Which free keyword research tool to use?
This has been an important week for free keyword research tools, Overture’s tool has been unavailable for the last few days (now back online) while Wordtracker and KeywordDiscovery have both released free versions of their own keyword research tools. So now there seems to be much more choice to find the best keywords, but which tool is best to use?
Overture
I’ve been using the Overture keyword tool for over a year and while the responsiveness has sometimes been very slow I have generally been quite pleased with the results. The search count has been lower than I expected as these figures are only based upon Yahoo! queries from the previous month and occasionally some strange long-tail results appear, such as the “beer college college…” result above but overall this gives a good idea about the popularity of keywords. Another advantage I like is how you can search to find the popular keywords in the UK using the Overture UK tool.
Wordtracker
My first impression of using the Wordtracker keyword tool is that I’ve found the search figures to be very low for most terms, this is calculated using Netapplications.com which only account for 0.63% of searches and as a result this gives a rough idea of the popular keyword searches but really needs to be based upon a wider range of searches to provide more accurate results.
KeywordDiscovery
I’ve only briefly used Trellian’s KeywordDiscovery tool but I have been very impressed with the results returned. The accuracy of search figures looks to be much greater than both the Overture and Wordtracker keyword tools, mainly because search data is collected from all major search engines.
Overall I find KeywordDiscovery to provide the most accurate results and search terms but would also suggest comparing results over a couple of keyword tools to make sure your not missing out on some valuable long-tail keywords. Personally I would probably compare the KeywordDiscovery results with the Overture UK list to check that the British have the same search trends.
Google Trends or the AdWords keyword tool could also be useful options, but I’d prefer to use tools which combine keyword suggestions with search stats (although the AdWords does display a search volume indicator) so I normally wouldn’t use these as regularly. What does everyone else think, which keyword tools do you prefer to use?
In agreement with the above completely. The Wordtracker seems to return complete crap, whereas KD seems to be more realistic in both count and word stream. Nicehbot is a nice alternative to KD - it actually uses the KD data but with far superior UI and functionality. I think if you’re really relying on the data you need to use multiple sources to validate each other.
Comment by Richard Hearne — February 4, 2007 @ 9:15 am
Hello! I new subscriber & ppc’r her…
So no trusting the ADword system? Perhaps I’m naive but, isn’t it in Google’s best interest to provide me with the most relevant results?
Comment by ovdimalze — February 5, 2007 @ 8:05 pm
Hi, nice to meet you - I work up north in Glasgow.
Google’s search volume indicators are a little frustrating, given that the bar only has a few widths to choose from, thus making comparisons between keywords rather inaccurate.
Have you found any tools useful for regional keywords? I find the numbers just aren’t there for any results.
Cheers.
Comment by iain — March 26, 2007 @ 10:03 am
Can also give KeywordSpy.com a try
It would be interesting to note some of the features our site has to offer:
• The most comprehensive keyword database with over 100 million entries
• Day to day updates of search logs and keywords from our partnership with Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and other reliable data servers
• Professional and distinctive sorting, filtering and tracking of search advertising activities done and provided for our users
• User friendly search log accessibility thru the use of either Keywords or Domain names
• 100 percent search results accuracy
• Instant downloading capabilities on all search results.
We offer a full access trial to sites interested in our product
Comment by Anonymous — June 6, 2007 @ 10:23 am
I have to agree with you that KWD seems to be the most accurate and complete. Wordtracker seems to have a lot of hiccups with some terms not being as popular as the results show. Nice post.
Comment by Dean — July 5, 2007 @ 5:19 am
I think Rushmore’s Free Keyword Brainstorming Tool is another tool worth considering when carrying out your keyword research.
Comment by Anonymous — September 27, 2007 @ 11:31 pm
WordTracker’s free or trial versions provide very limited results because they don’t draw on the data from the major search engines. For example, the trial version will only give you results from AlaVista whereas the full version provides you with the options to use all search engines’ search and competition data.
Keyword Discovery draws on a huge database and boasts “36 billion searches” from “over 180 search engines.” So it’s database is much larger than WordTracker but it is rather costly. These tools each have their own particular uses. A few are keyword suggestion tools for SEO purposes, others for AdSense and yet more for AdWords. In short: there are horses for course. You need to decide after reading up on their respective features and benefits as to which one suits your own objectives.
If you want to have most of the options available to you but at an affordable fee ($9.99/per month when last I looked), then NicheBot is well worth a try. Although this is the “Lite” version, it’s more than sufficient to carry out your searches and to test out the software before opting to go for more credits at a higher monthly subscription. This software allows you to draw on WordTracker, Keyword Discover and Overture all in one package! The only downside is that it can, at times, take several minutes for your deep digging results to show up for further analysis.
One, other, very easy keyword selection tool is Good Keywords which is free to download. Again, analyze its features and benefits before you rely on it entirely for your keywords.
Comment by Magda — January 26, 2008 @ 1:12 pm
I do some low level seo on non-english sites, so only KD works for me, so thanks - I discovered it right here.
Comment by Pozycjonowanie — February 15, 2008 @ 3:26 pm
Great post and great comments!!!
I’d like to add something…
All too often a single, popular keyword will be too difficult and expensive to target. The solution is to aim for “long-tailed” keywords of 3 to 4 words in length that will be much easier to rank for. In many cases, long-tailed keywords produce better converting traffic then general one-word keywords.
That’s where the keyword research engine comes into play:
http://www.covertsem.com/tools/keyword-research-engine/
Comment by Sam — February 18, 2008 @ 4:13 am
^^^ cool tool, thx for sharing!
I agree, root keywords are so difficult (and expensive) to target these days.
Comment by Colin Greig — February 27, 2008 @ 6:59 am
A great resource for researching keywords can be found on Aaron Walls SEO Book.
Comment by website submission — March 24, 2008 @ 12:29 am
Does overture still work?
Comment by Web design in Lincolnshire — March 26, 2008 @ 7:57 pm
The question I need answering is what timeframe does the free keyword discovery data apply to? Is it monthly, weekly or yearly?
Comment by Search Engine Optimisation — April 23, 2008 @ 10:23 am
Google is adwords tool is best when compared to others and it is a must for adsense users as it gives advertiser competition for a particular keyword also.
Comment by VENKATAKRISHNA NALAMOTHU — May 31, 2008 @ 12:25 am
How good are tools like clickadequalizer or keywordelite?
Comment by Keywords tools — June 11, 2008 @ 9:16 am
I think Word Tracker has come a long ways since it first lauched.. the free version is great to use for finding niches.
Chris
Comment by Keyword Magic Pro — June 21, 2008 @ 8:40 pm