1. Build a list of keywords are connected with your business in your opinion
Write down keywords and phrases, that you think are suitable to use to promote your website online. Who can know your business better than you, right? Although you shouldn’t use your keywords in the first place, this kind of research could give you an idea of what you should be looking for.
2. Use tools from your PPC campaigns
Researching keywords is not only important for SEO purposes, but is also essential for your paid SEM activities. You can check our article on when to choose PPC and SEO.
Google Keyword Research provided by AdWords advertising platform is a good place to start. Of course there are other tools on the market like Bing Ads Intelligence, but let’s stick with Google, since it’s the global number one and is quite comprehensive and a complementary tool.
3. Use your own historical data
The other tool you could use is of course your analytics software. I assume that Google Analytics would be your first choice in that area. You can use it to track many types of traffic from search engines – paid, referral, social and organic.
4. Analyze search trends
Another variable you should bare in mind are search trends. You can get some inspiration from the keywords, if the ones you’ve chosen fit in local or global search trends, (depending on your business). If not, it would be a good idea to do additional research and add some new keywords and their variations to your list.
5. Analyze your competition
You can also check how much competition your chosen keywords have. Type some of of the keywords of your choice and look what results will be shown to you. Check if your competitors offer is available and look if the sponsored links of similar offers will appear.