Google Adwords is an advertising program which allows you to create ads and have them run alongside searches at http://www.google.com. Google thankfully allows free use of the tool that advertisers use to determine their best keywords. That tool is what we will be talking about today. It is very powerful and can give you more than enough information to determine which keywords to target for your website or blog.

Supplies Needed:

Computer with Internet Connection
List of Keyword Phrases you want to research

Step 1: Navigate to the tool in your browser

If you plan to use Google’s Adwords tool very often, you’ll probably want to bookmark it. You can always find it by going to Google and typing Google Adwords Keyword tool. It will most likely be #1. :o) The URL is https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal.

Step 2: Conduct your keyword search.

When doing keyword research, I recommend you start with at least 10 keyword phrases that you want to research. These would be keyword phrases you believe apply (or will apply) to your business website. If you already have a website, you can review your stats to see which phrases are already bringing you traffic. If you haven’t optimized for the phrase and you are already getting some traffic, imagine how much more you can get if you create a page or post and optimize it specifically for that phrase. Please avoid one-word keywords (i.e. gluten) as it is usually very hard to rank for these. Do a good enough job with your keyword phrases though and you may end up ranking for a few one-word keywords.

Ok, let’s get started. In the box that says “Word of phrase (one per line)”, enter your keyword phrase and then click on the Search button. (If needed, change the Location.)

Step 3: Evaluate your results.

After you click on the Search button, wait a few seconds for your results to appear.

Below is just the top 6 results. If you do not see the competition column, click on the “Columns” button (top right of the screen) and choose which columns you want then search again. You will want to play around with the settings to see which ones work best for you. Given screen print limitations, I am only showing the first few columns here. The other columns give you some very helpful information so do not be afraid to experiment.

After clicking on the Search button, wait for the results to appear.

NOTE: You will most likely need to scroll to see the complete list.

The search volume for this tool is Monthly so depending what other tools you are using, you may need to make adjustments if you want to be able to compare data across tools. If local search engine traffic is important to you, be sure to pay attention to the “Local Monthly Searches” column (not shown in the screen print).

I personally do not recommend comparing the information from various tools to each other. I recommend that you choose one tool and stick with it. That way, you know you are comparing apples to apples.

The goal here is to look for phrases that apply to your website and will likely convert the visitor into a buyer/customer.

If your website is less than a year old, you should probably focus on phrases toward the bottom of the list. If your website is older and you are good at acquiring backlinks, then you can probably pull from the top results as well.

Look for long-tail keyword phrases. That means look for the longer phrases that are more targeted. If your website sells women’s shoes but only “high-heel wedding shoes”, you might not want to optimize for “women’s shoes” as someone looking for sandals or tennis shoes would not be your potential customer. As soon as they hit your page and see you do not have what they want, they’re gone anyway.

Review the results from your search. Choose 5-10 keyword phrases you believe you can get ranked for. If you’re a beginner at creating keyword-rich content, you’ll probably want to target only two keyword phrases per page or post. Your main keyword phrase will be your primary and the other is considered secondary.

Step 4: Look at the Google Trends data.

For keyword phrases you are seriously considering, click the (magnifying glass) to review the Google Trends data. This information is very helpful. It shows you how that keyword phrase has been searched over time.

Google Trends will give you an entire year but here is just the last 4 months for “outdoor solar lights” which as you can see has declined. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad keyword phrase, only that it’s seasonal as one would expect.

The criteria you can edit once you are on the Google Trends screen contains the following choices:

There is also some interesting data presented at the bottom of the Google Trends screen. Click on any of the links and the page automatically refreshes to give you Google Trends data for that keyword phrase.

Google Trends will even give you an idea which searches are rising.

Step 5: Create and optimize your content using the keyword phrases

This is a beginner guide so we won’t go into much detail here but you need to actually USE the keyword phrases in your content for the research to accomplish anything.

Make sure you use your keyword phrases in the Title, Description, Headings, Alt Text, etc. When possible, link from other pages/posts to the new page or post using the keyword phrase. This is called internal linking.

You’ll also want to get external links from websites other than yours. The external links need to appear natural to search engines so don’t obsess over all of the links having the same phrase.

Additional Tips

The more popular a search is, the fiercer the competition usually is. Don’t forget to make sure you look for long-tail keyword phrases. These are phrases with multiple words that further define the search. For example, “web design” would be a typical search and “small business web design” would be a long-tail keyword phrase related to web design. The number of searches on “web design” is far higher than for “small business web design” but getting a first page ranking is harder with the more popular search.

Step 6: Rinse and repeat

Things change over time so conduct keyword research periodically to make sure you are still targeting the best keyword phrases.

Google Analtyics is a free online tool offered by Google that provides important information about your website or blog, including, but not limited to:

The number of visitors to your website or blog during any given time period.
Where your visitors came from – by directly typing in your URL, from a link, or from a search engine.
Which search engine keywords were used that resulted in a visit to your site
Which pages within your website or blog were visited, how frequently, the average length of each visit.

And much, much more.

Google Analytics offers everything from the basics to the very detailed and generates a variety of reports, which you can customize and even export to save on your computer or email to someone else.,

Google Analytics may also be used in conjunction with Google AdWords to track the performance of your pay-per-click ads and landing pages. Google Analytics can also work in concert with your ecommerce shopping cart to track sales for an online store.

Many computer users rely on Google web searches to retrieve information they need. One benefit of using Google for research is that it provides a search engine that can retrieve relevant information quickly from the World Wide Web (WWW). Also, doing a search in Google is simple. A basic search will comb the Web for content that’s relevant to a search. Google is case insensitive and punctuation is generally ignored. Google also employs synonyms automatically.

Note: Since Google will use all the words entered into Google’s search box to search for and find results, it’s best to keep the search simple; it helps to use only words that are most likely to appear on the page.

Another benefit of using Google for research is the option to perform a phrase search (“”): searching for the exact words in an exact order. Also, it is possible to search within a specific website: it will return results only within a certain site or domain. To exclude words in a Google search, placing a minus sign (-) immediately before a word indicates that a user does not want Web pages that contain that word to appear in the results. If a user includes an asterix (*) within a query, it tells Google to fill-in the blanks: the search engine will look for any unknown term(s) and then find the best matches. If instead a user wants Google to search exactly for the word typed in the search box, placing a (+) immediately before a word will do just that. Lastly, users can use the OR / AND operator for Google to allow either one of several words (OR) or to consider more than one of several words (AND) in a search.

* Note: using Google for research is free. That’s right; all of Google tools, services and resources are free.

Another benefit of using Google for research, to make things easier for users to research information, Google has developed some of its own special search features: Everyday Essentials, Reference Tools, Choosing Keywords, Local Search, Health Search, Trip Planning, Query Refinements, and Search by Number. Note: These search features that Google offers will indeed streamline your research.

Using Google’s Tools

Google has many tools and products available at its site that can help streamline users’ reseaches; some examples are Google Pack, Google Desktop Gadgets, Google Products, Google Features, Google’s Dictionary, and Google’s Directory.

Google Research Tip: To streamline searches within Google, it may be useful to Install the Google Toolbar. Look for the “New” Toolbar feature for the installation/download. Users might want to check the privacy and disclosure of information page to understand how this installation affects their browsing experience.

List of Google Tools

Advanced Search

– It’s the first search help tool provided by Google.

– It lets users filter results though a variety of parameters including, language, file types, date of publication, keywords.

Desktop Gadgets

– Google also offers a collection of desktop gadgets that can make searchers’ life simpler.

– Users can download these gadgets to access a variety of pre-made search portal that allow easy browsing of sites like E-bay, Amazon, and Craiglist.

Web History

– Activating the web history option in their own accounts, users can search and view pages previously visited

– Users can also get personalized search results and recommendations based on their previous browsing history

The Language Tool (Google Translate)

– It lets you translate text, a phrase, or even an entire website

– It makes it easier to search for info in pages written in foreign languages