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It is important to understand what an essay question or assignment brief is asking of you. Before you start to research or write, it is worth spending time considering the wording of the question and any learning outcomes that may accompany it. Each assignment will generally have at least three learning outcomes which you must cover if you are to achieve a pass.

Breaking down an assignment question

Before you attempt to answer an assignment question, you need to make sure you understand what it is asking. This includes not only the subject matter, but also the way in which you are required to write. Different questions may ask you to discuss, outline, evaluate… and many more. The task words are a key part of the question.

• Key Words in Assignment Briefs

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Glossary of Task Words

Understanding the meaning of words, especially task words, helps you to know exactly what is being asked of you. It takes you halfway towards narrowing down your material and selecting your answer.

Task words direct you and tell you how to go about answering a question. Here is a list of such words and others that you are most likely to come across frequently in your course.

Maddox, H 1967, How to Study , 2nd ed, Pan Books, London.

Marshall, L., & Rowland, F 1998, A guide to learning independently , Addison Wesley Longman, Melbourne.

Northedge, A 1997, The good study guide , Open University, Milton Keynes, UK.

Essay and assignment writing guide

• Essay writing basics
• Essay and assignment planning
• Complex assignment questions
• Glossary of task words
• Editing checklist
• Writing a critical review
• Annotated bibliography
• Reflective writing
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Understanding Assignments

What this handout is about.

The first step in any successful college writing venture is reading the assignment. While this sounds like a simple task, it can be a tough one. This handout will help you unravel your assignment and begin to craft an effective response. Much of the following advice will involve translating typical assignment terms and practices into meaningful clues to the type of writing your instructor expects. See our short video for more tips.

Basic beginnings

Regardless of the assignment, department, or instructor, adopting these two habits will serve you well :

• Read the assignment carefully as soon as you receive it. Do not put this task off—reading the assignment at the beginning will save you time, stress, and problems later. An assignment can look pretty straightforward at first, particularly if the instructor has provided lots of information. That does not mean it will not take time and effort to complete; you may even have to learn a new skill to complete the assignment.
• Ask the instructor about anything you do not understand. Do not hesitate to approach your instructor. Instructors would prefer to set you straight before you hand the paper in. That’s also when you will find their feedback most useful.

Assignment formats

Many assignments follow a basic format. Assignments often begin with an overview of the topic, include a central verb or verbs that describe the task, and offer some additional suggestions, questions, or prompts to get you started.

An Overview of Some Kind

The instructor might set the stage with some general discussion of the subject of the assignment, introduce the topic, or remind you of something pertinent that you have discussed in class. For example:

“Throughout history, gerbils have played a key role in politics,” or “In the last few weeks of class, we have focused on the evening wear of the housefly …”

The Task of the Assignment

Pay attention; this part tells you what to do when you write the paper. Look for the key verb or verbs in the sentence. Words like analyze, summarize, or compare direct you to think about your topic in a certain way. Also pay attention to words such as how, what, when, where, and why; these words guide your attention toward specific information. (See the section in this handout titled “Key Terms” for more information.)

“Analyze the effect that gerbils had on the Russian Revolution”, or “Suggest an interpretation of housefly undergarments that differs from Darwin’s.”

Additional Material to Think about

Here you will find some questions to use as springboards as you begin to think about the topic. Instructors usually include these questions as suggestions rather than requirements. Do not feel compelled to answer every question unless the instructor asks you to do so. Pay attention to the order of the questions. Sometimes they suggest the thinking process your instructor imagines you will need to follow to begin thinking about the topic.

“You may wish to consider the differing views held by Communist gerbils vs. Monarchist gerbils, or Can there be such a thing as ‘the housefly garment industry’ or is it just a home-based craft?”

These are the instructor’s comments about writing expectations:

“Be concise”, “Write effectively”, or “Argue furiously.”

Technical Details

These instructions usually indicate format rules or guidelines.

“Your paper must be typed in Palatino font on gray paper and must not exceed 600 pages. It is due on the anniversary of Mao Tse-tung’s death.”

The assignment’s parts may not appear in exactly this order, and each part may be very long or really short. Nonetheless, being aware of this standard pattern can help you understand what your instructor wants you to do.

Interpreting the assignment

Ask yourself a few basic questions as you read and jot down the answers on the assignment sheet:

Why did your instructor ask you to do this particular task?

Who is your audience.

• What kind of evidence do you need to support your ideas?

What kind of writing style is acceptable?

• What are the absolute rules of the paper?

Try to look at the question from the point of view of the instructor. Recognize that your instructor has a reason for giving you this assignment and for giving it to you at a particular point in the semester. In every assignment, the instructor has a challenge for you. This challenge could be anything from demonstrating an ability to think clearly to demonstrating an ability to use the library. See the assignment not as a vague suggestion of what to do but as an opportunity to show that you can handle the course material as directed. Paper assignments give you more than a topic to discuss—they ask you to do something with the topic. Keep reminding yourself of that. Be careful to avoid the other extreme as well: do not read more into the assignment than what is there.

Of course, your instructor has given you an assignment so that they will be able to assess your understanding of the course material and give you an appropriate grade. But there is more to it than that. Your instructor has tried to design a learning experience of some kind. Your instructor wants you to think about something in a particular way for a particular reason. If you read the course description at the beginning of your syllabus, review the assigned readings, and consider the assignment itself, you may begin to see the plan, purpose, or approach to the subject matter that your instructor has created for you. If you still aren’t sure of the assignment’s goals, try asking the instructor. For help with this, see our handout on getting feedback .

Given your instructor’s efforts, it helps to answer the question: What is my purpose in completing this assignment? Is it to gather research from a variety of outside sources and present a coherent picture? Is it to take material I have been learning in class and apply it to a new situation? Is it to prove a point one way or another? Key words from the assignment can help you figure this out. Look for key terms in the form of active verbs that tell you what to do.

Key Terms: Finding Those Active Verbs

Here are some common key words and definitions to help you think about assignment terms:

Information words Ask you to demonstrate what you know about the subject, such as who, what, when, where, how, and why.

• define —give the subject’s meaning (according to someone or something). Sometimes you have to give more than one view on the subject’s meaning
• describe —provide details about the subject by answering question words (such as who, what, when, where, how, and why); you might also give details related to the five senses (what you see, hear, feel, taste, and smell)
• explain —give reasons why or examples of how something happened
• illustrate —give descriptive examples of the subject and show how each is connected with the subject
• summarize —briefly list the important ideas you learned about the subject
• trace —outline how something has changed or developed from an earlier time to its current form
• research —gather material from outside sources about the subject, often with the implication or requirement that you will analyze what you have found

Relation words Ask you to demonstrate how things are connected.

• compare —show how two or more things are similar (and, sometimes, different)
• contrast —show how two or more things are dissimilar
• apply —use details that you’ve been given to demonstrate how an idea, theory, or concept works in a particular situation
• cause —show how one event or series of events made something else happen
• relate —show or describe the connections between things

Interpretation words Ask you to defend ideas of your own about the subject. Do not see these words as requesting opinion alone (unless the assignment specifically says so), but as requiring opinion that is supported by concrete evidence. Remember examples, principles, definitions, or concepts from class or research and use them in your interpretation.

• assess —summarize your opinion of the subject and measure it against something
• prove, justify —give reasons or examples to demonstrate how or why something is the truth
• evaluate, respond —state your opinion of the subject as good, bad, or some combination of the two, with examples and reasons
• support —give reasons or evidence for something you believe (be sure to state clearly what it is that you believe)
• synthesize —put two or more things together that have not been put together in class or in your readings before; do not just summarize one and then the other and say that they are similar or different—you must provide a reason for putting them together that runs all the way through the paper
• analyze —determine how individual parts create or relate to the whole, figure out how something works, what it might mean, or why it is important
• argue —take a side and defend it with evidence against the other side

More Clues to Your Purpose As you read the assignment, think about what the teacher does in class:

• What kinds of textbooks or coursepack did your instructor choose for the course—ones that provide background information, explain theories or perspectives, or argue a point of view?
• In lecture, does your instructor ask your opinion, try to prove their point of view, or use keywords that show up again in the assignment?
• What kinds of assignments are typical in this discipline? Social science classes often expect more research. Humanities classes thrive on interpretation and analysis.
• How do the assignments, readings, and lectures work together in the course? Instructors spend time designing courses, sometimes even arguing with their peers about the most effective course materials. Figuring out the overall design to the course will help you understand what each assignment is meant to achieve.

Now, what about your reader? Most undergraduates think of their audience as the instructor. True, your instructor is a good person to keep in mind as you write. But for the purposes of a good paper, think of your audience as someone like your roommate: smart enough to understand a clear, logical argument, but not someone who already knows exactly what is going on in your particular paper. Remember, even if the instructor knows everything there is to know about your paper topic, they still have to read your paper and assess your understanding. In other words, teach the material to your reader.

Aiming a paper at your audience happens in two ways: you make decisions about the tone and the level of information you want to convey.

• Tone means the “voice” of your paper. Should you be chatty, formal, or objective? Usually you will find some happy medium—you do not want to alienate your reader by sounding condescending or superior, but you do not want to, um, like, totally wig on the man, you know? Eschew ostentatious erudition: some students think the way to sound academic is to use big words. Be careful—you can sound ridiculous, especially if you use the wrong big words.
• The level of information you use depends on who you think your audience is. If you imagine your audience as your instructor and they already know everything you have to say, you may find yourself leaving out key information that can cause your argument to be unconvincing and illogical. But you do not have to explain every single word or issue. If you are telling your roommate what happened on your favorite science fiction TV show last night, you do not say, “First a dark-haired white man of average height, wearing a suit and carrying a flashlight, walked into the room. Then a purple alien with fifteen arms and at least three eyes turned around. Then the man smiled slightly. In the background, you could hear a clock ticking. The room was fairly dark and had at least two windows that I saw.” You also do not say, “This guy found some aliens. The end.” Find some balance of useful details that support your main point.

You’ll find a much more detailed discussion of these concepts in our handout on audience .

The Grim Truth

With a few exceptions (including some lab and ethnography reports), you are probably being asked to make an argument. You must convince your audience. It is easy to forget this aim when you are researching and writing; as you become involved in your subject matter, you may become enmeshed in the details and focus on learning or simply telling the information you have found. You need to do more than just repeat what you have read. Your writing should have a point, and you should be able to say it in a sentence. Sometimes instructors call this sentence a “thesis” or a “claim.”

So, if your instructor tells you to write about some aspect of oral hygiene, you do not want to just list: “First, you brush your teeth with a soft brush and some peanut butter. Then, you floss with unwaxed, bologna-flavored string. Finally, gargle with bourbon.” Instead, you could say, “Of all the oral cleaning methods, sandblasting removes the most plaque. Therefore it should be recommended by the American Dental Association.” Or, “From an aesthetic perspective, moldy teeth can be quite charming. However, their joys are short-lived.”

Convincing the reader of your argument is the goal of academic writing. It doesn’t have to say “argument” anywhere in the assignment for you to need one. Look at the assignment and think about what kind of argument you could make about it instead of just seeing it as a checklist of information you have to present. For help with understanding the role of argument in academic writing, see our handout on argument .

What kind of evidence do you need?

There are many kinds of evidence, and what type of evidence will work for your assignment can depend on several factors–the discipline, the parameters of the assignment, and your instructor’s preference. Should you use statistics? Historical examples? Do you need to conduct your own experiment? Can you rely on personal experience? See our handout on evidence for suggestions on how to use evidence appropriately.

Make sure you are clear about this part of the assignment, because your use of evidence will be crucial in writing a successful paper. You are not just learning how to argue; you are learning how to argue with specific types of materials and ideas. Ask your instructor what counts as acceptable evidence. You can also ask a librarian for help. No matter what kind of evidence you use, be sure to cite it correctly—see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial .

You cannot always tell from the assignment just what sort of writing style your instructor expects. The instructor may be really laid back in class but still expect you to sound formal in writing. Or the instructor may be fairly formal in class and ask you to write a reflection paper where you need to use “I” and speak from your own experience.

Try to avoid false associations of a particular field with a style (“art historians like wacky creativity,” or “political scientists are boring and just give facts”) and look instead to the types of readings you have been given in class. No one expects you to write like Plato—just use the readings as a guide for what is standard or preferable to your instructor. When in doubt, ask your instructor about the level of formality they expect.

No matter what field you are writing for or what facts you are including, if you do not write so that your reader can understand your main idea, you have wasted your time. So make clarity your main goal. For specific help with style, see our handout on style .

Technical details about the assignment

The technical information you are given in an assignment always seems like the easy part. This section can actually give you lots of little hints about approaching the task. Find out if elements such as page length and citation format (see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial ) are negotiable. Some professors do not have strong preferences as long as you are consistent and fully answer the assignment. Some professors are very specific and will deduct big points for deviations.

Usually, the page length tells you something important: The instructor thinks the size of the paper is appropriate to the assignment’s parameters. In plain English, your instructor is telling you how many pages it should take for you to answer the question as fully as you are expected to. So if an assignment is two pages long, you cannot pad your paper with examples or reword your main idea several times. Hit your one point early, defend it with the clearest example, and finish quickly. If an assignment is ten pages long, you can be more complex in your main points and examples—and if you can only produce five pages for that assignment, you need to see someone for help—as soon as possible.

Tricks that don’t work

Your instructors are not fooled when you:

• spend more time on the cover page than the essay —graphics, cool binders, and cute titles are no replacement for a well-written paper.
• use huge fonts, wide margins, or extra spacing to pad the page length —these tricks are immediately obvious to the eye. Most instructors use the same word processor you do. They know what’s possible. Such tactics are especially damning when the instructor has a stack of 60 papers to grade and yours is the only one that low-flying airplane pilots could read.
• use a paper from another class that covered “sort of similar” material . Again, the instructor has a particular task for you to fulfill in the assignment that usually relates to course material and lectures. Your other paper may not cover this material, and turning in the same paper for more than one course may constitute an Honor Code violation . Ask the instructor—it can’t hurt.
• get all wacky and “creative” before you answer the question . Showing that you are able to think beyond the boundaries of a simple assignment can be good, but you must do what the assignment calls for first. Again, check with your instructor. A humorous tone can be refreshing for someone grading a stack of papers, but it will not get you a good grade if you have not fulfilled the task.

Critical reading of assignments leads to skills in other types of reading and writing. If you get good at figuring out what the real goals of assignments are, you are going to be better at understanding the goals of all of your classes and fields of study.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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16 Keyword Clues – Determining the Type of Writing

When you receive your writing assignment from your instructor, it’s important to stop and think. What are the requirements? What is the purpose of this assignment? What is your instructor asking you to write? Who are you writing for?

Before you begin to write any part of an assignment, think about the requirements and how you plan to meet those requirements. It’s easy to jump into an assignment without stopping to think about and analyze the assignment requirements .

What does it mean to think about and analyse assignment requirements?

It means that you’re considering the purpose of the assignment, the audience for the assignment, the voice (see Chapter 20 – Academic Tone and Language )  you might want to use when you write, and how you will approach the assignment effectively overall.

With each writing assignment, you’re being presented with a particular situation for writing. Learning about assignment requirements and expectations can help you learn to make good decisions about your writing.

Every writing assignment has different expectations . There is no such thing as right, when it comes to writing; instead, try to think about good writing as being writing that is effective in that particular situation.

When you receive an assignment from an instructor, paying close attention to the assignment description and expectations can help you determine what will be most effective for your writing.

The University of Queensland myUQ student support site provides tutorials about how to approach and complete an assignment:

my.UQ – Steps for Writing Assignments

Analysing the topic

Before you start researching or writing, take some time to analyse the assignment topic to make sure you know what you need to do.

Read through the topic a few times to make sure you understand it. Think about the:

• learning objectives listed in the course profile – understand what you should be able to do after completing the course and its assessment tasks
• criteria you’ll be marked on – find out what you need to do to achieve the grade you want
• questions you need to answer – try to explain the topic in your own words
• task words – what you have to do (usually verbs)
• topic words – ideas, concepts or issues you need to discuss (often nouns)
• limiting words – restrict the focus of the topic (e.g. to a place, population or time period)
• If you’re writing your own topic, include task words, topic words and limiting words to help you to focus on exactly what you have to do

Example of Keyword Identification

Sample Assessment Topic: Evaluate the usefulness of a task analysis approach to assignment writing , especially with regard to the writing skill development of second language learners in the early stages of university study in the Australian university context.

Task words: Evaluate – HOW

Topic words: task analysis approach, assignment writing, writing skill development – WHAT

Limiting words : second language learners (population), early stages of university (time period), Australian university (place) – SPECIFICS

Looking for and highlighting keywords in your assignment can help you know what your instructor expects. Try it out! Match the keywords below with their definitions:

These are some of the most common keywords you might see in an assignment. Whether a beginner, intermediate, or experienced academic writer , if you are uncertain about assignment requirements – ask your teacher / instructor.

• From “ College Success: “Chapter 8, Section 8.1: What’s Different about College Writing? ” by Saylor Academy (2012) CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 ↵
• Adapted from “Thinking about Your Assignment” by Excelsior Online Writing Lab CC BY 4.0 ↵
• Source: https://my.uq.edu.au/information-and-services/student-support/study-skills/assignment-writing/steps-writing-assignments ↵

Voice is the unique word choices of the author that reflect the viewpoint they are arguing (not personal opinion). Your “voice” is about WHO the reader ‘hears’ when they read your text.

Academic Writing Skills Copyright © 2021 by Patricia Williamson is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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What are keywords and why are they important.

Brought to you by the University of Houston Libraries.

You have a research assignment and need to use the library's databases to find different information sources.

When searching for sources in library databases, you will need to use specific search terms known as “keywords.” Picking the right keywords is an important part of the research process and can affect your search results.

Keywords should represent the main concepts in the topic you’re exploring. Generally speaking, they are single words or short phrases that can be combined in various forms to generate different search results. Even if you’ve never done academic research before, you probably already have experience developing keywords.

For example, maybe you searched online for the showtimes for a new movie you wanted to see. You probably used the title of the film and the word “showtimes” as your keywords to bring up the results you needed.

Keywords in academic research are similar. For example, let’s say your research question is “how does cyberbullying affect teenagers’ mental health?”

First, you’ll want to think about what the main concepts are. In this case, that would be cyberbullying , teenagers , and mental health .

Next, consider what words or short phrases will help you find information for each main concept. Remember that there is usually more than one way to say the same thing, so try to think of relevant synonyms as well.

For example, for teenagers , you would probably want to list adolescents and students , but you might also consider using high school as a related term for students .

Once you have a starting list of keywords, try searching in different databases to see if you’re on the right track and can get relevant results.

Pay attention to the language used in the sources you find. You may see other words you can use that you hadn’t thought of yet that you can use as additional keywords.

As you keep searching for sources and trying new keywords, contact UH Libraries if you need further help.

• What are Keywords and Why are they Important transcript

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How to Do Keyword Research for SEO: A Beginner's Guide

Published: September 04, 2024

Keyword research has remained a constant in a rapidly changing search landscape. If you’re an inbound marketer looking to optimize your website, understanding how to do keyword research is a must.

In this post, we’ll define what keyword research is, why it’s important, how to conduct your research for your SEO strategy , and how to choose the right keywords for your website.

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What is keyword research?

Why is keyword research important, elements of keyword research, how to research keywords for your seo strategy, how to find and choose keywords for your website, best keywords for seo.

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Keyword research is the process of finding and analyzing search terms that people enter into search engines with the goal of using that data for a specific purpose, often for search engine optimization (SEO) or general marketing. Keyword research can uncover queries to target, the popularity of these queries, their ranking difficulty, and more.

Keyword research helps you find your SEO sweet spot — the overlap of keywords that aren’t too hard to rank for and keywords that you can confidently produce excellent content on. It also identifies the queries that your target audience is actually searching on Google.

I talked to HubSpot Growth Manager Amal Kalepp , who says that keyword research “determines who your competitors are and which area of the search landscape you can rank for. Doing keyword research and understanding where your blog or website sweet spot is — that’s what gives you rankability.”

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Drill down into your website’s traffic sources and sift through your organic search traffic bucket to identify the keywords people use to arrive at your site.

Repeat this exercise for as many topic buckets as you have.

Remember, if you’re having trouble brainstorming with relevant search terms, you can always head on over to your customer-facing colleagues in sales or service. Ask them what types of terms their prospects or customers have questions about.

Those are often great starting points for keyword research.

Here at HubSpot, we use the Search Insights Report. This template is designed to help you do the same and bucket your keywords into topic clusters, analyze MSV, and inform your editorial calendar and strategy.

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Step 3. Understand how intent affects keyword research and analyze accordingly.

User intent is now one of the most pivotal factors in your ability to rank well on search engines like Google.

That means it’s vital that your web page addresses the problem a searcher wants to solve rather than simply including the keyword the searcher used.

So, how does this affect your keyword research?

It’s tempting to take keywords at face value, but they can have many different meanings.

And because the intent behind a search is so important to your ranking potential, you need to be extra careful about how you interpret the keywords you target.

Let’s say you’re researching the keyword “how to start a blog” for an article you want to create. “Blog” can mean a blog post or the blog website itself, and the searcher’s intent behind that keyword will influence the direction of your article.

Does the searcher want to learn how to start an individual blog post ? Or do they want to know how to launch a website domain for a new blog?

If your content strategy only targets people interested in the latter, you’ll need to determine the keyword’s intent before using it.

To verify a user’s intent, it’s a good idea to simply enter this keyword into a search engine yourself and see what types of results come up.

I did a quick search for “how to start a blog,” and it looks like most users are searching for info on how to start a website with a blog, not an individual blog post:

8. KeywordTool.io

Using KeywordTool.io is exactly what they promise in the headline. When I typed in “keyword research,” I got a list of 502 keyword ideas.

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Google Keyword Planner: How To Use The Free Tool For SEO

Don't get overwhelmed by the wide range of SEO tools. Start by utilizing Google Keyword Planner effectively for your keyword research.

With all the options on the market, deciding which SEO tools you want to use can be a bit overwhelming.

There are many tools for keyword research, competitive analysis, keyword rankings, and all the other tasks we complete as SEO pros.

The number of SEO tools available continues to grow, and it can be challenging to determine which is best for you.

That answer depends on many factors, including budget, team size, and the structure of your business and website.

Do you run a blog or an ecommerce store? Are you at an agency or in-house ?

The list goes on, and you don’t want all those options to give you analysis paralysis.

Google Keyword Planner is one of the most common keyword research tools and has been around for quite a long time.

The benefit of using Google Keyword Planner for keyword research is that it is free and uses Google data.

If you don’t know what to use, Keyword Planner is a safe pick that can provide value to just about anyone.

This article will walk you through how to leverage Keyword Planner for your keyword research needs.

What Is Google Keyword Planner?

Google Keyword Planner is a free tool that assists digital marketers in their research efforts, most commonly for search campaigns, both paid and organic.

It highlights various types of “keywords” or “search phrases and terms” related to your business.

Keyword Planner estimates the monthly search volume for specific keywords and the cost of targeting them with a paid campaign.

While Keyword Planner’s original intent was for paid search campaigns, the tool is valuable beyond search engine marketing (SEM).

SEO pros have been dipping into this free tool for years as a free resource for keyword research.

Why Use Google Keyword Planner For SEO?

Google Keyword Planner offers the ability to look for keyword insights for free.

Many tools require a paid subscription, but Keyword Planner is a free alternative that allows you to conduct keyword research .

Keyword Planner has many benefits, including finding new keywords related to your objective and determining how many times consumers search for these each month.

Suppose you don’t have access to any paid tools yet. In that case, Keyword Planner can help you identify what is essential in a keyword research tool so you know what features to look for when shopping around later.

How To Get Started With Google Keyword Planner For SEO

Now, let’s walk through the steps to getting Keyword Planner set up – and getting you one step closer to your keyword research goals.

1. Create An Account

First and foremost, you need to have a Google account to leverage Google Keyword Planner.

If you already have an account, you will need to log in.

Once you have created your new account, log into Keyword Planner .

3. Choose A Task

Upon logging into Keyword Planner, you will be presented with two options: “Discover new keywords” and “Get search volume and forecasts.”

If you are unsure which option you are looking for, jump in and try one!

Mining The Data For Strategies

Discovering new keywords is a great option when you want to expand the keywords, phrases, or topics you cover for your domain.

You can also use a domain’s URL to help filter out suggestions that don’t match your business well. This means that the domain you use will filter out any keywords that are a service/product you don’t offer.

This will provide you with ideas for related keywords, the monthly search volume, how much demand has changed year-over-year, the level of competition, and the cost per click (CPC).

You have the option to broaden your search to include other keywords to give you more diverse keyword ideas .

You can also narrow it down to the desired criteria for location, language, and time frames.

If you want to get even more granular, depending on your search topics, you will be given the option to refine based on options like brand or non-brand, new or used.

1. Discovering New Keywords

Let’s walk through an example.

You are looking for new opportunities to target for Xbox.com in terms of gaming. You start with products or services closely related to your business, such as “Xbox games” and “gaming.”

You will then use xbox.com as the site to filter out unrelated keywords and run the results.

2. Location

Now, let’s take your results and narrow them down even further.

By default, it is filtered to the United States and the last 12 month’s timeframe.

You are going to narrow down your location, which also allows you to see the “reach” in different locations.

Reach is defined as the estimate of how many people are interested in the topics you choose on specific sites. It is based on the number of signed-in users visiting Google sites, so keep in mind that demand could be much higher.

You will change your location to California, giving you opportunities to reach your California audience.

Using location could show significant shifts in keywords, but it also may not. This depends on your product or service.

There are other filters available, but for this scenario, I will mention the dropdown where it defaults to “Google.” You can change this to Google and Search Partners.

These sites partner with Google to show advertisements and free products, such as YouTube.

Expanding your research to partner sites can be a great opportunity if you are wondering about overall reach or planning to pursue topics from angles other than just written content – like video .

When you look at the keyword ideas, they are sorted by relevance. Keep in mind the top keywords might not be your greatest opportunity.

In this example, you can take a look at the average monthly searches, the three-month change, year-over-year changes, and competition to get you started for SEO strategy purposes.

The first set of keyword ideas is very broad, or head terms, with a lot of volume, pretty flat YoY, and high-medium competition.

So, as you scroll down and keep an eye on the fields we outlined above, some opportunities stick out here.

3. High Volume Broad Vs . Narrowing

First, Fortnite.

Fortnite is a popular video game played across many gaming consoles.

Remember, it filters results based on Xbox.com and its products and services. This could be an excellent opportunity to pursue if you haven’t maximized it yet.

It shows an average demand of 1-10 million per month for California alone, stable demand over the last year, and low competition!

From here, you would dive deeper into Fortnite to decide what strategy and tactics would allow us to perform well in the space.

4. Seasonal Opportunities

The second stand-out opportunity is for another game on the list, “Madden 23.”

Pretend that, for the sake of this exercise, you are not familiar with this popular game franchise. Seeing the monthly demand of 10,000 to 100,000, a year-over-year decline in interest of ~90%, and high competition.

These data points could lead you to look into Madden 24 and preparing a strategy around this topic, year after year.

Remember, keyword and topic research doesn’t have to yield net new ideas every time. There are events, products, services, etc., that occur on a cadence, so leverage that knowledge and those reoccurring opportunities.

5. Refine Even Further: Brand, Game, And Others

You can also leverage the “refine keywords” to add another layer.

For this use case, you can filter opportunities by brand or non-brand, game, food, and others. You will filter by brand and choose “Lego.”

As you can see, your results get even more granular and present you with specific opportunities around “lego.”

Leveraging the logic we discussed in example two, we see a trend for the “Star Wars Lego game,” which has increased by 900% in the last three months. This indicates that this is a hot topic and an opportunity for you to capitalize on.

You can also leverage the “game” filter in this example, similar to “brand.” The filtering opportunities aren’t perfect, but they can definitely help form strategies when appropriately leveraged.

Bonus Strategies & Tips

1. save money.

Everyone likes to save money, so why not use that data point to help form a strategy?

One of the columns we can leverage for this in Discover Keywords is the “top of page bid (high range).” Sort by this column to view the most expensive keywords first.

You can then evaluate this list in partnership with your partners in SEM for any costly keywords that are a priority for the brand.

Once you identify these, you can decide how to better capitalize on these keywords in the organic search landscape, whether to improve ranking, gain a featured snippet , drive higher click-through rates, etc.

2. Export Your Data

While there are many ways to expand and filter the data, there is also a way to export it to share with your team or manipulate it in an Excel file in a way that benefits you.

Select “download keyword ideas” and choose Google Sheets or CSV file format.

3. Unlock The Exact Data

If you have used Google Keyword Planner over the years, you know Google hasn’t been open to sharing exact search volumes, which can be frustrating, as a range might be from 1,000 to 10,000 searches per month.

This can be a bit too broad, especially when looking at long-tail keyword opportunities .

There is a new “trick” to unlock the exact search volume when you need it in Keyword Planner. Leveraging the “Get search volume and forecasts,” we used “discover new keywords” for the example above, so we’re changing gears.

From there:

• Enter your keyword in square brackets.
• Navigate to the Forecast tab.
• Click the arrow to show the graph.
• Look for the highest cost on the graph and click on it.
• Look at the impressions column.

Knowing you selected the highest cost, your impression volume should directionally show search volume per month.

This may seem like a lengthy process and can be a bit tricky, so if you have access to other tools for exact search volume, that would be great. However, if you don’t, this can be very helpful.

4. Understand Your Audience

For international and national brands, don’t rule out the value that exists in localization strategies. I am not referring to just having a Google Business Profile for your brand; what I mean is knowing your audience and crafting strategies for them.

Go to the saved keywords tab and select the keyword you would like to use. If you don’t have any saved keywords, add one and name the group.

Once this is saved, navigate to the forecast tab and scroll down to the locations module. You can view this by region, state, county, etc.

Continuing with our example above, for the term “Fortnite,” the top city is New York City. But Miami is in the top 5; you may consider targeting Miami as one of your opportunities to grow.

That could be a variety of things, but if your goals are to increase awareness and bring people to your website, you may explore written content about Fortnite with contextual information relevant to Miami.

Outside of SEO, you may decide to connect with an influencer with a high presence in Miami. The list can go on forever.

You can also leverage the Device section to adjust or optimize strategies you have in place.

For the term Fortnite, we see that most impressions may happen on mobile phones. Still, actual clicks and conversions happen at a higher rate on desktops.

Does that change your strategy in terms of how you create SEO content? Maybe not. Could it change how you align your calls to action on your experience? It could.

Both are great examples of ways to leverage Keyword Planner for SEO, but they should be taken to the next level to drive results.

Final Thoughts

There are many ways to leverage Keyword Planner for various marketing channels besides its initial creation, which focused on the PPC space.

The opportunity to leverage the tool lies in the “how” you use it and the data it provides. We reviewed how to get started, use the functionalities, and leverage that data for strategy.

As an SEO professional, I always recommend using tools to complement each other rather than using only one. However, not everyone has access to various tools.

You can form an entire SEO strategy by leveraging only Google Keyword Planner and maybe some other acquisition strategies as well.

If you are in a position where you can leverage different tools, I recommend reading about these keyword research tools.

More resources:

• How To Effectively Perform Keyword Research For Ecommerce
• Top 7 SEO Keyword Research Tools For Agencies
• A Guide To Essential Tools For SEO Agencies With Sortable Master List

Featured Image: Monster Ztudio/Shutterstock

Tessa Nadik leads the SEO and Content Team at Kelley Blue Book and Autotrader as the Sr. Director for Cox ...

• SEO Software
• Keyword Research

How to Do Keyword Research — SEO Cheat Sheet for 2024

Keywords are one of the crucial things in SEO. With the help of keywords, Google understands your content and thus shows it up in SERPs for relevant queries.

The more relevant your keywords are to what people are looking for, the higher the chances of ranking at the top. Which obviously means getting higher impressions, traffic, conversions, and, finally, profits.

Finding the best keywords requires a comprehensive keyword research. So, here I am to show you the whole process of picking the right keywords and making your site win SERPs, beat competitors, and survive through Google updates.

What is keyword research?

Why is keyword research important, how to do keyword research, step 1: create a list of seed keywords, google ads keyword planner, google search console, google trends, competitor research, keyword gap, autocomplete tools, related questions, tf-idf explorer, keyword combinations, # of searches, keyword difficulty, keyword length, irrelevant words, apply filters, semantic segmentation, segmentation by search intent, segmentation by volume, keyword difficulty, and competition, check urls ranking in google, pay attention to keyword difficulty, map keywords to landing pages, research keywords to rank and grow.

Watch our video on how to do keyword research like a pro

Basics first. Keyword research is the process of finding and analyzing keywords that you want to rank for to pick the best ones for your content strategy. Keyword research includes evaluating search queries by their relevance, popularity, and a set of other parameters (competition, difficulty, region, etc.) that identify if the keyword will be a go or a no.

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Keyword research is crucial because it helps you create relevant content. As a result, you rank for relevant search terms and become visible to your audience. It is also a way to study your SERP competitors and outperform them in search. Besides, targeting the right keywords with the right pages helps you match users’ intent and successfully drive them through sales funnels.

Roughly speaking, keyword research can be divided into three key parts:

• Finding keywords
• Evaluating keywords
• Segmenting keywords

Still, in practice, everything turns out to be a bit more detailed. The process of finding and evaluating keywords includes extra steps that can take more time depending on your niche, competition, website size, and so on. Keyword segmentation, needed to target keywords correctly, requires comprehensive analysis and powerful tools.

So, here's your action plan on how to do keyword research:

• Create a list of seed keywords
• Find more new keyword ideas
• Filter and refine keywords
• Segment keywords
• Build a keyword map

Seed keywords are the simplest terms that broadly define your business. These are the words that you are already supposed to rank for, even if you haven’t optimized for them intentionally. Like, it’s hard to have a site selling apples without a single mention of apples there. 

In the process of keyword research, seed keywords are used to kickstart the development of more complicated keyword ideas. As soon as you come up with a few seed keywords, you will be able to use SEO software to generate thousands more.

The easiest way to find seed keywords is to actually look at your website. Pick the words and phrases that best describe your products and services.

For example, your site is selling kitchen hardware. Look through the items in your catalog, browse categories, adjust filters, etc. Bet you’ll find dozens of seed keywords as a result.

If I were choosing seed keywords related to kitchen hardware, I’d probably pick the following terms: mixers , blenders , coffee , grills , pans , kettles , and microwaves .

Once seed keywords are found, write them down — you’ll need them soon.

Step 2:  Find more keyword ideas

This step requires Rank Tracker . You can download it now for free. Download Rank Tracker

Now, it’s time to broaden your list of keywords and discover new opportunities for your content ideas. To do this, you’ll need your list of seed keywords and a powerful keyword research tool.

For starters, you can take advantage of the native tools made by search engines. Although they are considered pretty odd, they can help you greatly if you know where to look and what to search for.

Google Keyword Planner is probably the first place you go to do keyword research. Keyword Planner works like this:

• You add a few of your seed keywords;
• Specify language and region;
• The tool generates a huge list of similar words and phrases.

You can evaluate your data using such metrics as search volume, competition, and bid ranges. As a result, you are likely to get a shortlist of keywords pretty similar to your seed keywords, but it's still a good place to start.

One thing to keep in mind is that Keyword Planner is a part of Google Ads. This means it best suits for advertising forecasts, so only relative judgments are possible. Like, you cannot get a precise number of searches a keyword has, but you will definitely get precise bid ranges.

Nevertheless, the tool is not useless at all. You can apply advanced niche-related filters (e.g., in my example with kitchen hardware , I can filter food type, color, appliance, etc.) to refine your keyword list. And you can filter your data by removing adult results, branded keywords, keywords with low search volume or too high/low competition, or exclude negative keywords.

While Google Ads is a powerful Google-built keyword research tool with search statistics directly from the source, it provides very basic data — you'd definitely need more keywords and more metrics to make your research comprehensive and useful.

Unlike Keyword Planner, Google Search Console is used to monitor keywords you already rank for, not to search for new ones. 

So what’s the point? The point is to discover the keywords that are on the verge of achieving top SERP positions (the so-called low-hanging fruit ).  And then give those keywords a little boost. These keywords require less optimization effort — you already rank for them. So, you don’t need to create new pages or rewrite your content completely.

To find your underperforming yet promising keywords, go to Performance > Search Results and make Position and Impressions visible.

Then, filter results to wipe out keywords with too low impressions (people do not look for them, so you don’t need to focus on them, either).

Your second step is to decide what underperforming means for you. Is it a keyword with an average position between 10 and 15 or 5 and 10? Actually, there’s no correct answer to this — some SEOs say that low-hanging fruit are something like position 11 (not reaching Google’s top 10), while others consider that position 3 is already underperforming. It's up to you, but I’d suggest choosing keywords between positions 5 and 11.

Apply the relevant filter — and enjoy your list of underperforming keywords.

Google Trends is a good tool to explore how a topic (a keyword or a search term) performs over a selected time period in a specific region (or worldwide). Besides, it lets you compare your keywords’ popularity and decide which of them your audience would appreciate more.

Google Trends will also help you see which queries are seasonal. You can check out what is trending now and what will be a hot topic in, say, a couple of months.

In terms of new keyword ideas, check the Related topics and Related queries sections:

Here, you can get pretty nice insights into what your audience is looking for now and how trending these keywords are.

Google Trends is a great source of hot and trendy content ideas. Although these keywords may not bring great traffic every day, they can help you boost your online presence during seasonal occasions. You can even get to Google Discover , as trendy (and well-written, of course) content is appreciated there. Alternatively, you can explore a Google Trends alternative to find additional insights and diversify your content strategy.

Rank Tracker

Rank Tracker is truly a beast of an SEO keyword tool. It has over 20 keyword research tools in one place and offers various keyword research methods (including competitor research!), so you can use all of them, or choose those you like best. 

Besides, Rank Tracker lets you evaluate keywords with plenty of metrics (search volume, competition, keyword difficulty, CPC information, expected visits, etc.) and choose the type of content for any keyword. Advanced filtering options go without saying.

What’s more, Rank Tracker lets you further work with your keywords — split them into groups, map to landing pages, and track positions as time goes by.

Download Rank Tracker

To start working with Rank Tracker, you need to download the tool and create a project for your website. At this stage, you have two ways:

• Let Rank Tracker do everything on its own;
• Enable expert options to add your seed keywords to track, connect Google Search Console and Analytics accounts, and specify search engines where you want to track keywords’ performance.

Which option is better? They are both perfect — the first one just lets you research keywords even if you have no seed units.

Note: you can manually add keywords and integrate Google accounts any time later, so don’t worry; you don’t miss anything.

Now that you've set up your project, let’s explore some of the keyword research methods available in Rank Tracker:

If your website is fairly new, and you cannot tell for sure who your SERP competitors are, there is a Competitor Research module where you can look them up.

Enter your website, specify the search engine, and here you are. Rank Tracker will show you domains that rank for the same set of keywords as you do (or don’t if your site is really new and small).

Spot how many intersecting keywords you have, how big the traffic difference is, how many unique keywords each competitor has, and so on.

Note: if you understand that your website is too small to outperform big and powerful competitors like, say, Amazon, go read this underdog SEO guide . I believe it will help you greatly.

Read more about competitor research here:

Find Your Competitors' Top-Performing Pages (and more competition research features)

Competitive SEO Analysis: 6 Things to Learn from Competitors

Keyword Gap tool is an awesome method to check what keywords your competitors rank for and get traffic from, but you don’t.

Chances are that you will find something to add to your content strategy. Just add the competitor domain / several domains and pick the parameter by which you wish to make the comparison (I recommend choosing any competitor but not your site ).

Rank Tracker will show you the list of competitors’ unique keywords, their rankings, your position for this keyword (if any), and other useful insights like if a keyword wins a SERP feature, keyword difficulty, etc.

The Autocomplete Tool combines autocomplete keyword suggestions based on search predictions from Google, Amazon, YouTube, etc. So, depending on the search engine you’re going to work with, your content and niche, you can see what search terms are most popular and then add them to your keyword list.

To get autocomplete suggestions for your site, enter a couple of your seed keywords, choose the tool, and here you are:

This keyword research method combines two options: Questions Autocomplete and People Also Ask . It pulls up related questions from the corresponding Google section. 

Keywords generated this way are usually long-tail keywords with a low competition level. While these keywords may not bring you millions of visitors, they tend to have higher conversion rates. What’s more, Google often gives featured snippets to pages that offer short yet to-the-point answers to questions like these.

Stay reasonable anyway — if a keyword has too few searches, like 10, it is not worth your attention.

TF-IDF is a statistical method that evaluates how important a certain keyword is to a document (page). The importance of the term increases proportionally to the number of times it is mentioned in the body of the content. 

In Rank Tracker, TF-IDF Explorer allows you to find the most meaningful and frequently used keywords of your top 10 ranking competitors, carefully analyzing SERPs for the keywords you provide. If many competitors use a certain keyword quite often, then this keyword is considered important and gets a higher score.

Through a TF-IDF analysis, you can identify what topics your top competitors cover and gain insights on which content to add for optimal optimization.

The Keyword Combinations feature is basically a set of keyword randomizers that lets you mix words, generate keyword combinations, and discover how people misspell your keywords. 

The point is that you may not be forming queries the exact way other users do, so this feature may let you discover a couple of keyword variations that have better ranking chances.

Just choose the mode (mixer, combination, or misspell), add a couple of words, and watch the tool mix them until every possible combination is found.

Step 3: Filter your data

So, you're done with the research and now have thousands of potential keywords from all the tools you have used. Sure thing, not all of them are a good match for your website, so your next goal is to refine the raw keyword list and exclude keywords that are meh.

The best place to do your keyword grooming is Rank Tracker, as it has all the essential SEO metrics necessary to evaluate keywords, as well as many useful features that you’ll need further. So, to keep all your keywords in one place, add the keywords you’ve retrieved from other SEO tools like Keyword Planner or Trends to Rank Tracker.

Go to Keyword Sandbox (the place where all the keywords found for the current project are stored) and click Add Keywords . Enter your keywords one per line.

Now that you have all the keywords in one tool, you can start your filtering routine.

Define filtering parameters

First, let’s see which metrics can help you in keyword filtering and how to interpret them correctly. 

The optimal solution depends on the size of your website, the niche it operates in, and your budget. Some sites can easily enter highly competitive environments, while others have to consider less difficult options to succeed. Anyway, it’s up to you which keywords to choose, so let’s get down to metrics.

Same as search volume — this metric shows how many times a keyword is searched for per month. 

Two things to remember here:

• Keywords with too low search volume do not bring you any significant traffic, no matter how big or small your site is.
• Keywords with too high search volumes are, in most cases, pretty generic, and it may not be a good idea to focus on them foremost.

But while those very high-volume keywords are still usable, keywords with no search volume could be easily omitted.

Keyword Difficulty (KD) shows how difficult it's going to be for you to rank for a given keyword. The KD score is calculated based on how strong each competitor in the SERP is (positions 1 to 10). So, if SERP competitors are strong, the difficulty score is high. Which means it will be harder for you to rank there.

I do not recommend choosing keywords with very high difficulty scores to start with, as they require too much SEO effort. Put them aside for a while and focus on somewhat easier keyword options.

Keyword Difficulty score is calculated for each SERP individually, so it is necessary to explore the SERP closer to get more details and adjust your keyword strategy. What ranking factors affect positions more than others? How strong are the top domains? Does the SERP have special features ?

Rank Tracker’s SERP Analysis module will help you here:

The shorter the keyword, the broader the term, and the more traffic it will bring.  However, short keywords are way too generic, so have low conversion rates. Likewise, the longer your keyword is , the less traffic it will bring and the higher the conversion rate.

Actually, the best solution is, as usual, somewhere in between. A typical SEO tip here is to use ordinary keywords (2+ words) to rank up. Then, while growing into a stronger website, go after both short-tail (generic) and long-tail (pointed) keywords.

Today, as search becomes more and more sophisticated , keywords tend to turn into concepts or entities. 

Like, let’s take the keyword Italy. To rank for Italy , it’s not enough to use this keyword 100 times on a single page. What’s needed is to mention Rome , pasta , Vatican , Ferrari , Venice , pizza , wine , and many other Italian entities and describe them in detail. If you want to rank for, say, pizza , you need your pizza page to feature tomatoes , marinara , and mozzarella .

This way, the more generic the search term is, the more SEO effort it requires. Don’t let keyword shortness deceive you.

Another way to get rid of undesirable keywords is by applying filters for irrelevant words. You may exclude irrelevant locations, irrelevant brands, or any other words you consider to be indicative of low-quality keywords.

Now that you are familiar with Rank Tracker’s filtering parameters, it’s time to apply them to finally refine your keyword list. Here’s how:

1. In Rank Tracker's Keyword Research > Keyword Sandbox module, click on the funnel icon in the top right corner of your workspace. A modal window with filtering options will pop up.

2. Click Add filter , select the parameter you need to adjust, and set up values. For example, you can choose # of Searches > more than > 100 to wipe out keywords with less than 100 searches per month.

3. To add extra filers, click AND and select the option you need. For example, Keyword Difficulty > less than > 40 (feel free to go higher or lower for stronger or weaker websites).

4. Add as many filtering options as you need. In the end, you’re likely to have something like this:

5. Then click OK . Your workspace will be updated and show only those keyword phrases that are over three words long, have search volume above 100, difficulty below 70, and are devoid of irrelevant words.

Now it’s time to move your set of keywords from the keyword sandbox for easier use. To do that, click on any keyword, press Ctrl+A (Cmd+A on MacOS), and select Start Rank Tracking .

Go to Rank Tracking > Tracked Keywords for further steps.

Step 4: Segment your keywords

Now you have eliminated all the unnecessary keywords, but your keyword list is still a mess. So, to turn this chaos into order,  the next step of your keyword research will be keyword segmentation and prioritization.

At this stage, you will divide your keyword list into a number of smaller lists united by any SEO parameters. Doing so will make it easier to segment and prioritize your final selection of keywords for better management and implementation in your SEO strategy. 

In addition to the SEO parameters I have mentioned before (search volume, keyword difficulty, and competition), there are two more criteria vital for content strategy — semantics and search intent.

Semantic segmentation allows you to group keywords of similar topic buckets together. This will help you understand what topics to cover within a single page.

See how to group keywords in Rank Tracker

Example: You have a set of keywords like coffee bean grinder, best rated coffee beans, good coffee beans, espresso machine coffee, coffee machine espresso, coffee drip machine, coffee dripper machine, grinder coffee machine .

All of them deal with coffee, so they belong to one big coffee group. Still, if you take a closer look at them, you’ll see that they are different and imply different entities. Grinder coffee machine and espresso machine coffee are two different machines:

While best rated coffee beans is not a machine at all.

So, based on some logic, common sense, and, of course, semantics, you can group your coffee keywords the following way:

• Group 1: coffee bean grinder, grinder coffee machine
• Group 2: best rated coffee beans, good coffee beans
• Group 3: espresso machine coffee, coffee machine espresso
• Group 4: coffee drip machine, coffee dripper machine

In Rank Tracker, you can get topic groups created automatically . To find them, expand the Keyword Groups folder in any section you’re working with (let it be Tracked Keywords ). Click a folder to see what keywords got there:

In case you want to change groups or consider that a single group has some too different keywords, you can easily regroup keywords. Right-click All Keywords , select Regroup by Topic , and choose the level of semantic similarity (low, medium, or high). The higher the lever is, the more keyword groups you will get and the smaller these groups will be.

Anyway, you are still free to manually move keywords to different groups by using Rank Tracker’s drag-and-drop functionality. The same is true about moving folders to subfolders or backward.

In SEO and digital marketing, search intent is the end goal of a user, the reason why a user actually searches for the term. Depending on the intent, a user expects to see a specific type of content in the SERP.

For example, if users are typing something like how to cook pasta bolognese , they expect to get recipes. If the query looks like iphone 15 buy , then product pages are needed. When users type top places to eat out in London , they would probably like to see listicles with reviewed locations and where to find them. You got the idea.

So, to match the search intent and get the most out of your content and SEO effort, you need to decide what keywords belong to this or that intent group and create the appropriate type of page.

There are several approaches to how many search intents exist , but the most detailed specification looks like this:

• Navigational intent. A user just needs to get somewhere, be that a site or an offline location. It has two micro intents, Location ( Grand Opera, Broadway ) and Website ( SEO PowerSuite blog, Google Analytics ).
• Informational intent. A user needs to get some kind of information. Here we have Entertainment ( italians react to british food, cat memes ), Definition ( who discovered the north pole, napoleon height ), Explanatory ( how pyramids were built, history of the great wall of china ), and Enablement ( how to cook rice, how to learn SEO ) micro intents.
• Commercial intent. Users are not ready to buy yet but are specifically mining information about certain services/products. Examples: iPhone 15 vs iPhone 15 Pro, best coffee machines, top indian restaurants in london .
• Transactional intent. A user is ready to make that purchase (or download or book etc.). Examples: Rank Tracker buy cheap, fishing rod buy .

Each search intent can be signalized by certain words and phrases.

Still, it is recommended to double-check search intents in SERPs in case you have doubts.

Based on these intent modifiers (and some common sense as usual), you can refine your keyword groups in Rank Tracker.

1. Go to Rank Tracking > Keyword Map . Click on the funnel icon in the top right corner. The advanced filtering dialogue will pop up.

2. Add filters to see keywords with a particular search intent ( Keyword > contains > “intent modifier” ). To add many modifiers, use the OR function:

3. Rank Tracker will return the list of phrases containing any of the words that you have specified.

4. Now, you can tag these keywords for easier management. Select all of them, right-click, and select Add Tags . Name the tag according to the intent type you’re working with.

The process of segmentation by search volume, KD, and competition in Rank Tracker is technically the same as search intent segmentation. You need to apply relevant filters and give keywords relevant tags.

By now, we've managed to spot important keywords that are likely to bring us traffic — and it only took a few minutes. You can apply other filters to tag or quickly remove keywords that match any specific criteria.

Step 5. Build a keyword map

Keyword mapping is the process of assigning keywords or keyword groups to landing pages. It is necessary to prevent keyword cannibalization and optimize your content creation and optimization effort.

In Rank Tracker, you can do keyword mapping in the corresponding module, Rank Tracking > Keyword Map .

Top things to notice here:

Even if a keyword is new and you have not optimized for it before, always check your ranking URLs. It may turn out that some of your pages already rank for this keyword.

To figure this out, check the Rank Analysis workspace of the Keyword Map module and look at the URL Found column:

For building a keyword map, keyword difficulty is ultra-important as it greatly determines pages’ SERP success. The trick is to use the indicator in combination with your page's SEO authority ( Page Strength metric in Rank Tracker) so that you can target more difficult terms with more authoritative pages.

So, here’s how to explore Keyword Difficulty right in the Keyword Map module, so you won’t have to interrupt the keyword mapping process:

1. In Rank Tracking > Keyword Map , select a keyword you want to map now and switch to the Keyword Difficulty workspace.

2. Look at the KD score calculated for the given SERP, paying attention to Page Strength of your competitors.

If the page you want to rank there matches this weighted KD average, then you have a pretty nice chance to easily enter this SERP. If not, then content optimization for the selected keyword (group of keywords) may take more resources.

To find out which SEO factors have a greater impact on positions in a SERP, use the SERP Analysis module.

Besides, if your webpage already ranks for a keyword but somewhere at the bottom of the SERP, you can quickly investigate your page’s strength and InLink Rank. By understanding what a page lacks (backlinks, PageSpeed, etc.), optimization can be sped up.

Now, let's see an example of how to assign keywords to landing pages in the project and build a keyword map for a website.

To map a keyword to an already ranking page, right-click the keyword, select Map to Landing Page , click Assign currently ranking URL , and choose Google URL found (this option appears instead of the Assign currently ranking URL line as you click it):

To map a keyword to a new landing page that is not ranking in Google or maybe doesn’t even exist, click Enter a new URL and type in the page address you need.

Rinse, repeat. Once you’re done with keyword mapping, switch to Landing Pages at the top of the list of your topic buckets. Here, you'll find your keyword map — the list of landing pages and the keywords you'll be targeting with each page.

Keyword research is a fascinating journey and a vital part of SEO. And, despite speculations, it is not going to die out or be replaced with AI or anything else. 

The concept of keywords is transforming for sure, and I hope this cheat sheet has simplified it for you. So, take it, find great keywords, do your best in content creation, and high rankings will not take long to come.

By the way, how do you think keyword research will change in 2024 and beyond? Share your ideas and keyword research tricks in our Facebook community.

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About organizing keywords in Keyword Planner

Determining where to place new keywords in your account can be challenging. Organizing keywords simplifies this process by helping you find the right placement for new keywords based on how your keywords are currently organized for relevant campaigns.

Benefits of organized keywords

• You’re in control : You have the option to either accept a suggested ad group assignment or reassign a keyword to another ad group.
• Saves you time : Organizing keywords eliminates the need to download keyword ideas. You no longer have to add keyword ideas manually to relevant existing campaigns and ad groups.

How it works

When you have a set of new keywords or you’ve found new keyword ideas, the Keyword Planner will automatically organize and identify new keywords that could be relevant to your campaign.

Instructions

How to use organized keywords to discover new keywords.

• Click the Planning drop down in the section menu.
• Click Keyword planner .
• On the “Keyword Planner” page, click Discover new keywords .
• Add seed keywords that are relevant to your current account.
• Click Download keyword ideas in the upper right corner.
• Note : The more keyword ideas you have, the better your results will be. Aim to have at least 25 keyword ideas before you start to organize keywords.
• Uncheck the “Use top performing campaigns” option to customize which campaigns to use.
• Keywords marked “In plan” aren’t active until you implement your plan.

• Click View Keywords at the top of the “Keyword plan” page to assess any keywords that may not have been suggested. Then, manually add the relevant keywords to your ad group by dragging and dropping.
• When you’re finished with your ad group assignments, select Download Plan .

How to organize keywords you’ve saved to a plan

• On the “Keyword Planner” page, click Get search volume and forecasts .
• Click Upload a file .
• Upload a list of keywords. Your file should have just one column with the header titled “Keyword”.
• Upload an entire keyword plan. Download the template to include optional data like campaign, location, or ad group in addition to your keywords.
• Once you have at least 25 keywords, click Submit .
• Click Get started .
• Click Organize keywords from the left-hand menu.
• Navigate to your saved plan in the list and review the suggested keywords.
• To add a suggestion to an ad group, check the box next to the keyword to accept it, and then click Add to Ad Group .
• When you’re finished, select Download Plan .

Related links

• Use Keyword Planner
• Best practices for finding new keywords

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