How to Use Google Keyword Planner Tool to Find Keyword Phrases

In this online business guide, I'll teach you how to use Google Keyword Planner tool to find search volume of keyword phrases. Before you start building a website or blog as a blogger, webmaster, internet marketer, affiliate marketer, etc, you should be able to research and find profitable keyword phrases to target on different web pages of your web site or blog if your ultimate goal is to make money online.

You've to do this because majority of online shoppers and information seekers usually go to search engines to type search queries associated with the products, services or information they want to buy or learn about on the internet.

Unless you create content around these search terms which buyers are entering into search engines' boxes, the possibility of web surfers finding your website or blog is slim or even non-existent.

It is even more important for you to know how to find profitable keyword phrases if you fall in any of the following categories:

• You want to build websites, optimize them for on-page SEO, rank on first page of major search engines and make money with Google Adsense, 
• You want to build websites or blogs to promote affiliate products and make money with affiliate marketing, 
• You are a blogger and your main goal is blogging for money through getting free targeted traffic to your web site, and 
• You are a merchant or vendor selling your own digital products and services.

One of the ways you can find these keyword phrases is to use keyword research tools which are available on the internet either as free or paid keyword software. 

The free keyword research tools are good but they have their own limitations when it comes to “analyzing competition” for specific search terms which you want to rank for and then create quality content around these key phrases.

However, you can use the free keyword research tool to start your own business, make money on the internet and then reinvest part of your profits to buy essential business tools so that you can automate some of the online jobs and live life in your own terms with hands-free income generating business from home.

If your goal is to find profitable keyword phrases in less time and target them in order to get free targeted traffic from search engines such as Google.com, you're lucky to be reading this guide.

This manual keyword research method is okay for beginners who are just starting out when you don't have much money to buy keyword research tool from the get go except the cost of registering a domain name and buying web hosting.

If you don't want to work too hard in your internet business, make sure you invest in automation tools as soon as you make money from the internet. Personally, I like to work less and earn more so that I can do other important things that matter to me.

You've to always remember that the main purpose of keyword research is to speedily find profitable long tail keywords with low competition to target on your blog or website. To use internet marketing jargon, you have to find low hanging fruits to target when writing and publishing blog posts and articles!

You can find long tail keywords using the free Google Keyword Planner tool or any other good alternative and then analyze each of the keyword phrases for competitiveness manually.

For you to successfully find long tail keyword phrases manually with weak competition, you've to resort to your gut instinct and common sense based on the level of your internet marketing experience.

With the help of Mozilla Firefox, SEOQuake plugin or Moz Rank Toolbar and with a high dose of patience, you can complete this task successfully. To tell you the truth, the manual keyword research system is cumbersome and time consuming but it is worth it when you don't have all the money in the world to invest in your business.

This part of digital marketing, i.e. keyword research, if done right can help you to make your first $1,000 within 90 days of starting an online business with only the cost of registering a domain name and buying web hosting.

Paid keyword research tool is good but expensive. It helps you to effortlessly find profitable long tail keywords which you can rank for on the first page of major search engines especially Google.com, Bing.com, Yahoo.com, etc.

What I want to teach you in this guide is how to find keywords using Google Keyword Planner tool especially for beginning affiliate marketers and internet marketers. First and foremost, you have to sign up for Google Ads account to use it if you don’t have an account.

Right now, it is only Google Ads account holders who have access to this free keyword research tool right from their account's dashboard. To get started, go to Google Ads “sign in,” “create an account” or “sign up” page link above.

But don’t be scared; you don’t have to run Google Ads campaign immediately in order to make use of the Keyword Planner. Simply sign up and fill out your billing info. Google will charge $1 to your debit or credit card in order to verify your account and to make sure you're for real.

If you have done that, simply follow this guide on how to use Google Keyword Planner tool to generate as many buyer keywords as you can from the free keyword research software.

With that said, let’s get cracking!

Step 1: Identify a Niche Market or Product to Promote

Our starting point is for you to identify a niche market or product you want to promote. After you've identified the niche market or product, find out the best word/words that precisely describe(s) your market or product.

For instance, if you want to build a website in the “weight loss” market, you'll start with broad keywords such as:

• Weight loss
  
• Lose weight
  
• Fat loss
  
• Fitness programs
  
• Weight loss exercise
  

From the above search queries, you'll be able to go deep and find “niche market keywords” which are closely related to your product, service or information. In this exercise, it's “weight loss,” “lose weight,” “fat loss,” etc.

By now, I guess you should understand the train of thought.

What you've to do next is to type each search term, separated by a comma or simply hit the “enter” button on your keyboard, into the tool search box in order to find additional keywords related to your original search terms.

After you've entered all the initial keywords (maximum of 10 keywords) into the search box, click on the “Get results” button for the search engine to go to work and return your expected result.

You can also use this same method to discover related “product name” keywords assuming you're promoting an affiliate product. Product name is the name of the product which you want to promote and sell from your blog or website.

Let's continue with our “weight loss” example. There is a product name from Clickbank marketplace which I hand-picked for this keyword research tutorial. It called “15-Minute Weight Loss.”

I'll take note of “15-Minute Weight Loss” as the product name keyword and investigate it to determine the average search volume per month plus additional synonyms or keyword variations which potential buyers are typing into the search engine box to find the product.

From the image above, Google Keyword Planner tool returned additional search terms closely related to my “seed keyword” along with the average search volume and CPC (cost per click) per month for each of the search terms.

But you've to take note that keyword research tool may not return any keyword data for a new or emerging market or new product. As an internet marketer, you should know in advance the type of keyword phrases which potential buyers will be typing into Google to buy such products and services.

If you can use these new-found keywords and write SEO articles to target them on your blog, you'll make money as an early bird in your target niche market before others do.

Now that the above step has been sorted out, let’s go on to step 2.

Step 2: Launch Google Keyword Planner

To start the keyword research exercise proper, you've to sign in to your Google Ads account and from your account's dashboard, you'll see a menu bar across the top of the web page.

Simply locate the spanner image link and click on it.

A drop down menu will come down. Click on the “Keyword Planner.” It'll take you to a page where you will see another link to click on; it says “Discover new keywords.”

Or, you can directly access the keyword research software from https://ads.google.com/home/tools/keyword-planner. You can enter keyword(s) in the search box, each keyword separated by comma. There are lots of filters in Google Ads Keyword Planner which you can apply in your keyword research exercise as you master its use in order to streamline the results you'll get.

There is also a search box where you can enter the domain name URL of your competitor's website if you want to discover the type of keyword phrases he or she is targeting.

But in this section, I want us to concentrate our efforts on finding buyer keywords to target. To start off, I will enter the “niche market keyword” and “product name keyword,” separated by comma.

After entering the keywords and before clicking on the “Get results” button, you can select the country where you want to target your online marketing campaign to. In this exercise, I selected United States because from my experience US has the largest market!

Also, because I want to get as many keyword ideas as possible, I'll not apply any other search filters for now. Next, I'm going to click on the “Get results” button so that Google Keyword Planner tool can go to work for me.

As soon as the software finishes processing the information, it will return the results which you can download in CSV excel file to your computer or laptop for later use.

From the keyword research example and depending on the popularity of your niche market, you will get many search terms to investigate. Definitely, not all search terms will be relevant to your needs. Simply copy and paste the most relevant keyword phrases into a separate notepad and save it.

If you follow this Google Keyword Planner tutorial, you'll discover that potential buyers are searching for “weight loss tips,” and others. With these set of keywords to work with, you can start analyzing each of the search terms for keyword competition. A keyword with low competition means lots of authority websites are NOT targeting that specific keyword.

In other words, you have a fighting chance of ranking your website or webpage on the first page of Google and other big search engines preferably in positions 1 to 3 if you target the keyword by publishing quality content, i.e.SEO article, around it and building quality authority backlinks to the page.

It is only advisable to pursue a buying keyword when it has low competition if you really want to get free targeted traffic from search engines. Now, the question you may want to ask is, “How can you determine if a keyword has low market competition?”

The first and fastest method is to use a paid keyword research tool. Now, I prefer using paid keyword research tool to analyze keywords in order to save time. I would rather invest the time to write SEO articles around long tail keyword phrases with weak competition than conducting manual keyword research for hours on end.

Step 3: Keyword Competition Analysis

You've to download Mozilla Firefox browser and install SEOQuake plugin or Moz Rank Toolbar to complete this step. Mozilla Firefox browser, SEOQuake plugin and Moz Rank Toolbar are free to download and install. It takes few minutes to download and install.

After the installation, open up Google.com in your Firefox browser. After you have done that, copy and paste each search term into the Google search box.

The keywords you should not target are search terms which have authority websites on the first page of SERP. Authority websites will vary from webmaster to webmaster based on his or her level of internet marketing skills and experience.

Personally, I usually avoid a keyword with the following attributes:

1. More than 5 websites that are on page one of Google.com already targeting my potential keyword have 100 and above backlinks each linking to the ranking web page,
   
2. There are well-known authority websites dominating the first page of Google.com such as Amazon.com, Wikipedia.org, etc,
   
3. The age of the domain name ranking on page one is 2 years and above, and
   
4. The websites on the first page of Google are intentionally targeting the keyword on their title page, meta description, domain URL and content.

Attempting to beat HealthLine.com, WebMD.com, etc for keywords like “weight loss for women” will be an exercise in futility. The age of these domain names are years back.

So, Google.com will trust these domain names than your own domain name which you just registered yesterday. This is why you see experienced SEO specialists fighting over expired domain names to buy which are 3 years old and above.

What I'm really interested in is to have at least 2 to 5 slots on the first page of Google to rank my website for my target target keyword. Also, I've to double check to make sure that I can rank for my target search term as quickly as possible by looking at the second page of Google to dispel any fear of finding 2 to 5 major contenders who are already gunning for the same slots on page one of SERP which I'm aiming at too.

If you're using Moz Rank Toolbar, you may want to target a keyword with Domain Authority (DA) less than 25 and Page Authority (PA) less than 25. You can use MajesticSEO.com or AHREFS.com to analyze the backlinks and determine their authority.

This is how to use Google Keyword Planner tool to find search volume of any keyword or phrase in your target niche market. And I believe you can do it now.