How important is Keyword research as an SEO tool? Do you think keyword research is really the lifeline of a website’s SEO?
Yes it is. Keyword research plays a major role in driving web traffic to your website, particularly if your web pages contain highly-searched keywords. In fact 95% of web surfers make use of search engines to look up what they need.

Take note that they do not merely browse randomly but often use particular “power” keywords, especially when they intend to buy something. With this in mind, you must identify these “power” keywords, particularly if your market consists mainly of internet users. You have to convert these surfers to buying customers.

Additionally, you must know that content and keywords work hand in hand to help optimize your web page and to put it in the top search engine results page. There are four key requirements here: contents that are relevant, unique, fresh and useful to your target audience. These will extremely aid achieving your success. You may work with a professional to enhance your SEO but if your business is still growing and you want to cut down your expenses, you may use free SEO tools to help you build a strong and solid keyword list.

3 Free Keyword Tools

• SEO Tools Keyword Phrase List Generator – This tool provides a listing of all possible combinations of particular phrases. However, take note that you still need to manually determine which of the keywords or key phrases will work best for you. That’s right! You must do your research to understand which keywords are likely to generate more traffic to your website.
• Google Adwords Keyword Tool – This is one of most popular free keyword tool to instigate brainstorming highly-searched keywords. So how does it work? Enter one keyword and Google Adwords Keyword Tool will generate a list of related keywords. You also have the option to use synonyms. For example, when you put in “men’s shirt”, the free tool will generate suggestions like “dress shirt” and “comfortable men’s shirt”. This free tool also provides an idea of how often does the phrase appear on Google as search query.
• Google’s Search-based Keyword Tool – This free tool allows you to input the URL of your website or web pages on your site and it will generate a list of relevant search queries that have been searched on Google over the past year. This gives a clearer picture of what web surfers/users are most interested in. With this in mind, you can identify what information is worth optimizing and what keywords are relevant and can be applied to your own website.

Final Note

After deciding on the relevant and powerful keywords that you aim to optimize, you can also use a free page grader to test the content’s keyword density.