Keyword Research Pointers

Sometimes it's much more useful to know the profitability of keywords than it is to know outright search popularity.

There are manual ways of discovering some sort of working ratios. Basically - the number of searches for a particular term at Overture, divided by the number of results that come up on your favorite search engine for that term.

The result gives you an idea of where to find the 'low-hanging fruit' - the search terms it's likely to be easier to rank well for on search engines.

Unfortunately, it's a very tedious business.

There are tools and services available to help, but keyword research is still time-consuming.

It is also still vital.

I'm aware of 20 or 30 research sites plus more than a dozen pieces of software, all of which can help.

Ken Evoy goes into this in his free ebook, and also provides a valuable free search tool.

Most people are aware of the Overture search tool - soon to go through its third name change, this time to be rebranded 'Yahoo Search Tool'.

For a quick and dirty idea of relative popularity it's probably the best available. Unfortunately, it does a great deal of double-counting, so the numbers are highly inflated.

The relativity, however, is solid.

The best tool is Wordtracker, where you can do unlimited free searches, although the results are limited in a number of ways. Pay for a subscription - from about $8 a day - and you've hit the motherlode.

A free alternative that uses Wordtracker's results is Nichebot - but again, it lacks the full Wordtracker functionality. Sign up for a free membership for added functionality.

There are many more, but those will give you a very good start.