Parklab STORIES: our blog.

Keyword research and analysis, also known simply as keywords, is one of the most important activities in marketing.

In fact, they are a fundamental indicator for setting up and understanding the results of an SEO campaign, but also for building a sensible editorial calendar, for Digital PR and for managing Link Building activities, as well as growing the company website’s search traffic to increase contacts, awareness and sales.

The keyword research process: what it is and what it’s for

Keyword research and analysis (commonly called “keyword research”) is the process of finding and analyzing the terms people enter into search engines for a specific purpose.

The main goal is, most of the time, search engine optimization (SEO), but not only that.

Keyword research and analysis can help you discover which queries to target, how popular they are, how hard they are to rank for and much more.

For example, having a complete view of the queries your target audience is really searching for on Google also lets you create targeted content for SEO copywriting, genuinely useful and easy for your audience to find, and able to give rise to a genuine strategy of inbound marketing. It aims to attract visitors through content designed to draw them in, tailored to their needs.

All of this begins with keyword analysis.

Keyword analysis tools: the main ones and the advantages they offer.

Keyword analysis is carried out using tools that are more or less professional, free and paid.

Among the free resources to start your analysis with, these are the most popular:

Other tools worth knowing for a more in-depth keyword analysis.

Keyword analysis is not a given: it takes time, skill and, above all, the right tools.

Especially when you’re optimizing keywords for a substantial website, this analysis needs to be as in-depth and detailed as possible.

For this reason, there are many tools, both paid and free, that help SEO experts and digital marketers with this work.

Here are the main ones:

Keyword analysis: the different types of keyword that exist.

In keyword analysis, keep in mind that there are many different types.

For example, keywords fall into three types, depending on their composition.

• If it’s made up of a single word (“hotel”, “vitamins”, “supplements”, …), these are known as head keywords. They have a very high search volume, but they are extremely vague, with a huge amount of competition and hard to convert.
• If, on the other hand, a keyword is made up of 2 or 3 terms (“hotels in Milan”, “vitamins for hair”, “supplements for pregnancy”), we call it a “body keyword“. These have less competition than head keywords, a still-interesting search volume and are easier to convert.
• Finally, in keyword analysis based on length, there are also the so-called “long tail” ones. These are actual phrases, made up of at least 4 words, and are extremely precise and specific. For example, “cheap hotel in central Milan”, or “affordable travel insurance for students”. Obviously the search volume is much lower in these cases, but competition is greatly reduced and the chance of conversion very high.

Keywords are also distinguished by their intent, that is, the desire that drives the user searching for them online.

These can be:

• Informational: the user is looking for information on a specific topic, for example how to use a product or how to achieve a certain result. Example: “How to wash cashmere”.
• Commercial: these are searches driven by the desire to find a specific product or service. For example: “best tennis shoes” or “best photo editing app”.
• Transactional: the user is ready to complete an action, for example buying a product or service. For example: “discount code for site X” or “discount code for subscription to service X”.
• Navigational: these are used to reach a specific site, for example by searching only for a brand name to land on the official website or searching “brand name + e-commerce” to reach the online shop.
• Local: these are tied to a specific location, for example: “eye doctor in Florence”.

Choosing the perfect keyword: which factors to consider in keyword analysis.

Knowing the types of keyword is very useful in keyword analysis, but it’s not enough.

There are some factors to take into account, provided by the software listed above.

First of all, you need to consider search volume.

This parameter refers to the number of times a given keyword is searched each month on the chosen search engine, most often Google.

The value of this parameter can vary widely, depending on the type of keyword and also on the niche and target market.

It’s also important to consider the organic CTR, that is, the “click through rate”.

This refers to the effectiveness of the keyword being analyzed and depends on many factors, not just the word itself.

The presence of snippets, paid ads, shopping ads and other “extra” elements on the SERP tends to reduce this value, because they lower the chance of getting clicks on the organic results, which sit further and further down.

The third value to keep in mind is ranking difficulty. Competing with highly authoritative sites is hard, especially for newer websites.

So, if you’re doing keyword analysis for the SEO of a new site, or a site with few clicks, it’s good practice to start with keywords that have low competition.

As the site’s authority grows, you can move on to more competitive keywords.

The last parameter we’ll look at in this beginner’s guide to keyword analysis is CPC, that is, Cost per click.

Even though the SEO website positioning activity has no direct costs, understanding whether the competition spends money to rank paid content for a given keyword is highly indicative of that keyword’s value.

If its commercial value is zero, it’s not worth investing time in creating content and optimizing a site for it.

Also, sometimes you can achieve an optimal ROI with a keyword that has a low search volume and a high CPC.