Google Keyword Planner
The Google Keyword Planner allows users to find the most relevant keywords for the content they’re creating. It lets you view which search terms are used more often than others and how competitive they are to rank for. This information is imperative for helping you narrow down which keywords to optimize your content for.
This is helpful for all sorts of content creation: Website copy, ad campaigns, blog posts, etc., because optimizing your work for higher-quality keywords increases the likelihood of your site appearing on the first page of search engine results.
Where Do I Need to Insert Keywords?
Your chosen keywords should be used in a variety of places on your website, including your site’s meta description. This is the couple of lines of text that appear in Google search results right under your website’s title.
Amazon, for example, has the following set as its meta description:
Online shopping from the earth’s biggest selection of books, magazines, music, DVDs, videos, electronics, computers, software, apparel & accessories, shoes.”
While this appears to be a natural description of the site’s purpose, it also includes several relevant keywords to boost its SEO. For instance, “online shopping” and the list of product categories that potential customers might be interested in.
SEO also matters in the backend of your site, and therefore, keywords do too. Why? Because Google also reads the HTML file of your website even for things that aren’t visible to your visitors—for example, your image titles and alt tags. So, it goes without saying, this these are other places you can insert your keywords.
How Do You Use Google’s Keyword Planner?
To start with, you’re required to set up a Google Ads account. This, however, is easy to do and free of charge. You don’t, however, need to launch a Google Ad to use their keyword planner.
Beyond the sign-up process, there are a few guidelines to get you started with how matching keywords work.
If you do decide to run a Google Ad, it’s worth noting that “exact match” keywords will only target your campaign toward people who are searching for your desired keyword.
For instance, if “men’s shirts” is your keyword, your ad will only appear to those searching for “men’s shirts,” or phrases exceptionally close to the original keyword. This can be helpful if you’re targeting a niche demographic and want to attract the most relevant audience for your campaign.
Whereas, “broad match keywords,” pair your ad with a wider variety of search queries that most of us would consider relevant. As such, the website visitor doesn’t have to enter your exact keyword to stumble across your ad. Instead, the search just needs to contain a related keyword. For example, if you posted an advertisement containing the words “women’s clothes,” it would still appear to users searching for “ladies clothes,” “women’s wear,” “clothes for women,” or even potentially “dresses.”
What about “phrase” match? This is when your keyword is a whole phrase and you only want your ad to appear when the user is searching for that specific sentence. For example, this could be helpful if you’re creating blog content to answer a particular question such as, “What is digital marketing?” or “How to cook potatoes.”
What are Google’s Keyword Planner’s Best Features?
To sum it up, here are some of the Google Keyword Planner’s most renown features:
- You can explore new keywords using categories and phrases
- You can manage your search results based on location
- You get access to historical data on keywords so you can observe trends
- You can filter search results by organic impressions, ad impressions, suggested bids and average monthly bids
The Google Keyword Planner tool is an essential resource for anyone running Google Ad campaigns or creating online content. It’s also invaluable for helping you to improve your website’s SEO and grow organic search engine traffic! Once you’ve created a Google Ads Account, you’re good to go—so, what are you waiting for?
