If you’re a Search Engine Optimization professional or SEO Specialist, you’ll know what your company or, clients demand from you.
Every business wants to appear at the top rankings in Google searches for a variety of keywords.
Keyword research is at the heart of SEO practices. Therefore, if you want to give your company/client the result they seek, you must be familiar with a variety of free as well as paid Keyword Research Tools to ensure you aren’t bidding or using the wrong keywords.
Through this post, I intend to suggest the top 10 Keyword Research Tools you must be familiar with as an SEO Specialist.
10 Keyword Research Tools for Success in SEO
There are dozens of great keyword research tools that simplify your task of keyword research. And the good news is that many of them are FREE!
Here I am listing the Top 10 Keyword Research Tools for SEO followed by a detailed explanation of each tool.
- Google keyword planner
- SEM Rush
- Ubersuggest
- WordStream’s Keyword Tool
- MozKeyword Explorer
- KW Finder
- Soovle
- LSIGraph
- Google Correlate
- IMforSMB Bulk Keyword Generator
Google keyword planner
Let’s start with Google’s own keyword research tool ‘Google Keyword Planner’. Most of the SEO professionals or someone who has a Google Ads Account will definitely know about this popular tool from Google.
- It is one of the best local SEO Keyword Research Tool
- It is completely free and easy to use.
- It is a valuable resource tool for local and service-based businesses
- You can filter keyword data by language and by location
It can be used to perform keyword research for a specific area (for example, “SEO Trainer Abu Dhabi”)
Google Keyword Planner is best used for examining the search volume and to find keyword ideas.
When you want to generate a list of keywords which is related to the search term you have input, Keyword planner will generate a long list of keywords which can be called as keyword suggestions, or keyword ideas.
According to the value of each keyword suggestions, you have to decide which keywords from the list should be used on the website you target.
Google Keyword planner allows filtering statistics and traffic estimates per language and location, and therefore very useful for analysis of local search volume data.
However, the Keyword Planner can’t be used to estimate keyword difficulty or to predict the ranking probability for the suggested keywords, to filter keywords by keyword groups, highly seasonal products (search trends), and filter keyword search volume by the device (Mobile vs Desktop).
If you want to use the Keyword Planner you need a Google AdWords/Ads account. But, even if you’re not running Adwords campaigns you can use it.
SEM Rush
SEM Rush is the Keyword research tool best for doing competitive keyword analysis. It helps you to find out what keywords your competitors are ranking and targeting for along with their estimated organic search traffic.
It will help you to create better content and steel some of your competitors’ traffic.
SEM Rush is an advantageous tool with several tools in one package. You can use SEM Rush for:
- Site Auditing
- Competitor Keyword Analysis
- Location Targeting
- To know the keyword trends
- Do Backlink analysis
- Get SEO keyword ideas
- Monitor Competitors
- See keyword trend
- Filter Keyword data by device
It is an advanced keyword research tool with more features compared to Google Keyword Planner.
It shows the number of pages in which a particular keyword ranks for.
This will give you a better idea about the chances a keyword will be ranked. SEM Rush lets you analyse your competitors’ landing pages and extract relevant keywords that have high search volume.
You may be quite excited to enjoy these feature, but, which keyword research tool will give you all these for free.
Therefore, it’s a paid tool worth the money you pay.
Ubersuggest
Ubersuggest is another keyword research tool which has been around for sometimes. Although not much popular, it is a great tool to find long-tail keyword ideas and can be used for FREE.
It can be ideally used for content writing purpose to find long-tail variations for the main keywords.
This tool is simple to use and at the same time gives reliable results pulling data from Google Suggest.
WordStream’s Keyword Tool
WordStream’s keyword tool can be used both for SEO and PPC keyword research.
You can use this tool to target niche group related keywords. This tool will give you further suggestions and allow you to group the keywords based on a common theme which makes it easy to launch group ads.
This keyword research tool is free to use up to 30 searches and after that, you’ll have to sign up in WordStream Advisor for additional use.
Also, there is a 7 day trial period offered as a bonus in addition to the 30 free searches.
MozKeyword Explorer
The Moz Keyword Explorer is one of the features in Moz Pro to find keyword ideas and asses keyword difficulty.
It is almost similar to Google’s Keyword Planner. Moz Keyword Planner helps you to generate a list of keyword suggestions based on the given query.
But this tool is worth value for measuring keyword difficulty score, Volume score and Opportunity score based on Google SERP.
It is a paid tool and limited to certain features but not so good for competitors keyword analysis.
Further, Moz Keyword Explorer allows you to make 2 keyword queries per day for free.
KW Finder
KW Finder is a keyword research tool used to find long-tail keyword ideas and asses real-time keyword difficulty.
This tool measures the SEO difficulty score in real-time and is based on the DA, PA, MozRank, MozTrust of the pages on the first Google SERP. Although KW Finder is a paid tool, it is available for a cheap price (12 USD/month).
You can use KW Finder freely but it is limited to 5 keyword lookup per data and most of the keyword suggestions will be hidden.
Other features of this keyword research tool are calculating SEO competitiveness rank, Google SERP Analysis, GEO Targeting and Search Filters to narrow keyword research to a region or even city level worldwide and in more than 40 languages.
The downside of KW Finder is this tool won’t offer competitors keyword analysis and filter keyword search volume by mobile and desktop.
Soovle
If you have used Google’s autocomplete feature to generate keywords or to get a blog post title, then Soovle is just that.
Soovle allows you to explore the most typed in keywords on multiple search engines based on the keyword root you give.
It is an easy-to-use keyword research tool and a brainstormer at the same time to auto-generate a list of keyword ideas.
Soovle provides autocomplete suggestions from a variety of sources such as from Google, Yahoo, Bing, YouTube, Wikipedia, Amazon and eBay.
Therefore, you need to choose your source first from the source icons provided in the search box to generate keyword ideas. This is also a free keyword research tool.
LSIGraph
LSI Graph in which LSI stands for Latent Semantic Indexing is a basic keyword research tool which is extremely easy-to-use and efficient when searching for keywords related to your topic.
LSI Graph provides you with keywords and related keywords by closely following Google’s suggestion of semantic indexing keywords in web pages rank better.
Therefore, LSI Graph provides variations of keywords by examining search engines based on your focus keywords. Although not much used by SEO professionals it can be used when creating blogs or articles.
It is a free tool and helps marketers understand the topics related to their focus keywords and target a broader set of keywords.
Google Correlate
Google Correlate is another great tool from Google for getting keyword advice. It can be an extremely powerful tool for generating a large list of keywords.
Just as it is from Google, it has the ability to see the group of keywords that relate and searched together.
It will help you build your keyword list, especially the long-tail keywords. Therefore, there is no need to worry if you do not find related keywords when you want to create a blog post and don’t want to use the same keyword over and over.
It’s a free tool and all you need to do is simply enter the primary keyword and Google Correlate will do the job for you.
IMforSMB Bulk Keyword Generator
IMforSMB Bulk Keyword Generator fits best for local keyword research. Providing only the basic search results, this tool is best for local businesses.
Although there is nothing special about the results, you’ll feel better to get local search listings.
Even if you don’t get the type of business from the search tool, still you can get results, but you’ll have to replace some keywords with your own, in the search results.
Conclusion
When it comes to keyword research, there’s always a right and a wrong way of performing your keyword analysis. This will always depend upon your satisfaction and the results it gives.
Rather than simply guessing your keywords and hoping for the best, experiment with all these 10 keyword research tools.
While free tools will have its limitations, you can prefer to go for paid keyword research tools when you feel the competition is tough.
It will ensure that you choose the right keywords for your company’s/clients site, thereby guiding your content strategy, increasing your ranking with search engines and nearing success.
The usage of these tools helps you to improve your professional SEO skills for catching up with the ever-growing demand.
About The Author
Sharafudheen Mangalad is the managing director of a chain of educational institutions in the UAE. With more than 10 years of experience in the education industry, he successfully runs Edoxi Training Institute in Dubai and Time Training Center Abu Dhabi.
He is a strategist and a leader able to steer the company to the most profitable direction while also implementing its vision, mission and long term goals.
He always makes sure that his business continues to grow by identifying, developing and implementing the new strategies.
He leads his team in alignment with the company’s vision and values while preparing and implementing comprehensive business plans to facilitate achievement.