8 Keyword Research Tips for Small Businesses [Beginner’s Guide]

If I could give small business owners one piece of SEO advice, it would be this: Don’t skip keyword research.

Keyword research is the foundation of a successful online presence. Yet, countless website owners overlook this crucial step.

By understanding the terms people use to search for products and services like yours, you can optimize your website to attract the right audience and convert them into customers.

In this beginner-friendly guide, we’ll explore 8 keyword research tips for small businesses to help you attract more qualified traffic and drive more sales.

8 Keyword Research Tips for Small Businesses

Want to dive deeper into the world of keyword research? Check out our in-depth guide: Keyword Research for Small Business Owners.

For a quick overview, here are 8 essential tips to get you started.

1. Pick the Right Keyword Research Tool

The first step to effective keyword research is choosing the right tool.

But here’s the thing: there are a ton of SEO tools available on the market, and not all of them are a good fit for small businesses.

Typically, budgets and time are tighter when you run your business and its SEO.

So, what to look for?

The best keyword research tools for small businesses will:

• Be easy to use
• Deliver a good value
• Have features that move the needle

And if we had to narrow it down to one recommendation, it would be LowFruits.

LowFruits is a keyword research and SERP analysis tool that was designed specifically for small business owners.

It focuses on long-tail keyword research, which helps you identify low-competition keywords that are easy to rank for. (We’ll get into this more in our next tip.)

It’s easy to use and saves you time when doing keyword research because you don’t have to wade through thousands of competitive keywords that, realistically, small or new websites wouldn’t be able to rank for.

LowFruits also comes with a budget-friendly price tag, with credits starting as low as $25 and monthly plans at $29.90.

Overall, it’s a powerful keyword research tool that doesn’t break the bank. It makes keyword research faster and helps you focus your optimization efforts on keywords with the most ranking potential.

2. Identify Low-Competition Keywords

Low-competition keywords are keywords with few websites competing for them. They’re considered low-hanging fruits because they’re easy ranking opportunities.

They also don’t require a high domain authority (DA) for a website to rank for them.

More often than not, low-competition keywords are long-tail. This means they consist of 3 or more words.

What’s attractive about long-tail keywords for small businesses is that they have significantly higher conversion rates than general, short-tail keywords.

Users are looking for something specific when performing a long-tail search, meaning if your site can answer their needs, they’re likely to convert.

So, how do you find them?

This tutorial teaches you how to find low-competition keywords in a few easy steps. It takes you step-by-step through the process so that you ultimately get a keyword report that looks like this:

In the above report, there are two key columns to pay attention to:

• SERP Difficulty Score (SD): This is a LowFruits metric representing keyword difficulty. It’s on a scale of 1 to 3, with 1 being the easiest and 3 the hardest.
• Weak Spots: These are low-authority domains ranking in the top 10 search results for a keyword. The more weak spots there are, the easier it will be to rank high for that keyword.

Ultimately, you want to look for keywords with a low SD and multiple weak spots.

This will help you identify low-competition keywords that can increase your visibility in search results and drive traffic to your site.

3. Find Buyer-Intent Keywords

You’ve probably heard of search intent by now, but here’s a quick refresher: Search intent is the motivating factor behind a search query.

It’s the why that drives someone to use a search engine.

There are several types, but small business owners should pay special attention to one in particular: buyer intent.

Buyer-intent keywords are search phrases that reflect a strong desire to purchase.

They’re typically a mix of commercial and transactional keywords, which cater to buyers at different stages late in the customer journey.

Buyer-intent keywords bring the following benefits:

• Increased conversions
• Greater return on investment (ROI)
• Improved customer experience

You can find them using the LowFruits KWFinder tool.

After entering a search, select the second option (Access all keyword ideas + analyze all high-intent keywords). This selection includes buyer-intent keywords in its analysis.

You’ll get a keyword report similar to the one we saw in our last tip, but this time, with buyer-intent keywords already analyzed.

4. Analyze Competitor Keywords

You know the saying, “Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer”?

It’s pretty accurate in the SEO world.

You need to keep a pulse on your competitors’ strategies to stay ahead.

By analyzing your competitors’ websites, you can identify the keywords they’re targeting and the strategies they’re using to rank for them.

You can then use this information to:

• Identify keyword gaps: Find keywords that your competitors are ranking for, but you’re not.
• Optimize your website: Poach their keywords and target them on your website.
• Improve your content strategy: Create content that’s more relevant and valuable than your competitors.

These optimizations can help you write stronger content that ultimately outranks your competitors.

Further reading: How to Find Competitors’ Keywords

LowFruits empowers you to extract the top-ranking keywords for your competitors using the Extract tool. Just enter your competitors’ domains into the Ranking tab’s search box, then click Extract.

LowFruits will generate a spreadsheet of your competitors’ keywords that you can download to your computer.

5. Create Keyword Clusters

Keyword clusters are the secret weapon of digital marketers and SEO professionals.

The idea is to group related keywords with the same search intent together. Then, you target this cluster of keywords in a single piece of content.

This strategy ensures maximum visibility for your content and streamlines your SEO efforts.

You could go to the old school route and create keyword clusters in a spreadsheet, but this can be time-consuming.

Instead, you should use a clustering tool like LowFruits to group your keywords automatically.

When you’re in any of your keyword reports, you can click on the Clusters tab. LowFruits will have already organized your keyword clusters, which you can expand by clicking on the main keyword. It’s a huge time-saver and supports a strong content strategy.

6. Use a Content Optimization Tool

At this point, we’ve covered how to get the best keywords for your small business.

Now, you need to work with them.

Optimizing your content is the next step for making the most out of your keyword research and getting customers to your site.

This can be a little intimidating when you’re new to SEO or busy with all the other tasks of running your own business.

Fortunately, certain tools can streamline the process.

Take, SEOBoost, for example.

This content optimization tool makes it super easy to understand your keyword optimizations.

It uses a color-coded system to tell you when you’ve hit an appropriate keyword density compared to other ranking pages. It also suggests related keywords, which you should try and work into your content.

Ultimately, it makes it very easy to visualize the effectiveness of your keyword optimizations to get the best results.

You can also use All in One SEO if you’re a WordPress user.

This plugin comes equipped with an on-page analyzer called TruSEO.

TruSEO analyzes your on-page SEO and provides feedback in real-time directly in the WordPress editor. You’ll get a handy checklist that lets you know when you forgot your focus keyword in critical areas.

Both tools can save you valuable time and ensure maximum reach for your content.

7. Optimize for Local Search

If you’re a local business, it’s important to optimize your website for local search queries.

These queries represent users looking for products or services in their area.

By appearing in local search results, you can attract more customers and boost sales.

Here are some tips for optimizing your website for local search:

• Claim your Google Business Profile. This will help your business show up in Google Maps and local search results.
• Use local keywords. Incorporate local keywords into your website content, such as your city, state, and neighborhood.
• Encourage customer reviews. Positive reviews can build trust with potential customers.
• Build local backlinks. Get links from local websites and directories.

8. Use a Keyword Rank Tracker

This last tip is essential for monitoring the effectiveness of your keyword strategy. A keyword rank tracker allows you to track the position of your website for specific keywords in search engine results pages (SERPs).

By using a rank tracker, you can:

• Identify which keywords are performing well.
• Identify keywords that need improvement.
• Track the impact of your SEO efforts.

LowFruits is one of the best rank tracker tools for small businesses because it’s extremely intuitive and quick to set up.

After entering the keywords you want to track into the tool, you’ll tell it how often you want it to fetch your Google rankings.

Rank Tracker will display these insights in a user-friendly dashboard, making it easy to see how positions have changed over time.

You can also expand any of these keywords to see their position history and the current top 10 ranking domains.

These insights can inform your content strategy and help you make data-driven decisions to improve your website’s visibility

Final Thoughts

By following these keyword research tips for small businesses, you can set your website up for long-term success.

Remember, SEO is a marathon, not a sprint.

Keyword research will give you a head start above the competition, but it’s up to you to transform these insights into high-quality content. Keep your audience in mind during every stage of the content creation process to ensure content resonates and drives results.