Market and keyword research

Why this matters

A seed keyword without context produces a larger list, not necessarily a better decision. The research brief keeps the work tied to real people, locations, offers, information needs, and site constraints.

Build yours

1. Name the audience and the problem, task, product, service, or topic they are trying to understand.
2. Record the geographic market and language.
3. List the pages or offers the site already has.
4. List known competitors, including publishers or marketplaces that compete in search without selling the same thing.
5. Define what would disqualify a keyword, such as the wrong country, audience, intent, product, or risk level.

Why this matters

Market estimates are directional. They help compare domains, page groups, keyword portfolios, and movement; they are not the site's analytics and should not be reported as exact traffic.

Build yours

1. Open Market Map and enter the site domain without a protocol or path.
2. Choose the correct country and decide whether subdomains belong in scope.
3. Review organic keywords, estimated traffic, traffic value, ranking distribution, and movement together.
4. Open top pages to identify page types and topics producing visibility.
5. Compare at least two relevant domains and record where their page portfolios differ.

Why this matters

Searchers with different experience levels describe the same need differently. Related terms reveal language, modifiers, comparisons, questions, and page-type expectations that a team may not use internally.

Build yours

1. Start with one focused seed drawn from the research brief.
2. Set the same market and language used in Market Map.
3. Review volume, difficulty, CPC, competition, intent, and trend as separate signals.
4. Inspect outliers and set-aside ideas before filtering; unexpected language can reveal a different task or audience.
5. Repeat only for clearly distinct topic families rather than near-duplicate seeds.

Why this matters

Intent labels are a first pass. The result page, current rankings, business fit, and existing content determine what action is appropriate.

Build yours

1. Describe the task the searcher is trying to complete.
2. Inspect the dominant page types and result features.
3. Check whether an existing page already satisfies that task.
4. Choose one action: improve, create, consolidate, monitor, or reject.
5. Record the evidence and confidence instead of assigning a page type from a keyword modifier alone.

Why this matters

A useful keyword record retains its market, metrics, intent, SERP context, target page, tags, and intended action. Saving only the keyword text forces the next person to repeat the research.

Build yours

1. Select only qualified rows and save them to the project Keyword List.
2. Tag by topic, audience, location, funnel task, client, or another decision-relevant dimension.
3. Attach an existing target URL when one should be improved.
4. Send approved new-page opportunities to Content Plan.
5. Add monitoring keywords to Rank Tracker only when movement will change a decision.