Keyword Planner: how to use the keyword research tool

How to find out what are the best keywords to use in your SEO campaigns?

Relying on intuition, in this case, is definitely not recommended.

For this I will explain to you how to use Keyword Planner, the keyword research tool by Google.

The keyword planning tool which is part of the Google Ads platform can also be used without entering credit card data, and therefore without necessarily having to start an advertising campaign.

Keyword Planner is a useful tool to start doing a first keyword research, but it still has some limitations.

For one thing, it does not provide accurate data on search volumes, but relies only on rough indications showing a range of values.

For example, you will not find the exact number of monthly searches for the word “shampoo for dogs”, but you will only see the indication “between 1000 and 10000”.

Furthermore, although it allows you to save and group the keywords you have selected, it does not include particularly advanced features.

If you need a tool to start optimizing your site, it can be very useful.

If, on the other hand, you are looking for a more precise and detailed keyword analysis tool, this is definitely not for you.

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But now let’s get back to us.

Keyword Planneris the free Google Ads tool, also called the Keyword Planner.

To use it you need to activate a Google Ads account, even if there is no need to start an advertising campaign or to enter your credit card details.

Thanks to this tool, you will be able to identify and analyze keywords and find out the possible performance of a list of keywords .

You will also get gods suggestions starting from the keyword you entered and you can enter a domain to filter the results, so as to exclude results that are not relevant to you.

Thanks to the language and location settings, you can also use this service to search for keywords in foreign languages, very useful if you want to work on the SEO of a multilingual site.

The Keyword Planner is the result of the union of two pre-existing tools, the one called Keyword Tool and the one for Traffic Estimation , but with several additional features.

Now let’s see together how to use Keyword Planner.

Keyword Planner: the potential of the keyword research tool

So let’s see how to proceed to make the most of Google’s keyword planning panel.

IMPORTANT!

• You can use it keyword research tool without credit card.
• You can use Keyword Planner, without necessarily activating an Ads campaign.

Below, we will refer to a campaign in each case, whether you create it or not.

First of all, go to the Keyword Planner tool and click on Sign in .

Then, if you don’t already have an account, click Create New Account .

At this point, you will be offered a wizard to create your account.

You will have several options to choose your advertising goal, but I advise you not to click on these items, if you don’t want to enter your credit card details.

Instead, click the Switch to Expert mode link at the bottom of the page.

Now you are asked to choose the objectives of your campaign, including sales, site traffic and other options.

Again, continue without the wizard and click the Create an account without a campaign link .

Confirm your country, time zone and currency details and continue to log into your new account.

Once done, click on the Explore your account button to start using the keyword planning tool.

Click on the wrench symbol ( Tools and settings ). You will find itkeyword research tool (or Keyword Planner) in the Planning section .

Before learning how to use Keyword Planner, I recommend that you familiarize yourself with the interface of the tool.

As I pointed out earlier, Keyword Planner incorporates the features of the keyword tool and that for the traffic estimate but, unlike these, its interface is simpler to use.

Use the Keyword Planner without entering payment details, however, it has limitations.

This happens for accounts without payment details or with a low monthly expense, unfortunately Google does not specify the precise value of this threshold.

Keyword Planner: how to use it with a credit card or active Ads campaigns

If you don’t mind entering payment details, you can create a fictitious advertising campaign on Ads, set a paltry budget (for example € 10) and immediately pause it.

You can unlock it whenever you want to use the Keyword Planner and relock it when you’re done.

It’s a bit cumbersome, but it works.

If, on the other hand, you are actively using Ads and have access to the full data, pay attention to the search volume of the keywords you see in the screen similar to the one above.

If you’re not careful, you may overestimate it.

I’ll explain better.

When you search very similar variations of a keyword, such as plural and singular, derived words and the like, you may notice that some have much higher volumes than you expect, with identical values ​​to each other.

If you add these values ​​together, you may find yourself overestimating them, merging volumes that have already been added up by Google.

In Keyword Planner Tool, Google has in fact begun to combine search volumes for similar variations of keywords and phrases. Among the cases of unification were observed:

• Plural and singular
• Acronyms, abbreviations and full versions of terms
• Forms derived from the same root with different suffixes
• Terms with spelling variations
• Words that can be written with or without hyphens, apostrophes, accents, etc.
• Words with the same meaning and different sequential order (eg. Man Jersey and Man knitted )

This could lead you to miscalculate advertising or SEO campaign goals.

Let’s see now how to use it Keyword Research Tool, then I’ll explain how to get more accurate data on single or compound keywords (called “long tail” in English).

Google Keyword Planner: how to get started

When you start using this new tool you will have to choose between two options.

You can choose to get suggestions on keywords related to your business, or know the metrics and search volumes related to those you already have in mind.

If you choose the first method and select the Find new keywords option , you will get word suggestions that you can use in your campaign and that you can add directly to your Ads account.

Google will also give you an estimate of research volumes and competition for each word or phrase.

You can do this both starting from keywords provided by you, and starting from the keywords of a website (it can also be your competitor).

If you choose the second method instead, Get Search Volumes and Forecasts , Google will perform an analysis of the keywords you provide.

How to choose keywords

At this point, the keyword tool will provide you with a list of keywords from which you can choose the best ones to create new content or improve existing ones.

To help you make an ideal selection of your keywords, the Keyword Planner interface also offers you the option of using filters.

Click on Add Filter and use these parameters:

• Key word : enter a word and filter the results based on exact match (i.e. exactly the word you entered) or semantic (i.e. with the same meaning or with variants of number or gender);
• Competition : define if you want to view keywords with high, medium or low competition;
• Ad impression share :number of impressions you received for this keyword divided by the number of total searches. It is a percentage value and you can choose whether to filter by higher or lower values;
• Offer for the top of the page : this filter allows you to indicate an amount and display words with an average CPC (Cost Per Click) higher or lower than that indicated;
• Competition (indexed value) : filters the concurrency level using a numerical value from 0 to 100 (unlike low-medium-high we saw above);
• Exclude keywords in my account / plan : with these filters, you will avoid getting duplicates, excluding words already used in your account;
• Organic impression share : the percentage value of the impressions obtained with that keyword;
• Average organic position : positioning of your site relative to other sites.

Some of this data can only be provided if you link Google Search Console and Google Analytics to your Ads account.

Keyword Planner it also allows you to focus your search by setting parameters such as language, location and reference period.

Find these options in the top bar.

Build your plan piece by piece and refine your data

Once you’ve identified the keywords or keyword groups that interest you, you can add them to your plan.

Adding keywords to the plan also allows you to see more precise values ​​instead of the ranges displayed for the averages of the search volumes displayed for accounts created without a credit card or with low advertising budget.

Select the keywords that seem most relevant to you and that you will use later, then click on Add keywords to save them.

As soon as you have added them, you can click on the message that will appear at the bottom of the View Forecasts page .

Here, Keyword Plannerit will show you an estimate of the possible performance of your keywords; for example, number of clicks, impressions, average position and cost.

Take a look at the cost even if you are not creating advertising campaigns, as it is an indicator of the competition that exists for the various terms.

The most expensive keywords are those on which many “bet”.

For this, even at the level of organic content, you can usually expect higher competition.

Later we see how to analyze the situation in more detail.

By adding to a plan and entering a time interval, which you can set from the top bar of the plan, you can get an estimate of the impressions of each search term.

When you select one or more keywords from your plan, you will be able to change the maximum CPC, so you can adjust your budget, and check the impression estimates.

The various types of correspondence are:

• Generic, which also includes misspellings, synonyms, related searches, and relevant variables.
• Exactly, which includes the exact term and its similar variants (words in different order as long as the meaning does not change, presence or absence of functional words).
• Sentence, which includes sentences and their variants preceded or followed by one or more words, but not additional words in the middle of the sentence.

To more accurately estimate the search volume (or impressions) of a particular keyword, you should choose the exact match, which will show you the results closest to your chosen term.

Keyword Planner: how to do a keyword research

Once you’ve found enough keyword ideas (thanks also to the tool’s suggestions) and added them to your plan, you can download them for more convenient analysis in Excel.

The Keyword Planner, in fact, it is a very versatile tool: it helps you to research the keywords to use for SEO, the topics on which to create content and, finally, to create the Ads advertisements.

In fact, you can use it to search for keywords with high search volume and medium or low competition for which to try to rank high in organic search results.

Choose the right keywords it means studying what your niche is looking for.

Since Google’s algorithm rewards content that satisfies users, using this strategy helps you get more exposure for your articles.

Let’s see how to select the most promising keywords step by step:

1. Deletethose that are too far from what you want to talk about , your niche or the products you offer.

For example, if I am a florist I will probably be able to exclude “campo di fiori” or “Campo dei fiori”.

2. Removekeywords that are too general , for which competition is very high.

They probably also need huge resources to beat their competitors.

For example, “flowers” or “florist” will probably have as competitors the giants of the sector, with the best known brands, very authoritative domains and high advertising budgets.

This point obviously applies if you have a small business.

If you are already the industry leader, you will have a good chance of ranking high in the search results already.

3. Take a look to the estimated monthly volumes / impressions.

If they are too low, maybe the game is not worth the candle.

Why waste resources optimizing a page for some term that nobody (or almost anyone) is looking for?

Of course, your brand name is an exception, but generally your site is already optimized for that term.

4. Search individually on Google the remaining keywords.

What kind of results appear on the first page of the search results?

Are these sites and blogs of the same type as yours?

In this case it is a keyword that can be used to create content and optimize your site .

If, on the other hand, there are many sites of different types, the keyword may not be suitable for your blog.

Still following the example of our alleged flower sales site, I try to search for “climbing plants” and find that most of the results are about gardening and cultivation and not about flowers.

Maybe this keyword is not suitable for the services I offer and my niche. I can exclude it and focus on something else.

If I decided to use it, I would probably have a disadvantage compared to a site that deals with botany or cultivation techniques.

Other ways to use the keyword planner

Now I will explain to you how to use Keyword Plannerby selecting the second option on the home page, which is Get Search Volume and Forecasts .

Here you can manually write your keywords, or upload a file, and you will be taken directly to the page where all the estimates relating to the words you have entered will be displayed.

Therefore, you will not get suggestions as in the system seen previously, instead you will see all the data of the keywords entered, from the number of impressions to the CPC, to the CTR etc.

Conclusion

Today I explained to you how to use Google Ads Keyword Planner, a good starting point for those who create content and for those dedicated to SEO.

Keyword Planner it is a free tool, but in order to use it you need to log into your Google Ads account.

By skipping the wizard of your account you can avoid entering your credit card to use it.

Once your account is created, use it regularly keyword research tool to analyze research trends and competition.

This will help you discover new opportunities to create user-relevant content and improve SEO.

Remember to add the most interesting keywords to your plan and set your budget and timeframe to get more accurate search data.

You will then be able to build a list from which to select the most suitable keywords for your site.

However, I would like to reiterate, as I said at the beginning of the article, that this tool actually has limitations and it is not possible to carry out very detailed analyzes on keywords.

Have you already used Keyword Planner?