If you’re trying to rank for keywords without doing proper research, it’s like going on a road trip without a map—sure, you might get lucky, but more often than not, you’ll get lost along the way.
Keyword research is a vital part of SEO and digital marketing. It gives you insights into what people are searching for and helps you predict your website’s organic traffic potential. By identifying high-value keywords, you can create an effective SEO strategy that targets the right audience, drives traffic, and improves your ROI.
Last 2 years, I worked as an SEO for Removal.AI – an AI background remover SaaS tool.
In just a few months of our SEO campaign, the results exploded from ZERO to 600,000 monthly organic traffic (and grew even more up to 2M currently).
There are no secrets to this. We just simply ranked #1-5 for major keywords that have high monthly search volume.
If you want to get serious about SEO and attracting relevant organic traffic to your website, you need to target specific keywords. The right keywords can help you attract the right audience, rank higher in search engines, and get more traffic. That’s where keyword research comes in.
In this guide, we’ll cover the latest tips for keyword research and the best keyword research tools you can use in 2025 to enhance your SEO efforts.
What is Keyword Research?
Keyword research is the process of identifying and analyzing the terms and phrases your target audience uses to search for products, services, or information related to your business. This data allows you to create targeted content that ranks well on search engines, drives relevant traffic, and ultimately boosts conversions.
What are the Types of Keywords?
There are different types of keywords that you can target, each with its own purpose. Here is a quick overview of the different types of keywords:
- Short tail keywords: These are general, one or two-word terms with a high monthly search volume. They’re usually more difficult to rank for because there is a lot of competition. If you’re a marketing company, short tail keywords include “SEO services,” “digital marketing,” and “content marketing.”
- Long tail keywords: These are more specific, three or four-word terms with a lower monthly search volume. They’re usually easier to rank for because there is less competition. Examples: “SEO tips for beginners,” “SEO agency for SaaS” and “affordable digital marketing services.”
- LSI (Latent Semantic Indexing) keywords: These are terms that appear to be semantically relevant in relation to a primary keyword. If your page’s major term is “SEO,” LSI keywords would include key phrases like “SEO keywords,” “SEO keyword research tools,” “SEO tips,” and “SEO interview questions.”
- Short-term fresh keywords: These are keywords that people are searching for right now or trending. They can be related to current events or hype. Examples: “gift ideas for Christmas,” “labor day deals,” “father’s day gifts,” and “black friday discounts.”
- Long term evergreen keywords: These are keywords that people are searching for on a regular basis. They’re usually related to timeless topics or evergreen content. Examples: “how to start a blog,” and “SEO strategy.”
- Product defining keywords: These are keywords that describe your product, product features or service. Examples: “backlink checker”, “content analytics” and ” SEO tools.”
- Customer defining keywords: These are more specific search terms used by customers to find the items they want. Examples: “SEO services for SaaS,” “digital marketing agency for SaaS,” “men’s apparel” and “shoes for kids.”
- Geo-targeting keywords: These are keywords related to a specific location or country. For example, if you’re a business in the Philippines, you might want to target keywords like “Filipino content writers,” “Best marketing agency in the Philippines” and “SEO services Philippines”.
- Search Intent keywords: These keywords show what the user is intended to do.
4 Types of Search Intent Keywords
- Navigational: These are keywords that people use to find a specific solution to their needs. For example, if someone wants to find the Removal.AI website, they might type in “remove background from image” and “remove image background.”
- Informational: These are keywords that people use when they want to learn something. For example, if someone wants to learn how to remove the background from an image, they might type in “remove background from image tutorial,” or “how to remove image background online.”
- Transactional: These are keywords that people use when they’re ready to buy something. For example, if someone wants to buy a solution to help them remove image background, they might type in “background removal tool,” and “background removal software.”
- Commercial: These are keywords that people use when they want to find a business or company. For example, if someone is looking for a company that provides background removal services, they might type in “Removal AI,” “Removal AI pricing” and “background removal company.”
Why is Keyword Research Important?
Keyword research is important because it helps you:
- Understand what people are looking for. By understanding the terms that people are using to search for your product or service, you can tailor your content to better meet their needs.
- Identify the right keywords to attract the right audience. If you use the wrong keywords, you could attract people who are not interested in what you have to offer.
- Connect with your target audience. If you use the right keywords, you can attract people who are more likely to convert.
- Improve your website’s ranking in search engines. Keyword research can help you identify the terms that you should be targeting to get the best results.
- Get more relevant organic traffic to your website
- Generate new ideas for content
- Decide the best strategy for your SEO
- Have insights about your traffic potential (monthly search volume)
- Measure costs and ROI from your SEO efforts – keyword difficulty (KD) and cost-per-click (CPC)
What is a Keyword Research Tool?
A keyword research tool is a software that helps you discover relevant keywords in the form of key phrases, search terms, or topic suggestions that people are looking for on search engines like Bing, Google, Amazon, and others. This helps you discover ideas for content that your consumers might be searching for.
Some common features include:
- Search Engine Results Page (SERP) analysis: This is a process of looking at the search engine results pages to gain insights about top-ranking pages for a keyword, including their domain rating, referring domains, backlinks, traffic, rank tracking, rich snippets, and more.
- Keyword analysis: This gives you insights about search volume, keyword difficulty (competition), cost, interest trends, often separated by organic vs paid, and more.
- Keyword difficulty (KD) score: This is a metrics that indicates how difficult it would be to rank for a keyword.
- Monthly search volume (SV): This is the number of times people have searched for a keyword in a month. You can check this by county or by global.
- Cost per click (CPC): This is the amount you would pay for each click on an ad if you were to run a paid search campaign for that keyword. CPC is important because it can help you estimate your potential return on investment (ROI) from running a paid search campaign.
- Keyword gaps: This gives you data about keywords your competitors are ranking for that you are not.
Best Keyword Research Tools in 2025
These keyword research tools will simplify your workflow and make it easier for you to find the right keywords that you need to rank better for SEO and your SEM campaigns.
Free Tools
If you’re looking for winning keywords to target but don’t have the budget for paid tools, never fear! There are plenty of great keyword tools available for free. Here are some of the best ones to try:
1. Google Keyword Planner (for discovering keywords for PPC & Ads)
Although it is primarily designed for advertising, this free tool is also helpful for SEO. It provides data on monthly search volume, CPC, and competition level. You can also use it to find keyword ideas, and keyword ad groups.
- Price: Free but requires a Google Ads account to work. You have to provide payment details, but you do not need to pay for anything, like running an ad.
- Ease of use: The user interface is clean and simple. Ideal for both beginners and experts.
- Key features: It has an option for exploratory keyword research where you search for keyword ideas from a seed term and another for in-depth analysis to check for search volume and forecasting.
- Integrations: Using the Google Ads API, you can interact with other programs for automated account management, custom reporting, ad management, and managing intelligent bidding strategies. It can work with several languages, including Java, C++, PHP, Perl, Ruby, and Python.
- Support: Many marketers use Google Keyword Planner, so there is an endless resource that can help you out when using it. You can explore the Community, where there are many experts, or directly contact the developers.
2. Answer the Public (for keyword mapping)
An excellent tool for those who are new to keyword research. It presents keywords in a visual format or a list form.
- Price: The free plan is suitable for a few searches, but you will get access to the best features with its paid plans that start at $99 to $199 a month.
- Ease of use: Although the visual data looks nice, it can lead to neck injury if you use it to analyze data for a long time. There is an option to export the files into spreadsheets for easier viewing and more opportunities to work on the available data.
- Key features: Aside from the unlimited daily searches and search listening alerts, it also allows you to create a Collections folder to organize research.
- Integrations: AnswerThePublic gathers its keyword results from Google and Bing’s auto-suggest features.
- Support: Priority customer support is available for premium users.
3. Google Trends (for finding keywords that are trending)
A wonderful keyword research tool to understand trending searches made on Google. It is easy to use and gives exciting insights about keyword popularity.
- Price: Free.
- Ease of use: Fill in any keyword into Google Trends and see their popularity, compare it against other keywords, and find suggestions for related keywords from the original search query.
- Key features: Excellent insights into search seasonality, provides local and regional interest results. It also helps you understand how the keyword trends change over time.
- Integrations: It has an API connector to enable cross-channel analytics.
- Support: You can browse the help topics for troubleshooting, FAQ, and other related queries.
4. Soovle (a fun way to discover keyword on different search engines)
Suited for SEO beginners to keyword strategy to research and get keyword ideas. It is super user-friendly and customizable.
- Price: Free.
- Ease of use: You can use Soovle in three ways: by searching for a term, clicking through the suggestions, or clicking on new phrases to update the results.
- Key features: It has country-specific search volume data and an option to find all keywords from any webpage to generate the volume metrics. You can save and export keywords in bulk.
- Integrations: Soovle integrates with many products, including Google, YouTube, eBay,Keywords Everywhere, and more.
- Support: You can contact the support team through the email form on their website.
5. Keywordtool (find great keywords using Google autocomplete)
A free tool that pulls out hundreds to thousands of keywords from Google searches. It works 99.99% of the time, which is why it is considered one of the highly reliable keyword tools.
- Price: You can use it for free, but the Pro features are awesome at only $79 per month.
- Ease of use: It automatically generates hundreds of relevant keyword suggestions after keying in a focus keyword. It is the easiest way to uncover popular keywords that will help you get better rankings on Google.
- Key features: Generates keyword suggestions in seconds. It also gives accurate search volume data, including the search volume for the next 12 months.
- Integrations: It gathers data from Google Trends but lets you save time by presenting it in a more straightforward and comprehensible format. There is also a Keyword Tool API to speed up keyword research by allowing you to extract data seamlessly.
- Support: Fast customer support through email or the website message form.
Other free tools:
6. Ahrefs – Free Keyword Generator
7. Keyword Sheeter
8. Keyworddit
Premium Tools
Paid or premium tools offer incredible features and benefits that free tools can’t keep up with. If you want to take your keyword research to the next level, then consider investing in one of these paid options:
11. Rank Tracker by SEO PowerSuite
Link Assistant offers a powerful link building tool that can help you with your SEO campaigns. The software provides you with a wide range of features that can help you with your link building efforts. Overall, Link Assistant is a great tool for managing your SEO campaigns.
- Price: You can try it out using a free account. Full access to all of its features starts at $299/year (professional plan) and $499/year (enterprise plan).
- Ease of use: The software is available as a desktop application and a web-based app. The desktop app is more comprehensive, but the web app is still pretty powerful.
- Key features: This software has a ton of features, including rank tracking, competitors’ analysis, content ideation, link building, site auditing, and more.
- Integrations: The SEO PowerSuite Backlink API is used by its partners to power their own tools and they are able to resell SEO PowerSuite data within their software and client reports.
- Support: The customer support team is responsive and helpful. They offer live chat, email support, and a comprehensive knowledge base.
12. Moz Keyword Explorer (for the best all-around free SEO keyword research tool)
One of the best SEO tools is where you can do keyword research faster and give high-impact suggestions so your site can rank higher.
- Price: You can try it out using a free account with ten free monthly searches. Full access to all of its features starts at $179 a month.
- Ease of use: You can use it as a keyword planner and prioritize keywords by topic through the comprehensive scoring feature.
- Key features: It has most features of popular keyword tools plus two unique features: the Organic CTR score and Priority score for smart targeting. You can use it to target long-tail keywords by finding keywords in question format. This will help you get highly-relevant keywords in broad topics.
- Integrations: Export data into well-formatted CSVs.
- Support: You can contact the help team or connect with over 500,000 digital marketers on the Moz Community page.
13. Semrush Keyword Research (for advanced SEO professionals)
A complete SEO tool suite designed to improve SEO rankings through cutting-edge keyword research.
- Price: It has a range of plans suited to the company’s needs, depending on how big the organization is. The Pro plan at $119 per month is excellent for newbies and small teams, while the Business plan at $449 per month will fit larger companies.
- Ease of use: It is popular among marketers because it has a full suite of SEO tools that are handy for content marketing, social media, digital marketing, and keyword research.
- Key features: Has a keyword overview tool that shows the monthly search volume, the trend, organic search terms, and more. You can also use it to research the competition and check out their search engine ranking positions, traffic value, and other related traffic metrics.
- Integrations: Finding more related keywords from WordPress is easier since SEMRush can integrate with the All in One SEO plugin.
- Support: A free training session for a demo will be in order upon signing up. There will also be a dedicated point of contact who will be assigned to help you out with all Semrush-related queries.
14. KWFinder (for SEO agencies)
Not all keyword tools can help you find the best long-tail keywords for effective targeting. KWFinder is efficient at identifying high search volume and low competition keywords.
- Price: Subscriptions start at 29.90 for Basic, 39.90 for Premium and 79.90 for Agency.
- Ease of use: Very intuitive to use with its simple interface.
- Key features: Identify seasonal keywords based on historical data. Find long-tail and competitor’s keywords, do local keyword research, and filter unproductive keywords.
- Integrations: Process more keywords per request and make high-priority requests with the KWFinder API.
- Support: There are many resources to learn how to use its various keyword tools, such as the Mangools Blog, KWFinder guide, SEO guide, and keyword research guide.
15. Growth Bar Keyword Research
A valuable keyword research tool for digital marketing companies. It can generate billions of keywords, determine search volumes, evaluate competitiveness, and more.
- Price: Get Started with the standard plan at $29 per month. There is also a Pro plan at $79 a month and the Agency plan at $129 per month.
- Ease of use: Compact and easy to use as it eliminates repetitive actions of analyzing websites using different SEO tools.
- Key features: Advanced keyword research for related long-tail keywords, keyword difficulty score, Google Ads cost-per-click estimate, and value of position 1.
- Integrations: Works with SpyFu for accurate keyword data.
- Support: Although everything about it is straightforward, you can contact the team through email for other information and support.
16. Spyfu
It is one of the easiest keyword tools to find advanced insights, SEO and PPC metrics, and Related Questions/ Transactional Keywords.
- Price: The Basic plan starts at $33 per month, and the Pro plan starts at $79 per month, but you can also choose the simple pricing plan at $0.50 per 1000 rows.
- Ease of use: The results are displayed right after searching a keyword in the search bar. It shows the top domains, ranking, and search links.
- Key features: More than the search results and data exports, SpyFU also gives you six months- worth of historical data and weekly tracked keyword rankings. There are also bonus features for SpyFu members, like services and tools for improving reach, automating SEO monitoring, optimizing PPC spending, and more.
- Integrations: The SpyFu API can be used to customize marketing solutions by integrating the gathered data into the software or workflow.
- Support: The SpyFu Team put up a resource page for advice and answers when using the app.
Other Premium Tools
17. LSI Graph
19. Keyword Insights
20. Keyword Revealer
21. Keyword Discovery
22. Serpstat SEO
23. Questiondb.io
24. Jaaxy
25. WordStream’s Free Keyword Tool
26. Microsoft Keyword Planner Tool
27. Majestic
28. Longtailpro
29. Getkeywords
30. Seo-explorer
Keyword Tool Extensions:
31. Surferseo
32. Keywords Everywhere – Keyword Tool
There are a number of different keyword research tools available, both free and paid. And while each tool has its own unique features, they all have one goal in common: to help you find the right keywords for your business or website.
How to Choose the Best Keyword Research Tools
With a variety of keyword research tools available in 2024, choosing the right one for your SEO strategy can feel overwhelming. Here’s a breakdown of key factors to consider when selecting the best keyword research tool:
1. Pricing
- Free vs. Paid: Depending on your budget, you may prefer a free tool like Google Keyword Planner, or a premium one like Ahrefs or SEMrush for more advanced features. Paid tools typically offer richer data sets, competitive analysis, and more in-depth insights, which can be crucial for high-impact SEO campaigns.
- Scalability: If your SEO needs grow, ensure the tool has scalable plans. Many premium tools offer various pricing tiers depending on the size of your team or business.
2. Ease of Use
- User Interface: A tool with a clean and intuitive interface will help you save time. Look for platforms that offer clear instructions, easy-to-navigate dashboards, and customizable reports.
- Beginner vs. Expert: Some tools are designed for beginners (like KWFinder), while others are built with SEO professionals in mind (like SEMrush or Ahrefs). Choose one that matches your expertise level.
3. Key Features
- Keyword Metrics: Ensure the tool provides essential keyword metrics like search volume, keyword difficulty, and cost-per-click (CPC). This helps you gauge whether a keyword is worth targeting.
- SERP Analysis: Look for tools that offer deep insights into the top-ranking pages for a keyword, including backlink profiles, domain authority, and traffic data.
- Competitor Analysis: Advanced tools like SEMrush or SpyFu allow you to track competitors’ keyword rankings, keyword gaps, and traffic estimates.
- Keyword Suggestions: Tools like Moz and AnswerThePublic provide a range of related keyword suggestions, including long-tail and trending keywords, to help you expand your keyword strategy.
4. Data Accuracy
- The tool should provide up-to-date and reliable data. Tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush are known for their data accuracy in tracking search volume, trends, and competition levels.
5. Integrations
- Other SEO Tools: For more seamless workflows, choose a tool that integrates well with other platforms such as Google Analytics, Google Ads, or CMS platforms like WordPress. Some tools also integrate with social media and content management systems to give you a complete digital marketing overview.
- APIs: If you need large-scale data analysis or integration into your existing systems, make sure the tool has an API feature to automate data collection and reporting.
Support and Resources
- Customer Support: Ensure the tool offers responsive customer support, including live chat, email, or dedicated account managers for enterprise plans.
- Learning Resources: The best tools provide extensive documentation, tutorials, webinars, and communities to help you make the most of the tool’s features, especially if you’re new to SEO.
Frequently Asked Questions about Keyword Research Tools
1. What is the most important metric to consider in keyword research?
The most crucial metrics are search volume and keyword difficulty. Search volume shows how many people are searching for a specific term, while keyword difficulty estimates how challenging it would be to rank for that term. Balancing high-volume, low-difficulty keywords is key to an effective SEO strategy.
2. Can I rely solely on free keyword research tools?
Yes, but with limitations. Free tools like Google Keyword Planner or AnswerThePublic are great for basic keyword research, but they often lack advanced features like competitor analysis, comprehensive SERP data, or keyword gap insights. For more competitive niches or detailed analysis, paid tools provide deeper insights.
3. What are long-tail keywords, and why should I use them?
Long-tail keywords are longer, more specific phrases with lower search volume but often less competition. They are easier to rank for and tend to attract more qualified traffic, leading to higher conversion rates. For example, instead of targeting “shoes,” a long-tail keyword might be “affordable running shoes for women.”
4. How often should I perform keyword research?
Keyword research should be an ongoing process. Revisit your keywords every few months or whenever you’re launching new content, updating your SEO strategy, or seeing a drop in traffic. Trends change, and so do search behaviors, so staying up-to-date with your keywords is essential.
5. What is the difference between SEO and PPC keyword research?
SEO keywords focus on ranking organically in search engines, while PPC keywords are used for paid advertisements. While many of the same tools (like Google Keyword Planner) can be used for both, SEO keyword research typically emphasizes long-term traffic growth, while PPC focuses on immediate visibility and conversions.
6. How do keyword research tools calculate keyword difficulty?
Keyword difficulty is usually calculated based on a variety of factors such as the number of backlinks, domain authority of competing sites, and the overall competition for a keyword. Tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Moz offer their own difficulty scores to help you decide how tough it will be to rank for a specific term.
7. What are LSI keywords, and are they still relevant?
LSI (Latent Semantic Indexing) keywords are semantically related terms that search engines use to understand the context of your content. While the term “LSI keywords” is somewhat outdated, using a variety of related keywords in your content still helps improve relevance and ranking potential by covering the topic comprehensively.
8. Should I prioritize local keywords for SEO?
Yes, if you operate a local business, targeting geo-specific keywords is crucial. For example, a dentist in Miami should focus on keywords like “best dentist in Miami” or “Miami dental services” to capture local search traffic. Google also favors businesses that include local keywords in their SEO strategy for regional searches.
9. Are keyword research tools accurate in predicting search volume?
Keyword research tools provide estimates based on historical data, and while they are useful for gauging potential, they aren’t 100% accurate. Trends, seasonality, and competition can affect search volume. Tools like Google Keyword Planner and Ahrefs are generally reliable, but always cross-check data for accuracy.
10. How can keyword research tools help with content creation?
By providing keyword suggestions, search trends, and related terms, keyword research tools help you discover content topics that your target audience is actively searching for. This can inform blog posts, product pages, and even social media content, ensuring you create valuable, high-ranking content that meets user intent.
Your Turn…
Finding the right keywords is the backbone of any successful SEO strategy. Whether you’re just starting out or looking to improve your existing efforts, these 30+ keyword research tools offer a wide range of features to help you stay ahead of the competition. The right tool for you will depend on your specific needs, but investing time in keyword research will pay off in higher search rankings and more targeted traffic.
Ready to take your SEO to the next level? Start with these keyword research tools today and see your rankings soar! Got any favorite tools? Share them in the comments below!
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