A Beginner’s Guide to Keyword Search Volume for SEO (2023)

A Beginner's Guide to Keyword Search Volume for SEO
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Keyword search volume is an important component when it comes to SEO. Studies show that 93% of online journeys begin with a search engine.

Understanding the keyword search volume of a particular keyword or phrase will give you an idea of how many searches are being done for that phrase. This gives you a better idea of how much competition a particular phrase or keyword has.

But are keyword search volumes really that important? How do you know what keyword search volume to go for? And how does keyword search volume affect my keyword’s ranking? All these questions and more will be answered in this blog.

What is search volume?

Search volume is the number of times a given keyword or phrase is searched for on a given search engine in a given period of time. It is used to gauge the popularity and relative importance of a given keyword or phrase and can be used to help choose which keywords and phrases to target in SEO and content marketing campaigns or while writing content.

Why do we need a high search volume?

There are a number of reasons why high search volume is important. It indicates that there is a large number of people interested in the topic. This means that there is a potential audience for any content that is created on the topic.

High search volume can also be used as an indicator of market trends. This means that businesses can use high search volume keywords to identify new opportunities and target their marketing efforts accordingly.

Finally, high search volume also indicates that there is a lot of competition for the keyword. This means that businesses need to be extra-competitive in order to rank highly for the keyword.

How important is keyword search volume?

There is no definitive answer to this question as it depends on a number of factors. Some people believe that keyword search volume is the most important factor in SEO, while others believe that it is just one of many factors.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. Keyword search volume is certainly an important factor in SEO, but it is not the be-all and end-all. There are other factors, such as the quality of your content, that are also important.

That being said, if you are trying to optimize your site for SEO, then you should definitely pay attention to keyword search volume. Try to find keywords with a high search volume that are relevant to your site. If you can get your site to rank for these keywords, then you will likely see a significant increase in traffic.

How to find the search volume for a keyword?

There are a few different ways to find the search volume for a keyword. One way is to use a keyword research tool like Semrsuh, ahrefs, or Ubersuggest.

New to Keyword Research? Read our Beginners Guide to Keyword Research

For the sake of this blog, let us use ahrefs to find the search volume of a keyword. Go to the ahrefs keyword generator and type in your keyword.

find keywords using ahrefs Keyword research tool for free

After searching for that keyword, you will get the search volume and other metrics like SEO difficulty. This tool is free meaning you can try that as many times as you want for different keywords.

find keywords using ahrefs Keyword research tool for free (1)

Also, click on questions to see the search volume of related questions or longtail keywords so that you can easily rank #1 on Google.

find keywords using ahrefs Keyword research tool for free (2)

There are many tools that can help you with finding keywords and their search volume. Here is our list of 15 FREE Keyword Research Tools

How to get the exact Keyword search volume in Google Keyword Planner?

To use the Google Keyword Planner, you will need to have a running campaign. If you haven’t advertised with Google you will probably be asked to set up a new ad campaign. Google doesn’t really want SEO people to use their tool for keyword research so for a non-advertiser, it might be a bit tricky to find the tool.

So whilst Google is doing its best to make you set up and run a Google Ads campaign, you can just click here and you will end up in the right place to get started. The start page of Google Keyword Planner should look something like my screenshot below.

How to get the exact search volume in Google Keyword Planner

After clicking “keyword planner“, you will be redirected here. You can choose to discover a new keyword or find the search volume of a specific keyword.

How to get the exact search volume in Google Keyword Planner (1)

We will consider first discovering a new keyword then after we can find the exact search volume of that keyword.

How to Discover a New Keyword using Google Keyword Planner?

On the next interface after pressing “discover new keyword” enter the term you want to get keywords for.

Here’s an example using the Wincher.com website:

How to discover new keywords using Google Keyword Planner

So, if you input your business website, Google will provide keyword suggestions for suitable SEO keywords. Every suggestion provides average monthly searches (keyword search volume) and competition.

How to discover keywords using Google Keyword Planner

Note!

When referencing ‘competition’ within Google Ads, it is important to note that competition in Google Keyword Planner refers to the advertisers bidding on a particular keyword, not its organic competition.

The next part is for those who want to run an ads campaign and want to know the exact keyword search volume. If you just needed to know the keyword search volume, skip to the next section.

If you want to further refine your search, add a filter using the part labeled “X” on the image above. For the filter, choose a “broad match” to filter the results to the best keywords. You can always try the others to see what works best for you.

How to get the exact search volume in Google Keyword Planner (2)

After that, enter the amount you want to spend on your ad campaign. You will see the estimated clicks and impressions depending on the amount you entered.

How to get the exact search volume in Google Keyword Planner (3)

But for you as an SEO specialist, the number of clicks is not that interesting. Not only because the CTR on ads and organic search is different, but also because right now we are interested in search volume. So the column Impressions will give us much more valuable data.

The Best Tools to get accurate search volume

Here is our list of keyword research tools you can use to get accurate search volume:

Free tools include Ubersuggest, keyword planner, ahrefs keyword generator, Semrush, etc.

Paid tools include Semrush keyword magic, ahrefs keyword explorer, MOZ pro (keyword explorer), KWFinder, etc.

There are many tools that can help you with finding keywords and their search volume. Here is our list of 15 FREE Keyword Research Tools

This guide also shows you how to use some of the tools in the guide above: Beginners Guide to Keyword Research e.g Semrush and Ubersuggest.

Frequently Asked Questions?

What is Keyword search volume in SEO?

This is the number of times that people are searching for a particular keyword or phrase. If you can identify keywords with high search volume, you can then focus your SEO efforts on those keywords in order to improve your ranking.

What is a good keyword search volume?

A good keyword search volume is typically over 1,000 searches per month. However, the competition for that keyword may make it difficult to rank unless you have a strong website.

There are a number of factors to consider when choosing keywords, including search volume (for beginners between 100 to 1000 searches per month tend to have a low difficulty in ranking), competition, and relevance to your business.

How to determine search volume for keywords?

There are a number of ways to identify high-search volume keywords. One is to use a keyword research tool such as Google AdWords Keyword Planner.

This tool lets you see how often people are searching for particular keywords. Another way to identify high search volume keywords is to look at your website’s analytics to see which keywords are being used most often to find your site.

What to do with Keywords after Keyword Research?

Once you have identified high search volume keywords, you can then start to work on optimizing your website for those keywords. This includes adding the keywords to your website’s content, title, and Meta tags.

You can also use the keywords in off-site SEO activities such as link-building and social media marketing. By focusing your SEO efforts on high-search volume keywords, you can improve your website’s ranking in search engines and attract more visitors.

New to Keyword Research? Read our Beginners Guide to Keyword Research

High search volume Keywords VS low competition keywords

There are a lot of factors to consider when choosing keywords for your website or blog. One important factor is the search volume of the keywords. This is the number of times people are searching for the keywords each month. Another important factor is the competition for the keywords. This is the number of other websites or blogs that are using the same keywords.

If you choose keywords with a high search volume, you will get more traffic to your website or blog. However, the competition will also be higher. This means it will be harder to rank well in the search engines for these keywords. If you choose keywords with low competition, you will have an easier time ranking well in the search engines. However, the traffic you get will be lower.

You need to balance these two factors to choose the right keywords for your website or blog. If you can find keywords with a high search volume and low competition, you will be in a great position to get a lot of traffic and rank well in the search engines.

What to do with low search volume keywords?

If you’re targeting a keyword with low search volume, there are a few things you can do to try and increase its visibility.

First, make sure you’re using the keyword throughout your content, including in the title, in the body, and in the keywords section of your website. You can also try using other related keywords in your content to help draw attention to your target keyword.

Finally, try promoting your content through social media and other online channels to get people to search for your keyword.

Conclusion

To summarize things, Keyword search volume is a measurement of how many times a keyword is searched for on a monthly basis. This is an important metric for SEO because it helps you determine what keywords are popular and which keywords are not.

With this knowledge, you can create content around popular keywords and optimize your web pages with less-popular keywords. Search engines will use this information to determine how relevant your page is to the keyword, and you’ll rank higher in search results.

It’s hard to determine keyword search volume for yourself, but luckily, there are a number of different sites that will do it for you, such as Semrush and Keyword Planner. We hope you enjoyed our post on keyword search volume for SEO, thanks for reading!

Closing Remarks!

We hope you enjoyed reading this blog, please do give it a share. Do you have any questions or concerns we didn’t address above? Please let us know in the comments below! We would love to hear from you.

Have A Nice Day.


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