In terms of daily search volume, Google is the largest search engine in the world and YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world. Both search engines are owned by Google, which is why it’s important to use them as you do keyword research.
What is meant by Google Keyword Research?
Keyword research with Google is the process of using Google-provided tools and information to find popular keywords. By simply utilizing Google’s search engine features like autocomplete, ‘people also asked’, ‘people also search for’, and ‘searches related to’, Marketers can find tons of keyword ideas. In addition, tools like Google Keyword Planner and Google Search Console are vital for SEO success.
Why Use Google For Keyword Research?
The first two places that people go to find information, guides, products, services, or anything else they are looking for are Google and YouTube. You need to understand the key phrases, words, and terms that people use to find either your business or your competitor’s business. That’s why you should utilize the built-in tools and free tools provided by Google to do effective keyword research.
Google Keyword Research Video
In the video below, which you can also watch directly on YouTube, I go over how to expand on a keyword idea. I start with a short-tail keyword and then I was able to find 42 different long-tail keyword variations using Google.
6 Ways To Do Google Keyword Research
With hundreds of free and paid keyword research tools, it can be difficult to know where to start. By using the 6 methods below, you can find every profitable keyword for your business. In fact, if you continuously build out keyword lists and create content based on those keywords, you will be driving thousands of SEO clicks sooner rather than later.
Throughout my example, I will show you how I found long-tail keywords based on ‘PPC Advertising’ as my short-tail keyword. At the very end, you can see my expanded keyword list that I was able to create.
- Google Autocomplete
- YouTube Autocomplete
- Google Search Tabs (News, Images, etc.)
- Google Keyword Planner
- Google Trends
- Google Search Console
When you search for something using Google, you probably know that you get plenty of suggestions related to your search. Whether you are searching for recipes, finance information, or anything else, you will see the most common phrases that people use. It looks exactly like the image below.
You can get a ton of ideas when you use Autocomplete. Google is trying to complete your search phrase based on the most popular phrases, and you can use that to your advantage. As a Marketer, this list is showing you the exact information that potential customers search for most often.
In addition, you can click before your search phrase to find even more ideas.
Another way to get Autocomplete keyword suggestions is by using YouTube. In fact, that is one of the main ways that I do keyword research for my Surfside PPC YouTube channel. It has helped me rank a lot of my videos high on YouTube and helped me gain visibility in the ‘Video’ carousel on Google.
You can look at the example below and see all of the suggestions.
All you need to do is type your short-tail keyword into YouTube and you can find a lot of new suggestions. Now, you can create content based on the most popular YouTube search terms.
One of my favorite places to find keywords is the Images tab on Google. Every time you search a phrase while you look for images, you will see additional suggestions. In addition, you can use the Shopping tab to find popular products and the News tab to find trending stories and popular stories. You can see the example from the images tab below.
When you do a Google search for your short-tail keyword, click on the Images, News, Videos, and Shopping tabs to find even more ideas. You may have to take some topics and product categories and turn them into keywords, but it’s a great place for new suggestions.
My favorite keyword research tool is the Keyword Planner provided in your Google Ads account. While it is a tool mainly for PPC Keyword Research as you build Google Ads campaigns, it can be used for many purposes. In addition to researching keywords, you can also see keyword search volume, build Google Ads campaigns, forecast keywords, see bid suggestions, and more.
I generally start all of my keyword research with the Google Keyword Planner. I start by searching my short-tail keywords and then I keep expanding with the keyword suggestions provided. You can easily find hundreds and even thousands of keywords that you can rank for in Google.
Google Keyword Planner Tutorial
For more information, you can find our keyword planner tutorial here and you can also watch the video below.
With Google Trends, you can see exactly what people are searching, what topics are trending, trending topics by location, and recently trending. What I like to do is explore topics and enter a search term.
Then, you can see some related topics and related queries at the bottom. It can be useful for finding related topics, rising search queries, and the top search queries based on the search term you enter.
Google Trends is the best tool for finding trending topics about the subjects you cover. It is not useful for every website, but it’s very important to use if you cover any news topics.
Google Search Console works best for established websites that are already ranking. It’s a great tool for seeing some of the short-tail keywords and long-tail keywords that your website is ranking for. You can see your clicks, impressions, click-through rate, and average position in the Google search results.
In addition, you can actually see related queries for the long-tail keyword you want to expand. You can see the example below where Google Search Console showed me 99 keyword ideas related to my short-tail keyword ‘PPC Advertising.’
First, I used filters to only include queries that contain the phrase PPC Advertising.
Then, I could see an entire list of 99 keywords that my website is already ranking for. Now, I just need to improve my content that targets those keywords.
Google Search Console Tutorial
For more information, you can find our search console tutorial here and you can also watch the video below.
My Final Keyword List Using Google Keyword Research
By utilizing the 6 free keyword research methods above, I ended up finding 42 keywords. They are all considered long-tail keyword variations of the keyword ‘PPC Advertising.’ You can use the same process to expand upon any keyword or topic that you create content for.
Frequently Asked Google Keyword Research Questions
Below, I answered some of the common questions that people may have as they look for new keyword suggestions using Google and Google keyword tools.
How Do I Research Keywords on Google?
For a simple method, you can use Autocomplete to find plenty of ideas as you complete a search. In addition, every single search query in Google will give you 8-10 related searches.
You can also utilize the Google Keyword Planner if you want more details and every single keyword that gets more than 10 searches per month. My favorite 6 methods include the ones above where I talked about Autocomplete, Google Trends, Google Keyword Planner, Google Search Console, related searches, and related questions.
What Is The Google Ads Keyword Tool?
The keyword tool available in Google Ads is called the Keyword Planner. It is meant to be used to build PPC Advertising campaigns with Google Ads and Microsoft Advertising. In addition, you can find the search keywords with the highest search volume, you can sort by competition, and you can see suggested bids based on advertisers current bids.
You can use the Google Keyword Planner by signing in to your Google Ads account, going to the Tools & Settings link, and clicking on the ‘Keyword Planner’ link.
In Summary
We all create high-quality content and target keywords so we can rank our websites. The 2 largest search engines in the world are Google and YouTube. Therefore, it makes sense to use their suggestions and Google’s keyword tools to find new ideas for our business. Within 10-20 minutes, I was able to find 42 long-tail keywords based on one short-tail keyword. Once I complete my content for all of the long-tail keywords, I know I will increase my Search Engine rankings and my organic search traffic.
