Don't Put All Your Faith On Google Keyword Tool. Here's Why...

[russells]

Hey Warriors,

The reason I say that is because so many people are leaving money on the table for taking the Google Keyword Tool data as Gospel.

Let me explain...

If the Google Keyword Tool told you that there were no monthly searches for a particular keyword in your niche, I bet penny to pound most of you wouldn't bother purusing it further.

Instead, you look for searches of 1000+ at least.

Oddly, I was looking at my analytics for one of my Amazon sites and noticed traffic from certain keywords that I wasn't targeting.

So, I checked these keywords against the Google Keyword Tool just for curiosity and found that the tool showed "-" for monthly searches.

Interesting.

So I did a test site. I registered a domain name and picked 10 products from Amazon that the Keyword Tool told me get no monthly searches.

After around a month I checked the stats. I was gettign TRAFFIC and a few sales - not many - but sales.

Now what I'm saying is, don't totally trust the keyword tool. Instead, be logical and target keywords that make sense to your website whether or not the Tool says it gets searches or not.

You might just be surprised.

~Riss

[johnapo]

You're right that G.K.T. is not a Gospel but it's an indication for the keyword research.
At least it helps you fine tune the set of keywords you're interested.
After that you can do the detailed work one by one

[weblink29]

Keywords for domain names and product choices are the bread and butter but many people reach my Amazon sites by searching for exact product names that are not part of my domain name or targeted keywords at all.

Here are some Google searches that people did to reach one of my recent websites that promotes fitness equipment:

80 lb. Dumbbell Set with Rubber Encased Plates
45 degree hyperextension ab bench home use
Pure Fitness Ab Crunch Sit Up Bench
Amber Sports 160-Pound Threaded Weight Set
surfing balance exercise equipment
Crescendo Fitness Slant Bench Sit Up Bench

None of those search terms have anything to do with my main keyword phrases that I target. Some people use VERY specific search terms at Google. I don't know what the Google search tool would show for those exact searches listed above but I doubt any of those terms generate any serious monthly searches.

It helps to have your separate pages named as the particular products that you are promoting. Google seems to love this.

I just thought I'd post my personal experience with this....

[Brandon Tanner]

From what I can tell, whenever GTK displays a dash, it simply means that they don't have data for that particular keyword (or they don't want to share that data). It doesn't mean there are no searches for it.

However, when you see a keyword that says <10 monthly searches, that is probably a better indicator of "no searches".

But even then, who knows how accurate it is. I've noticed pretty wild fluctuations from month to month for certain keywords before (and I'm not talking about "seasonal" keywords). So yeah, always take GTK stats with a grain of salt.

[cashcow]

Excellent point and what you are describing - mining your own stats for keywords - is an excellent way to find those keywords that no one else is targetting.

Lee

[davidtong]

Quite true... With my first niche site, my main targeted keyword shows <80 in google (that's <80 PHRASE, <10 exact hehe), but just looking at Analytics and within Jetpack Stats, for example, i already see more than 100 phrase search for my keyword and over 30 for exact.... My site's less than a month old.

[BIG Mike]

Originally Posted by weblink29

Keywords for domain names and product choices are the bread and butter but many people reach my Amazon sites by searching for exact product names that are not part of my domain name or targeted keywords at all.

Here are some Google searches that people did to reach one of my recent websites that promotes fitness equipment:

80 lb. Dumbbell Set with Rubber Encased Plates
45 degree hyperextension ab bench home use
Pure Fitness Ab Crunch Sit Up Bench
Amber Sports 160-Pound Threaded Weight Set
surfing balance exercise equipment
Crescendo Fitness Slant Bench Sit Up Bench

None of those search terms have anything to do with my main keyword phrases that I target. Some people use VERY specific search terms at Google. I don't know what the Google search tool would show for those exact searches listed above but I doubt any of those terms generate any serious monthly searches.

It helps to have your separate pages named as the particular products that you are promoting. Google seems to love this.

I just thought I'd post my personal experience with this....

This is called LSI or Latent Semantic Indexing - and it's based on the concept of "Contextual Relevance" for a given page. Your example above is exactly how we benefit from it.

You don't need to target specific keywords to gain traffic from them - just having related content relevant to the query does the trick.

[Key Largo]

The Google Keyword Tool is great in many respects, but is as the name says just a tool. For me it is part of the mix of things to consider, it can suggest avenues to pursue.

Google must deliberately make them somewhat loose and unpredictable, because it can't be that hard to add up how many times exactly each day someone searches for "lose weight" and yet the data is all over the place and many search terms are just grouped under the same quantity (eg 1000).

We can do all the analysis we like and number crunching, but the final decision comes down to us, the numbers are just part of the information we'll use.

I've also seen quirky search terms bringing people to my sites and even terms which aren't mentioned. I think the 'low hanging fruit' of terms rarely (if ever according to Google) searched can bring easy traffic and more importantly it can be targeted, eager to buy. I think that once one has a few core keywords established, then it can be good to go for the less likely ones, as the competition is possibly zero for them.

The other thing to bear in mind is that the Google results aren't up to the minute and if one's targeting a recent product, for example, the searches might not appear to be their, but could be in the 1000s.

KL

[webfighter]

As Brandon said, the "dash" actually implies that google has no data for that key phrase. I do also get traffic from a lot of long tail keywords without actually optimizing for them.

[JoshuaG]

So wait...you got a trickle of traffic from a few keywords that GTK shows no data on?
And you are surprised? This should be exactly what anyone with 1/2 a brain would expect to happen.

Its obvious GTK doesn't show the exact number of searches for ANY keyword.
The amount of times a keyword gets searched changes all the time!

Just because you can't comprehend the basics of the tools functionality is no reason to come here posting about its efficacy.

Sorry to be a dick but this just seems really dumb.

Like what if I said GKT says X keyword gets 800 searchs a month, I'm #1 for X keyword and this month I only got 500 searches!
Should I run here and start making posts about how GTK is not accurate?

Of course not, because its blatantly obvious that the GTK gives estimates based on data it has collected in the past and makes no claims to showing completely accurate data.

[russells]

Originally Posted by JoshuaG

So wait...you got a trickle of traffic from a few keywords that GTK shows no data on?
And you are surprised? This should be exactly what anyone with 1/2 a brain would expect to happen.

Its obvious GTK doesn't show the exact number of searches for ANY keyword.
The amount of times a keyword gets searched changes all the time!

Just because you can't comprehend the basics of the tools functionality is no reason to come here posting about its efficacy.

Sorry to be a dick but this just seems really dumb.

Like what if I said GKT says X keyword gets 800 searchs a month, I'm #1 for X keyword and this month I only got 500 searches!
Should I run here and start making posts about how GTK is not accurate?

Of course not, because its blatantly obvious that the GTK gives estimates based on data it has collected in the past and makes no claims to showing completely accurate data.

Hey, I'm not COMPLAINING about the tool.

I'm just trying to help others who take GKT for GOSPEL and completely throw aside keywords that display '-'.

I'm saying actually go for them too as part of your over all strategy as more often than not they do bring traffic and sale.

I'm more than aware of the points you put forward as I've been in the SEO game for years and yes, it's what I expect but many people don't expect it expecially those fresh on the scene.

Maybe I didn't put my point across well enough.

~Russ

[JoshuaG]

Originally Posted by russells

Hey, I'm not COMPLAINING about the tool.

I'm just trying to help others who take GKT for GOSPEL and completely throw aside keywords that display '-'.

I'm saying actually go for them too as part of your over all strategy as more often than not they do bring traffic and sale.

I'm more than aware of the points you put forward as I've been in the SEO game for years and yes, it's what I expect but many people don't expect it expecially those fresh on the scene.

Maybe I didn't put my point across well enough.

~Russ

Sorry for the misunderstanding, its nice to know you're looking out for those who can't comprehend the most obvious thing in the world but want to make a living online. You got your work cut out for you. =p

[yukon]

I do the same thing, only instead of Google Analytics I now monitor keyword traffic on my Wordpress Admin. with this plugin.

Very Cool SEO Plugin!

The above plugin gives you real time SERP traffic counts with the exact keyword phrase.

Originally Posted by russells

Hey Warriors,

The reason I say that is because so many people are leaving money on the table for taking the Google Keyword Tool data as Gospel.

Let me explain...

If the Google Keyword Tool told you that there were no monthly searches for a particular keyword in your niche, I bet penny to pound most of you wouldn't bother purusing it further.

Instead, you look for searches of 1000+ at least.

Oddly, I was looking at my analytics for one of my Amazon sites and noticed traffic from certain keywords that I wasn't targeting.

So, I checked these keywords against the Google Keyword Tool just for curiosity and found that the tool showed "-" for monthly searches.

Interesting.

So I did a test site. I registered a domain name and picked 10 products from Amazon that the Keyword Tool told me get no monthly searches.

After around a month I checked the stats. I was gettign TRAFFIC and a few sales - not many - but sales.

Now what I'm saying is, don't totally trust the keyword tool. Instead, be logical and target keywords that make sense to your website whether or not the Tool says it gets searches or not.

You might just be surprised.

~Riss

[bhuff85]

Originally Posted by Rickie

I Like Market Samurai

...which gets its data from Google

[spideysteve]

Originally Posted by bhuff85

...which gets its data from Google

What else would you suggest instead?