How to do keyword research for Google Ads
Keyword research is a crucial part of your digital marketing strategy. Good research ahead of time will significantly improve the efficiency and effectiveness of your Ad campaign. This guide will help you understand what keywords are, why they’re important to your campaigns, and other key considerations you need to make to smash your Campaign targets.
What are keywords?
Keywords are words or phrases that people use when they search for something on search engines like Google. In the context of digital marketing and SEO (Search Engine Optimization), keywords are the terms that businesses try to rank for in search results.
Why are keywords important to a Google Ad campaign?
Keywords are crucial to a Google Ad campaign because they determine where and when your ads will appear. When you select relevant and high-performing keywords, your ads are more likely to be seen by the right audience at the right time. This can lead to increased traffic, conversions, and ROI for your business.
How to research keywords for a campaign?
Keyword research involves identifying popular, relevant words and phrases that people are using in search engines. Getting the right keywords can drive relevant traffic to your website which will in turn increase conversions.
To maximise the utility of Google Ads, and get the best results from your paid ads strategy, you should spend time beforehand to plan your campaign and research appropriate keywords.
Understand your business niche and identify your target audience
Knowledge is power and that’s true even in digital marketing. The more information you have about your business, your product or service, your USP, and your customers, the better you can craft your messaging. Think about your target audience; what language do they respond to, what challenges do they face, and what is your solution to those problems.
What would a potential customer be searching for?
Armed with your knowledge on your target audience, begin to think about the types of queries they might be entering into a search engine. These queries will then inform the keywords you’ll be targeting.
Use keyword research tools
There are a number of great services out there to support your keyword research. Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, and Ahrefs can be powerful tools in helping you examine keyword popularity, cost-per-click (CPC) and the competition. They can even provide you with alternative keywords you may want to consider.
Google Keyword Planner: Provides search volume and competition data for specific keywords.
SEMrush: Offers comprehensive keyword analytics, including keyword difficulty, search volume, and competitive density.
Ahrefs: Provides a keyword difficulty score, search volume, and click metrics.
Google Trends: Provides easy to understand search term popularity over time, and allows you to compare multiple terms
Analyse the competition
What keywords are your competitors using? Knowing what your competition is doing can help inform your own strategy, aiding you to pick the right keywords. Tools like Buzzsumo and Google Auction Insights can be helpful in seeing what other companies in the same space are doing.
Choose a mix of keywords
To get the best results your keyword strategy will want to utilise a mix of short and long-tail keywords. Short-tail keywords are broader and more competitive, while long-tail keywords are more specific, higher intent, and less competitive. Getting the balance right will help you to capture customers who know exactly what they’re looking for, and be presented to those who might lack the technical expertise to understand their needs.
Using keywords in an Ad Campaign
Applying your keyword research to your ads involves more than just inserting keywords into titles and descriptions – although that’s something you should look to do too.
As mentioned, your keywords should be a mix of short and long-tail keywords, depending on your budget and overall strategy. For example, say you run a blog on helping amateur gardeners grow their own food. If you wrote a blog on growing tomatoes, an example of a short-tail keyword would simply be ‘tomato’, while a long-tail keyword might be ‘when to plant tomatoes’. Both of these directly relate to your post, but the search volume and associated costs will be different. If you want to spend less money, but rely on more niche and specific search terms, you might opt for more long-tail keywords.
But, there is more you also need to take into account. For instance, you might have several ad groups within a given campaign; you should make sure your keywords are correctly assigned to each group, and that they’re tailored to each specific audience. Getting even more granular, you should also be trying to include the keywords directly into your ad copy, showing audiences that your ad is relevant to their search.
What are broad, phrase, and exact match keywords?
If all the above wasn’t enough, you also need to be aware of keyword match types. This is how the words get matched to user search queries. There are three types of match; broad, phrase, and exact.
Broad match will reach the widest audience, and will place your ad next to any related keyword. It’s great for reach, but can lead to irrelevant traffic that will just cost you money.
Phrase match keywords will display your ads against search queries that match your particular keyword in the exact order you entered it, but the query can include other words before or after.
Exact match is, as the name suggests, the most precise targeting match type, and will only display your ad against queries that exactly match your keywords. This means the user typed your keyword in, and no other words before or after.
These tables visually outline what that would look like.
Top tips when choosing keywords for Google Ads
Always align your keywords with your business goals.
Understand user intent behind each keyword.
Use a mix of broad and specific keywords.
Regularly review and adjust your keyword strategy based on performance data.