If you are new to search engine marketing, know that keyword research is arguably one of the most important steps in optimizing your website to perform better in the SERP.

Keyword research is a core task in SEO that involves identifying popular words or phrases that are relevant to your business or industry in order to figure out what to rank for. Many businesses start by making a list of keywords that are relevant to their business but once you have that list you have to begin evaluating which keywords will work best for your individual campaigns and site pages.

Keyword research helps you better understand the demand for individual keywords and how hard it would be to compete for those terms in organic and paid search results. Understanding the competition will better help you adjust your strategy and optimization efforts to rank better in the SERP.

Proper keyword research should provide you with a variety of ways searchers may be using language to find products or information in the SERP. It can also help you find new content ideas, learn more about your audience, and keep you up to date on industry jargon.

Ultimately, by doing proper keyword research, you should be able to create targeted content to help drive traffic and conversions directly to your website. While there are a number of keyword research tools available, if you are using Google Ads, Keyword Planner is a great way to begin your research and start new campaigns.

What is Google Keyword Planner?

Google’s Keyword Planner is designed to help you research keywords to use in your Search Network campaigns. It is a handy free tool that allows you to discover keywords related to your business and see the estimated monthly searches they receive as well as the costs to target them.

Google Ads Keyword Planner is used for:

• Discovering new search keywords

• Seeing average monthly search numbers for keywords

• Helping to determine costs

• Creating new search ad campaigns