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How to do keyword research

The real process, not a tool advert: find the phrases people actually search, judge which ones your site can win, and turn them into a plan for pages.
Keyword research by hand: sorting topic index cards into intent columns on a workbench in a home studio

Keyword research is the process of finding the words people type into search engines, then judging which of them your site can realistically rank for. It answers one question before you write a single page: is anyone searching for this, and can we win it? Skip that check and you write pages nobody looks for; the method below is the same one behind this site's own content plan, and it starts with free signals sitting inside the search results. If SEO itself is new to you, start with what SEO is and how it works, then come back.

The five steps, in order

Every big-name guide teaches some version of these moves, usually as a 5,000-word walkthrough of the vendor's own software. You do not need the software to start. The discipline is in the sequence, not the subscription.

  1. 01

    Start with one or two seed keywords

    Write down the plain words a customer would use, not industry jargon. Google's own starter guide points out that one person searches "charcuterie" while another searches "cheese board": same topic, different vocabulary. One or two solid seeds are enough to open the door.

  2. 02

    Expand from the search box, for free

    Type each seed into Google and mine autocomplete, the People Also Ask box, and the related searches at the bottom of the page. These come straight from real queries. Add the queries Google Search Console says you already appear for, and aim for 30 to 50 raw ideas before you filter anything.

  3. 03

    Check volume and difficulty, and trust neither blindly

    Keyword Planner gives free volume ranges; paid tools add a difficulty (KD) score. Treat both as rough filters. A brand-new site should stay roughly under KD 30, or use the top-10 scan below to judge winnability by eye.

  4. 04

    Group the survivors by intent

    Sort keywords by what the searcher wants: to learn, to find a specific site, to compare options, or to buy. Ten keywords that mean the same thing are one page, not ten. A page whose intent mismatches the query will not rank no matter how it is optimized.

  5. 05

    Map each cluster to one page

    Give every intent group a single home page, with the closest supporting terms folded in. A simple spreadsheet with columns for cluster, target page, volume range, difficulty, and intent is your entire content plan.

Why you should not trust the volume number

Search volumes look precise and are not. The figures in every tool are annualized averages, and when we pulled raw month-by-month data for this site's own research, some keywords swung 10x to 100x between their aggregate figure and recent monthly demand. Use volume to separate "real demand" from "nobody searches this," never to forecast traffic to the visit.

Difficulty scores deserve the same skepticism, plus one practical shortcut that rarely makes it into the tool-vendor guides. Search your keyword and scan the actual top 10: if small, ordinary sites are ranking there without big budgets, the keyword is winnable for you too, whatever the KD score says. If the page is wall-to-wall household brands, move on and let them have it.

A worked example: how we picked our own keywords

Theory is cheap, so here are the real calls from this site's research spreadsheet. "Print on demand" showed about 22,200 searches a month but a difficulty score of 76; "how to sell digital products" showed only about 1,900 searches at difficulty 7. We prioritized the second, because a new site ranking for a small keyword collects more visitors than a new site ranking nowhere for a big one.

Same logic elsewhere in the plan: "best online business to start" (880 searches, difficulty 2) and "how to make money from home" (40,500 searches, difficulty 20) both made the cut ahead of flashier, harder terms. The rule the numbers teach is simple. Winnability beats raw volume, every time, until your site has authority to spend.

Keyword ideas on sticky notes clustered around a hand-drawn topic map, grouping search terms by intent

New site or established site? Pick your lane

The right keyword strategy depends on where you stand, so match the row that fits.

Which tools actually help

The search box is your first tool and it costs nothing. Autocomplete, People Also Ask, and related searches surface real queries; Search Console shows what you already rank for; Google Keyword Planner gives volume ranges; Google Trends flags seasonality; AnswerThePublic mines the questions people ask around a topic.

Paid tools earn their place once you need difficulty scores and thousands of ideas at once. That is a speed-and-scale upgrade, not a prerequisite, and we have not lab-tested them ourselves; we compare them on documented features and pricing in our guides to the best keyword research tools and the free SEO tools worth using.

Mistakes that quietly waste months

Four patterns sink more beginner sites than any algorithm update. Chasing head terms a new site cannot win, so six months pass with nothing to show. Treating volume numbers as precise forecasts instead of rough signals. Writing five separate pages for one intent, so they cannibalize each other and none of them ranks. And stuffing the exact keyword into every paragraph, which Google explicitly calls out as spam; its language matching understands a page's topic without robotic repetition.

What Google itself says about keywords

Google's own starter guide is blunt on this: write for people first. Its systems "can understand how your page relates to many queries, even if you don't explicitly use the exact terms in them," which means your job is anticipating the words different readers use, not repeating one phrase. Helpful, well-organized, people-first content outweighs every keyword trick in the guide.

Turn the map into pages, then earn trust for them

Research is worthless as a spreadsheet. The payoff is the map: each same-intent cluster becomes one page, those pages link to each other, and search engines see a coherent topic instead of scattered posts. Once the pages exist, the next job is authority; that is covered in link building for beginners. Recheck your keyword list every 6 to 12 months, and if you are building an income site around all this, it ladders up to making money online the honest way.

Source: Google Search Central SEO Starter Guide
FAQ

Keyword research questions, answered straight

How do you do keyword research for free?
You can run the whole process with no paid tool. Use Google autocomplete, the People Also Ask box, and related searches for ideas; Google Keyword Planner (free with an Ads account) for volume ranges; and Google Search Console for the queries your site already appears for. That free stack is exactly how this site's own keyword list was started.
Can I use ChatGPT for keyword research?
Only for the thinking parts. ChatGPT is genuinely useful for brainstorming seed keywords and sorting a messy list into intent groups. It has no live search data, so any volume or difficulty number it gives you is invented; pull real numbers from Keyword Planner or a keyword database instead.
What is a good search volume to target?
There is no magic number. A low-volume phrase with clear intent and weak competition usually beats a high-volume head term you cannot rank for. Volumes are annualized averages that swing heavily month to month anyway, so treat them as a rough demand signal, not a promise.
What is keyword difficulty?
A score, roughly 0 to 100 in most tools, estimating how hard it is to reach page one based on how strong the current top-ranking sites are. It is an estimate, not a guarantee. Use it as a filter for where to start; a new site should generally hunt below about 30.
How many keywords should one page target?
One cluster: a primary phrase plus its same-intent variants. If two keywords deserve genuinely different answers, they deserve different pages. Spreading one intent across several pages splits your relevance and is the classic cannibalization mistake.
How often should you redo keyword research?
Every 6 to 12 months, or sooner if rankings stall or a new subtopic appears in your niche. Search Console shows the drift for free: new queries creeping into your reports are new keywords asking for coverage.
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