Why Keyword Research Matters in SEO
It’s no exaggeration to say that keyword research accounts for more than half of where SEO begins. No matter how good your content is, you can’t expect much impact if it’s built around the wrong keywords.
Understanding the Customer’s Search Intent Is the Key to Keyword Research
In search engine optimization (SEO), grasping the search intent of the customers looking for your product or service is crucial. For example, if you’re promoting “gym memberships,” it’s important to find not only obvious keywords like “gyms in Seoul” but also highly relevant ones such as “diet workout routines,” and then create and surface content aimed at those potential customers.
When you write content that matches the customer’s search intent, you can attract more potential customers and lift your conversion rate, as shown below.
<Benefits of Writing Highly Relevant Content>
- Improved content relevance: by delivering content that matches user intent, the relevance and value of your content increase. This raises user satisfaction and can improve your ranking on the search engine results page.
- Better user experience: by understanding user intent and serving content that fits it, you can greatly improve the user experience. This in turn builds users’ trust in and loyalty to your website.
- Higher conversion rate: accurately identifying and targeting the customer’s search intent can increase your website’s conversion rate. For instance, you can provide detailed information and purchase options to users who already intend to buy a specific product.
Keyword Research With Duplicate Content in Mind
During keyword research, you also need to check whether content already indexed for a given keyword exists. If there’s already top-ranking content for your target keyword, you may need to adjust your content priorities based on where that content ranks.
That said, even if a keyword is already indexed, you may still decide to produce new content — for example, when the existing content has low relevance or when you judge that a piece with a different angle is needed.
Tools That Can Help With Keyword Research
Google Ads
- With Google Ads’ Keyword Planner, entering a specific keyword gives you related keyword ideas.
- You can also see the search volume for each keyword. If you’re running Google Search ads, exact search volumes are shown; if you’re not, you only get less precise ranges such as 100–1,000.
Naver Ads System
- For Naver search volume, you can look it up through the Naver Ads system.
- With Naver, you can check this even without running any ads.
