Keyword research takes time but can pay off in huge ways.
[This is part of the Developing Great Blog Content Series and The Blogger’s Essential Guide to Search Engine Optimization Series.]
The previous post hopefully opened your eyes to the importance of not only having great blog post titles and title tags but also the importance of leveraging strategic keyword research so that you can get more bang for your buck, so to speak, with your blog posts for users and search engines.
I introduced one such keyword tool in that post but I thought an easy follow-up would be to share some of the other free tools that I have historically used for my own personal blogging keyword research.
Here’s a list of 10 free keyword tools that you can use to further your strategic keyword research for your blog posts:
1. Google Insights
I already mentioned this tool in the previous post but it’s worth it to have it on this list to make this post comprehensive. Google Insights for Search should definitely be bookmarked!
2. Google Adwords Research Keyword Tool
The Google Adwords Keyword Tool was specifically designed for advertising buyers looking for the strength of keywords to help them make decisions on marketing purchases but it’s a crazy-awesome tool for bloggers to use to show keyword strength as well! It specifically designed to show “volume” of searches for relevance.
3. Free Keywords Wordtracker
This tool requires you to sign-up (very quick process) and then you can get your results. Done and done!
4. Google Search and Auto-Complete
Using Google directly is actually a pretty fascinating activity, especially if you’ve enabled Auto-Complete (or oftentimes called Google Suggest). For example, if I’m looking for blog topics, titles, or relevant and strong keywords related to “Professional Blogger” as I type out those characters (starting with “p”) you can see what Google is suggesting:
Interesting! Google is starting to show “Professional Blogger” – let’s continue…
Ah! I can now see what Google is suggestion as keywords and what many people are clicking through. Cue lightbulb-in-your-brain right now.
Slick.
5. SEOBook Keyword Tool
This is another free tool that is powered by Wordtracker but gives more detailed results. Get a free account and quickly start searching!
6. Google Trends Research
Sometimes I just want to see how keywords and phrases have trended overtime to see if I’m catching one on the “up-and-up” or one that’s generally falling in terms of search. Google Trends lets you do this.
7. iSpionage Keyword Tool
iSpionage is another free service that can give you much more information on a keyword than just search volume.
8. Wordstream Keyword Tool
A very similar tool to the ones listed above it might give you an additional insight but I haven’t used this one much lately. You’re limited to 10 searches so it has *ahem* limited use.
9. Quintura Search
Quintura can give you a cloud-look into what some of the top searches are. A nice handy companion tool for those that are more visually-inclined.
10. Virante Theme Keyword Finder
Virante’s Theme Keyword Finder is a really neat tool to show you related keywords that you might want to target for blog posts. I’ve used this more than a few times to narrow my topics.
And that’s that! Of course, there are tons of Paid and Premium Services out there but I suggest using the free stuff for as long as you can and only purchase a service if you’re already starting to make some money. Stay in the “black” people!
Cheers!
[This is part of the Developing Great Blog Content Series and The Blogger’s Essential Guide to Search Engine Optimization Series. Image via birgerking.]
Thanks brother, loving the list! SEOBook is a new one to me.
it’s a decent tool. i opt for other ones mostly, but still good.
I use Adwords and Google Insights all the time. I published a post on ProBlogger a while back about Google Insights. Thanks for the extra tips!
ah, what’s the link?
Great post…I actually went looking for my site traffic and SEO stuff today. Here is what I found:
http://addurleasy.com/bigb94.wordpress.com
All of the stats are correct as far as pageviews and everything goes, but is my site really worth anything if it is on wordpress.com? It says it is worth over $600?
don’t trust those evaluators… it’s not worth the time… seriously. this blog is “worth” a lot more than what a traffic analyzer can tell!
Gotcha. So is my site worth anything from using wordpress.com?
i mean… yes? it’s worth whatever you think it’s worth.
Great stuff–thanks for such good info…:)
of course!
Thank you. In your last post about this, you mentioned google insights, but I get frustrated with Google sometimes. I like having lots of options to pick from. Thank you for providing that!
sure thing patrick!
Awesome resources. Thank you very much!
wah wah.
So which one do you use? Do you use all of them? Or is it like, “I kinda feel like it’s a Google Trends day…” ?
You can’t POSSIBLY go through every single one! And if you do, don’t tell me that, because I’m OCD and will think I have to use every single one before I publish.
i use the “Googles” the most, ispionage, and virante the most i believe.
Hi John,
Excellent compilation of tools. I use several of them but I didn’t know the #7 and #10 – good ones!
I use visually also soovle.com as extra ideas of auto-completing.
Cheers,
Gera
ah, sweet gera! thanks for that.
Hey John – Thanks for the list, good stuff. One question – do you start with the blog post content first or do you come up with a title and then the post?
i’ve mentioned this already in a previous blog post but i typically write the content first and then come up with a title.
Great article John, I’ve used Wordtacker and google insights, I will have to check out wordstream though, I’ve heard some good things about it. Great post once again..
cool! i see your gravatar is sipping cofee. i need some more.
This one is my absolute favorite. It let’s you generate ideas up to 4 levels deep based on # of queries.
http://www.seodenver.com/google-instant-scraper/
interesting… let me check that out.
wow great article, ton of thanks to u bro..
sure thing harsha!
Thank you for sharing these great tool. I look forward to using them.
Well, a year later and this information is still great. Thanks for sharing in a way that all can benefit.
sure thing!