volume means many established and popular sites are likely trying to rank for it as well. This can make it challenging for smaller websites just starting out to rank for their most desirable keywords.

The trick is to find those keywords with high demand and low competition. One way to do this is by examining the keyword difficulty, which we will cover in more detail later.

Wilson Norman

CEO / Founder

Grow Your Website and Youtube Channel With SEOtoolsUSA.com - 100% Free tools for YouTubers, bloggers, and webmasters to improve your businesses SEO. SEOtoolsUSA is a leading SEO application in the USA.