Seed keywords are short and broad search terms related to your niche, usually one to two words long.
They are the starting point for keyword research, generating topic ideas, and finding long-tail keywords.
Seed keywords have high search volume and competition, so it’s important to build topic clusters around them.
This is where most people get confused…
Think of seed keywords like topics. They are simply a starting point to help you discover more specific, long-tail keywords.
For example, “fitness” or “health” are broad terms that make great seed keywords. If you run a website in those niches, these are good places to start looking for more long-tail keywords.
The thing to keep in mind is this…
Seed keywords are the first words you type into a keyword research tool for more keyword ideas.
From there, you can narrow it down to your target keywords.
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What Will I Learn?
Seed keywords are important for keyword research because they lay the foundation of your keyword strategy.
Here’s why:
One seed keyword can generate millions of other keyword ideas.
For example, if you use “running shoes” as a seed keyword, you find:
As you can see…
From a single seed keyword, there are many different keyword types to target. But the seed keyword starts pushing you in a specific direction for your research.
That means you need to know the broad words and phrases people use when talking about your niche, product or service.
It ensures that your keyword research goes in the right direction, making it easier to reach the right audience.
That’s the end goal, right?
Here are examples of seed keywords.
If you run a website about cooking, the seed keywords could be recipes, cooking tips, kitchen hacks and baking.
These words are short, broad and directly related to the cooking industry.
They are great starting points for getting more keyword ideas to target.
Here’s another example:
If you own a website about travel, the seed keywords could be travel tips, destinations, hotels, and flights. These could all be great starting seed keywords.
Your industry is your target niche. Seed keywords are like sub-niches.
Seed keywords push you in the right direction. You expand them into more specific and targeted keywords through further research.
These are the most effective strategies to find seed keywords:
Start by listing out broad topics related to your business or website.
This is the fastest and best way to find your initial seed keywords.
The truth is no one knows your business customers like you do. Using your own experience to generate seed keywords is an effective strategy.
As I like to say…
“Competitors are the best keyword research strategy there is.”
Here’s why:
Your competitors are already ranking for the keywords you want to target.
Why wouldn’t you look at what they’re doing?
To find seed keywords, look at your competitor’s website silo structure.
Check out the example from this coffee website:
Their main silos are great seed keywords. You could even dive deeper to analyse their sub-categories for more ideas.
This is an underused strategy that you should be taking advantage of.
Regularly engage with your audience through-
This will help you understand the language they use and the topics they’re interested in.
That kind of direct feedback can help you uncover seed keywords you otherwise would have never found.
The best part?
Most of your competitors are too lazy to get customer feedback.
That gives you an advantage and lets you jump on new trends before anyone notices them.
There are tons of great keyword research tools out there.
But my two favourites are Ahrefs and Semrush. They have a huge amount of data on keyword competition, search volumes, related keywords and more.
These tools will generate tons of new seed keyword ideas at the click of a button.
The only downside is the price…
That’s why I also use free tools like Google Keyword Planner and Google Search Console to help find new keyword ideas.
Google is completely free and has all the seed keyword ideas you’ll ever need.
Here’s what I mean:
There are a bunch of free tools you can use right in the Google search engine results pages (SERPs).
This includes:
These are a goldmine for relevant questions and search terms you can use to generate seed keywords.
Combine this with Keywords Everywhere to level up your research.
You’ll be able to see search volumes, competition levels, trends, suggestions and more directly in the SERPs.
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