The external keyword tool from Google is one of the best free tools available for doing keyword research for search engine optimization. The external keyword tool is so useful, because of all the different functions available for researching the best keywords for your article. We have talked in the past about different keyword tools to use, and this tool is by far my favorite. You can find out the traffic for specific keywords, website keywords, and determine the competition for different keywords. It has made developing this blog and doing the keyword research for different posts tremendously easier.

External Keyword Tool

Keyword Tool For Website Traffic

The most important thing to note about using Google’s external keyword tool is that it is a tremendous tool to help you determine traffic for your website from different keywords. For example, the keyword that we researched above is “business” From this search, we know there are 55 million searches across the globe, and 20 million in the United States. Note: the US for me is listed as local, since I do not have boundaries. What is amazing about this tool is that it not only lists the traffic and possible Adwords competition, it also gives you a list of similar keywords that might be a great alternative for you to use on your site.

Keep in mind when you are doing a search that Google allows you to do your keyword search in a few different ways. The most important thing to note when doing a search is whether the search you are looking at is exact or broad. One thing most people do not know is that when you do a search you can actually limit the search to only those who typed in the exact keyword you listed or people who typed it in similar to what you listed.

Business cards versus Business card might not seem like that big of a deal. However, one search might have 1.5 million searches and the other 2.75 million searches every month. Start off with the exact search, so you can be as specific as possible with targeting your ideal market.

You can change the search parameters to different geographic areas. For example, if I had a retail store in Chicago, I could check to see the hits for business in the Chicago area. Additionally, I could type in Chicago business and find out how many people are researching those keywords. The possibilities are endless.

External Keyword Tool For Your Website

Keyword Tool External For Websites

So far we have discussed how the external keyword tool can help you determine the traffic you can receive for your website. Now, let’s flip that to determine, which keywords are bringing in traffic to your site currently. This can be done by typing in your website, instead of putting in a keyword in the search menu. A list of keywords for your site pop up, and help you determine which keywords are gaining traction on your site.

This can be a useful tool for checking out what competitors are using for keywords. For example, a bookseller might want to check out Amazon’s top keywords. Then determine either to go head to head and get a higher position for those keywords, or maybe find alternative keywords they are not using. Most internet marketers use the external keyword tool for creating their niche markets.

External Keyword Tool For Determining Competition

We have already alluded to this partially in the sections above, and I believe this deserves repeating, due to it’s importance. Keyword research is not only about finding the right words for your site. It also means finding a niche, where you can determine the amount of competition.

As you can see in the graphic to your left, every keyword also lists the competition for different words. So when you take a look at the word business, it does not have as much competition for the keyword as business cards does, which has a fraction of the traffic.

Now, one thing to remember is that this competition is for people using pay-per-click ads on Google. It will give you an indication of how much competition you have, but also do a simple Google search to check how many sites already use the word business in their title. That way, you do not accidentally go up against 2.8 billion websites using the word business in their title. Look for keywords that have less than a million sites and at least 200 searches per month.

Now that you are a master at using Google’s external keyword tool, let me know how you were able to use it build your website traffic.