A quick question about keyword research thats been bugging me....

[Sonny Am]

Hi,


Ive started on my seo journey and researching blackhat as well as whitehat techniques, something that has come up time and time again, is the importance of proper keyword research and analysis, and ive read around finding a niche using this....a little background below

For example...I typed in the word "teddy bear" into google adwords keyword research tool, tweaked the values and had it under the "exact" search mode, and found the keywords "teddy bear dog" and "teddy bear hamster" as keywords with low competition, "green bar about a tenth of the total bar" but with global monthly searches of above 10,000 (which i think is a lot, is this a lot?)..

My issue is....most IM have the aim of getting to the first page of google, therefore a keyword might have low overall competition and high overall searches (according to keyword research tools) but can still have a very strong first page with really high authority official sites that are impenetrable....therefore even though the rest of the niche is low competition that first page isnt?

Is there not a tool to analyse the first page only and see how weak first page sites are, or am i missing something huge here, or have the wrong idea about something?.....


Any help would be very very much appreciated, thankyou

[chubbsky]

I don't quite get your question under "My Issue". But to answer your question about the tool, yes there are tools available to analyze competition on first page of Google. You can use Traffic Travis (free), Market Samurai, or Niche Finder (wso).

[Sonny Am]

Ive heard a lot about Market Samurai, i thought it was just another overhyped product, but it seems it isnt at all, may have to buy this real soon. So keyword research is a lot more complicated than just finding a keyword with a high search volume and traffic, as well as low competition....

[rob1985]

Don't pay attention to the green bar. Check it within quotes in google, to get some idea of competition.

[Sonny Am]

Originally Posted by rob1985

Don't pay attention to the green bar. Check it within quotes in google, to get some idea of competition.

Could you elaborate on this a little if you wouldn't mind, where is quotes located in the google adword research tool?....

[timpears]

The competition bar you are seeing in GKT is the 'AdWords' competition, not the competition for that keyword in search. That bar is telling you if there is a lot of advertisers buying AdWords for that term. If you are doing AdSense sites, this will give you some indication if there are enough advertisers to make it profitable for you. But really it is a measure of the search advertising, and not The Content Network advertising, but I think many people think there is some correlation between the two.

You can download a free version of Traffic Travis, which is a respected tool to measure these type things. I linked the name here to their site to download it. They will try to sell you on the paid version, but the free version provides enough information for most people.

[gskesavan]

Are you asking if 10,000 monthly searches is a lot? Of course, it is.

If the keyword is laser targeted to a specific type of buyer, then you will end up making a lot of money with just 1 site having 10,000 searches a month.

As far as the competition analysis is concerned, I don't even care how many pages are there on Google for that term. I just see if any new website is ranking there, if it does, then so can I

[hotboy18]

I have been using Market Samurai for over a year know and I agree that it is one of the best tools to use and spy on your competition for first page results. You can find out a lot about the sites on the first page off Google and many great other information.

[Robert X]

yes,, go to the colored graph in market samurai to see the strength of the top sites for a keyword. It will show where they are stong and where the sites are weak.

[vivaarturo]

use Market Samurai will show you all the details, go to their site and learn how to use the tool for free Noble Samurai - Dojo

cheers
Arturo

[UMS]

Originally Posted by sonnybh1

For example...I typed in the word "teddy bear" into google adwords keyword research tool, tweaked the values and had it under the "exact" search mode, and found the keywords "teddy bear dog" and "teddy bear hamster" as keywords with low competition, "green bar about a tenth of the total bar" but with global monthly searches of above 10,000 (which i think is a lot, is this a lot?)..

A lot of people get caught out with the competition column. The only thing it is showing you is the amount of competition between people bidding on that particular keyword via Google Adwords.

Originally Posted by sonnybh1

Is there not a tool to analyse the first page only and see how weak first page sites are, or am i missing something huge here, or have the wrong idea about something?.....

There's a few.

For the free option, I'd recommend Traffic Travis (version 3 is free and in my opinion still better than version 4)

For the paid option, SECockpit really has no competition.

[Pubster]

Originally Posted by sonnybh1

Hi,


Ive started on my seo journey and researching BlueFart as well as whitehat techniques, something that has come up time and time again, is the importance of proper keyword research and analysis, and ive read around finding a niche using this....a little background below

For example...I typed in the word "teddy bear" into google adwords keyword research tool, tweaked the values and had it under the "exact" search mode, and found the keywords "teddy bear dog" and "teddy bear hamster" as keywords with low competition, "green bar about a tenth of the total bar" but with global monthly searches of above 10,000 (which i think is a lot, is this a lot?)..

My issue is....most IM have the aim of getting to the first page of google, therefore a keyword might have low overall competition and high overall searches (according to keyword research tools) but can still have a very strong first page with really high authority official sites that are impenetrable....therefore even though the rest of the niche is low competition that first page isnt?

Is there not a tool to analyse the first page only and see how weak first page sites are, or am i missing something huge here, or have the wrong idea about something?.....


Any help would be very very much appreciated, thankyou

I just ran your Teddy Bear Dog through SECOCKPIT. It ran all the competition of the Top Ten Spots on Page One of Google. SECOCKPIT uses only Exact Count. This is what it looks like after about 2 minutes:
6600 Exact Searches per month
If you get your page (KeyWord) within the top 3 spots on page one you will get about 100 visitors Per Day with slightly moderate competition.
4th to 7th Spots 22 visitors a day to your page.
8th to 10th spots about 3 or 4 visitors a day.
Now figure in your estimated conversion rate and profit per sale and get a pretty good idea if the keyword will be profitable.
CPC was less than 50 cents.
Looks like a decent Keyword to me...

I have Market Samurai too and it is a good tool, but what I did in SEOCockpit in 2 minutes would have taken ME over a hour in Market Samurai. That is why I like it better. Plus the fact that it taps into SEMOZ for some of its calculations of competition. IMO more accurate than Google. I have compared results of Market Samurai and SECOCKPIT and they are similar findings. The ease and hours saved is the big plus. Keyword research is your life blood...get that wrong and your wasting your time after that.
So bottom line is I like Market Samurai, but SECOCKPIT is my tool of choice after testing and using it the past 6 to 8 months. It has been very limited and available only through webinars to a few. However it will be going live to the public in a few days. Hope that helps...

[dburk]

Originally Posted by Pubster

I just ran your Teddy Bear Dog through SECOCKPIT. It ran all the competition of the Top Ten Spots on Page One of Google. SECOCKPIT uses only Exact Count. This is what it looks like after about 2 minutes:
6600 Exact Searches per month
If you get your page (KeyWord) within the top 3 spots on page one you will get about 100 visitors Per Day with slightly moderate competition.
4th to 7th Spots 22 visitors a day to your page.
8th to 10th spots about 3 or 4 visitors a day.
Now figure in your estimated conversion rate and profit per sale and get a pretty good idea if the keyword will be profitable.
CPC was less than 50 cents.
Looks like a decent Keyword to me...

I have Market Samurai too and it is a good tool, but what I did in SEOCockpit in 2 minutes would have taken ME over a hour in Market Samurai. That is why I like it better. Plus the fact that it taps into SEMOZ for some of its calculations of competition. IMO more accurate than Google. I have compared results of Market Samurai and SECOCKPIT and they are similar findings. The ease and hours saved is the big plus. Keyword research is your life blood...get that wrong and your wasting your time after that.
So bottom line is I like Market Samurai, but SECOCKPIT is my tool of choice after testing and using it the past 6 to 8 months. It has been very limited and available only through webinars to a few. However it will be going live to the public in a few days. Hope that helps...

Hi Pubster,

You need to check your numbers again, they don't seem to add up.

If there are 6600 searches a month then that would be only 220 per day on average. If according to your post, each of the top 3 positions will get approximately 45% of all search traffic then you are way over the total traffic (136%) and that's before considering abandoned and revised searches or traffic to the other 7 positions on page 1 plus any traffic that could go to listings past page 1. Nor does your data correspond with any large datasets that have been made public, like the leaked AOL data.

It sounds like you are either using that tool incorrectly or the developers need to go back to the drawing board and start over.

[Pubster]

Hi Don,
I don't think I'm using the tool wrong. You type in the keyword and it starts up. There are no settings to change as far as search such as "Broad" etc...it uses Exact Match. It then spits out the data after running competition etc....The data works off the theory that the Top listing gets about 40% of the traffic give or take percentage points. The theory is that it is downhill from there. These KW tools can only give estimates to help you judge. Maybe it was misunderstood when I said WITHIN the spots 1 -3. The actual number SECOCKPIT said was 98 which is an estimate of what you might possibly get within that Range of the first 3 spots. I was not saying that EACH spot 1 -3 would get 100 searches. In fact the number 2 spot may get more than number 1. If the top 3 spots were all getting the same traffic each what would be the incentive of trying to get higher. No Tool can tell you what the exact numbers are your going to get...and I have used ALL the Major ones and some Not so major ones that I can think of. If you do a lot of keyword research a major factor is time. You know what I'm talking about as you have been around for a good while. And that is the main reason I favor SECockpit at this time. I also still use the GKT. However, I am always open to new tools and new methods if you have one you would like to share. In fact I would be willing to email you the Excel Spreadsheet of that search and results from SECockpit if you would like to analyze it and maybe compare to something else. I wish KW Research was an Exact Science...it sure would be a lot easier...Thanks for commenting...