A List of Keyword Research Tools

Trada is doing a blog post series on keywords. Previously: Intro to Keywords, Exact Match vs Broad Match vs Phrase Match, Negative Keywords Next week: Social Media Tools for Keyword Generation. Join Trada for an upcoming webinar on Crash Course on Keywords - Weds., Dec. 15 at 11 am MT.

How do you generate keywords? One quick way is to use keyword generation tools, so we’ve compiled a list of tools that we use or have had recommended to us. Let us know what keyword tools you use, and we’ll add them to the list.

But as we’ve said before, be wary using keyword generators. They’re not a be-all, end-all and a good dose of common sense needs to be used. And if you do use these keyword generation tools, be sure to check out our post on 3 problems (and solutions) for keyword generators for small PPC campaigns.

And if we’re missing any tools on the list, please let us know.

• Google AdWords Keyword Tool - Lets you type a word or phrase to generate keywords or you can also enter a website. By logging in with your Google AdWords account, it’ll generate additional keywords. By using the advanced features, you can select keyword ideas for mobile content or my favorite – adult ideas. It also lets you select whether you’re search for broad, phrase or exact match keywords.

• Google Wonder Wheel - When you search on Google, the left tool bar offers you an option called Wonder Wheel. What makes Google Wonder Wheel fantastic for paid search is that it allows you to drill down and drill down to more niche keywords. We started with the term pay per click, clicked on “make money with pay per click” and then clicked on “earn money with pay per click.”

• Market Samurai – They have a free trial version and a paid subscription. They claim to help you “find ‘gold-nugget’ keywords – each of these keywords can send hundreds, even thousands of free visitors to your site each day.

• Microsoft Advertising Intelligence - You have to download this free from Bing, but is a keyword research and optimization tool that operates seamlessly in Microsoft Office Excel 2007. It provides keyword expansion, research, pricing and KPI data, allowing you to maximize marketing ROI for your paid search and content ad campaigns.

• SEMRush – They offer a free and a pro version. SEMRush has a cool trick in that it’ll tell you the keywords of any website, and if they’re using Google AdWords, what keywords they’re currently using. They’ll also help you find hidden keyword tools that you haven’t been using.

• Spyword Smart Search – Part of the paid SpyFu subscription, it allows you to dictate the criteria the keywords need to meet helping filter out unnecessary keywords.

• Wordstream Negative Keyword Tool - We talked about Wordstream’s Negative Keyword Tool last week. It helps you quickly generate negative keywords.

• Wordstream Free Keyword Niche Finder – According to Wordstream, “Keyword niches are groupings of tightly related keywords that can be used to drive paid (PPC marketing) and organic search marketing strategies. Identifying niches of popular PPC keywords and AdWords keywords in your vertical allows you to create a strong PPC account structure at inception. This will save you time and money by delivering more relevant ads, which in turn generate more clicks and improve your Quality Score.”

• Wordstream Free Keyword Grouper -  According to WordStream, “Identifying groups of PPC keywords that are relevant to your business allows you to create a strong account structure for your pay-per-click campaign at inception. This will save you time and money by delivering more relevant ads, which in turn improves your Quality Score, which drives both greater impression share and lower Cost-Per-Click (CPC).”

And not quite a keyword research tool, but a brilliant tool to have in your keyword arsenal.

• Google AdWords Traffic Estimator – Above, Google AdWords Traffic Keyword Tool told us that Trada.com should try to rank for pay per click. But can we afford to rank for pay per click? Will it generate the volume of traffic we need?