If you're a small business owner, then you know how important it is to do keyword research.
It's the key to getting your website found online and generating traffic that converts into sales.
But what if you don't have the budget to hire a professional and can't spend on paid tools?
Don't worry - there are plenty of free tools out there that can help you get the job done.
Let's take a look at 10 of the best free keyword research tools available to help you find just the right keywords for your website.
The first free keyword tool in our list is Ahrefs Keyword Generator. It is a paid tool, but they offer a free keyword generator that can be used to get keyword ideas.
With Ahrefs Keyword Generator, you can generate up to 150 keyword ideas.
You have to enter your seed keyword and it will generate your similar and related keywords, plus related questions that users might type in when searching for that seed keyword.
The free version also provides you with a metric, which is Keyword Difficulty. This is a metric calculated by how many backlinks the top websites have and it is on a scale from 0 to 100. The higher the number the harder it will be to rank for that keyword.
In our opinion, it is the best free tool at the moment!
Google Trends is another free keyword tool offered by Google and it can be a great way to get ideas for keywords.
Simply enter your main keyword and you'll see how that keyword has performed over time, including seasonality data, regional variations, and more.
This can help you identify trends in the market so you know what keywords to target to get the most traffic.
It can also help you create a seasonal content plan by looking at what people are searching for during different times of the year.
The third tool on our list is the Google Ads Keyword Planner, a free keyword tool offered by Google that allows you to enter keywords and get keyword suggestions along with search volume for those keywords.
It used to be very good, but since then Google has modified how the tool works and instead of exact search volume, you can now only see a range of the search volume for those keywords.
It also shows the competitiveness of the keywords that it finds, but that is not the Organic search competition, it's the competition when advertising for those keywords.
If you have an ongoing campaign in Google Ads, it will show the exact search volume for the keywords.
It is still a very useful tool though, for generating keyword ideas!
Whether you have your own website or are considering starting a blog, this is one of the best tools available to help you find just the right keywords for your audience.
Answer the public is a very unique tool that allows you to find questions that people are searching online.
You can use this tool to generate ideas for blog posts or even create a FAQ page for your website.
To use the free keyword tool, simply enter your main keyword and it will generate a list of questions related to that keyword.
The results are divided into different tabs including Questions, Prepositions, Comparisons, Alphabetical, and Related Questions.
This is a great way to create content that directly responds to what people are searching for online.
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Keyword sheeter is a free keyword tool that allows you to generate keyword ideas by entering your main keyword and then generating up to 1,000 keywords related to that keyword.
It pulls its data from the autocomplete suggestions on the SERPs of Google and it can generate a good list of long tail keywords.
Unfortunately, it only gives you ideas, it doesn't give you data on the monthly search volume or competition, so you'll need to use that in conjunction with the other tools on this list.
Keyword Surfer from the Surfer SEO team is a free Chrome plugin that shows you the estimated monthly search volume for search queries you enter into Google.
To use the tool, simply install the plugin and then do a search on Google. The results will show you an estimate of the monthly search volume for that keyword.
You can set your preferred location (as each country has different search volume) and turn off the global search volume option.
At the moment, Keyword Surfer 3.0 provides dataset from 70 different countries.
With this free Chrome extension, you can also generate NLP optimized content guidelines. You can use this to create highly SEO Optimized content for the keyword you have searched for.
7. Keyworddit
Keyworddit is another free keyword tool that you can use for keyword research.
To use the tool, simply enter a subreddit and it will generate a list of related keywords that people are using on that subreddit. It will look at the comments, titles to find the keywords.
Keyworddit can be a great tool to learn about a niche or a market that you don't know a lot about. It also can pull lingo that you might not find elsewhere and it might have a good search volume.
It gives you the estimated search volume for each keyword, plus it has a "Context" button which shows you the threads in that subreddit where the keyword can be found.
8. WordTracker
WordTracker is a paid keyword research tool which has a free plan for you to work with. With the free plan you can do 12 searches, which you can reset by browsing from incognito.
To get the keyword ideas, you have to enter a seed keyword. Each search will give you 50 keyword ideas, with historical data, search volume, competition and IAAT which mean In Anchor In Title.
This metric looks at how many websites have the keyword in their title and in the anchor of their backlinks.
The higher the number, the harder it will be to rank for a keyword.
9. Questiondb
Questiondb is a free tool that finds questions that people are asking about a specific niche or topic.
The datasource of this tool is reddit, which has a database of 48 million questions.
You simply enter a seed keyword and the tool will give you a list of questions related to that keyword.
It is very useful if you are trying to add FAQ schema to a page or just a section where you are answering questions.
You can easily export the results into a CSV file!
Bulk Keyword Generator is a free keyword tool that allows you to generate keyword ideas in bulk for Local SEO purposes.
The tool is unconventional since it generates keyword ideas based on the selected industry and service types.
First, you have to select an industry and a service type.
Then you have to enter your locations.
After you click generate, the tool will give you keyword ideas for that location and service.
Free keyword Research Tool for YouTube
There are a few free keyword research tools for YouTube that you can use to find keywords related to your video content.
The only tool that we can recommend and which is accurate is the Ahrefs YouTube Keyword Tool.
This tool gives accurate search volume data and can generate you keyword ideas.
FAQ
Is there a free keyword research tool?
There are multiple free keyword research tools that you can use for your SEO purposes. There are also paid tools which have free plans that you can take advantage of.
What is the best free keyword research tool?
There is no one "best" free keyword research tool. Each tool has its own benefits and drawbacks. It depends on your needs as to which tool will work best for you.
Is Google Adwords keyword Planner free?
Yes, Google Adwords keyword Planner is free to use. However, it does require you to have an active Google Ads account in order to access the tool to it's full extent.
Is there any SEO tool as good as Google keyword planner?
We would say almost every free tool is better or is as good as the Google keyword planner. It depends on your specific needs, but there are many great options available for free or at a very low cost.
Is Semrush free?
No, Semrush is not free. They do have a 7 day free trial that you can sign up for.
Conclusion
These are some of the top free keyword research tools that you can use for SEO.
Each one has its own strengths, so be sure to check them out and see what will work best for your specific needs.
Although free tools are great, sometimes it is worth spending a little money on a paid tool if you need more features or data. Free tools just can't afford to offer the same features and data as paid tools.
But if you are just starting out or on a tight budget, then these free keyword research tools should be more than enough to get you started!
If you have any questions about these tools or keyword research in general, feel free to leave a comment below!