Keyword Research Programs - What do you use?

Hi KeithR,

I am still old fashioned in that I do all of my research "by hand." I simply use the process of elimination. I have ways of finding new, rising niches that I feel does not yet have a lot of competition but is bringing in a good amount of traffic. The key is to find a niche that is still maturing and has potential for more growth in traffic.

Hypothetically, that Keyword list would include something like Apple's iPad, Bronco's quarterback Tim Tebow, and the show House. I then use Google Keyword tool to see how much traffic each keyword brings in. I would then put Tim Tebow back on the shelf because it simply does not bring in enough traffic yet.

The next step would be to analyze all the competition that is ranked on the first page of that Search Engine results. There are a couple of ways to see if the competition is too stiff: if a lot of the sites have a Page Rank greater than 3, if it is clear the sites are using sound SEO strategies, if the sites have a lot of quality backlinks. Based on those strategies I would get rid of the keyword House, because the competition is too strong.

That would leave me with my one keyword, iPad. However, the niche is still wide open for the taking and there is a lot of potential for the traffic to spike within the next few months.

Market Samurai, google keyword tool and Wordtracker is a good tool also.

I have used a lot of them in the past but the two I found the most valuable are market samurai and keyword sniper pro.

I believe the keyword research module of market samurai is still free so you can give it a try and see how you like it.

best regards,

~R. Shawner