How To Use Semrush Keyword Research Tool: 18 Strategies To Pursue
How To Use Semrush Keyword Research Tool: 18 Strategies To Pursue
“What the hell are we going to write about on our blog? Anyone have any good ideas? “
That's a pretty common wall to hit if you've just started managing your B2B company's blog, or if you're flying without the right tools.
Today we're unveiling our B2B content planning process - a process you could help if you struggle with blogging topics. It's housed in spreadsheets, based on data and built using SEMrush (an SEO tool) -not a product of whiteboards and brainstorming sessions. We do that every day for 15 B2B companies and for our proprietary content planning at Nectafy.
We rely heavily on SEMrush for our keyword research and content planning. Here we show you the exact procedures we use in SEMrush to find great keyword opportunities. (For transparency we are a SEMrush customer and affiliate company. If you choose to click through some of the links in this post and sign up, Nectafy may receive a small commission at no cost to you.)
In this post teaches you how to use SEMrush for keyword research, including:
How to Use Six SEMrush Tools to Find Content Opportunities
18 step-by-step keyword research used on real websites
tactics 30 blog post generated from those tactics
ideas Try SEMrush free for seven days so you can follow it step by step.
The sections below are organized by SEMrush tools. You can go to a specific section to find the keyword tactics that go with each of these tactics:
research Topic Research Tool
we dive into.
SEMrush
Topic Research Tool Follow the Topic Research Tool.
You probably have a good idea of the topics you want to rank for at a high level. For example, if you sell payroll software, you know you want to score on anything related to payroll. The topic research tool allows you to insert one idea (or even your industry name itself) and get back a bunch of related topics. These all contain hundreds or thousands of keywords for you to follow.
You can call your industry 'enterprise data' solutions, but some of your potential customers may consider it 'data analytics'. SEMrush can help you find related topics for your brainstorming ideas. These related topics could be similar ideas that have just been rephrased, or related topics you haven't thought of yet. There is a high probability of finding keywords in related topics for your ideas.
Click on the tab "Subject research". Search for any topic or keyword you have.
Then click on one of the related topics relevant to your audience. In the example above, we clicked on 'Data Analysis'. You'll find a section with headlines related to that broad topic:
Blog Post Idea: What will Enterprise Data Analytics Look Like in 2030?
Blog Post Idea: Enterprise Data
Level Analysis Blog Post Idea:Analysis The Enterprise Data Strategy and Guide
You will also find questions asked on the topic in Google.
Blogspot Idea Why is data architecture important?
Blog post Idea: what is a data warehouse?
SEMrush Keyword Magic ToolKeyword Magic Tool The Keyword Magic tool
allows you to enter your topic at a high level (such as "payroll") and see all available keywords related to or related to that topic.
If you've been brainstorming on topics that are important to your persona, the Keyword Magic tool can help you find the keywords related to those topics that are frequently searched.
Under the 'Keyword Summary' tab, go to 'Keyword Magic Tool'. Search for any topic or keyword you have. Then sort the list from highest volume to least. These are the biggest opportunities to address during your brainstorm.
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Keywords that are less difficult to rank and that broadly match your important topics.
This is the same process as the previous idea. But instead of sorting by keywords with the highest search volume, we look for keywords that are the least difficult to rank.
Under the 'Keyword Summary' tab, go to 'Keyword Magic Tool'. Search for any topic or keyword you have. Then sort the list from least to difficult. These are the keywords that are less difficult to rank according to SEMrush. These are probably the best options for you if you are just starting out in keyword research.
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Blog: Post Idea Remote Team Activities: 25 Real, Default Ideas Keyword Research Tactic
This is the same premise as the previous two ideas. This time you are going to look for related keywords instead of matching keywords. This is a way to expand your search beyond the specific ideas you have looked up.
Under the 'Keyword Summary' tab, go to 'Keyword Magic Tool'. Search for any topic or keyword you have. Then switch from 'Broad Search' to 'Related'.
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This is the same premise as the previous idea. This time you will look for keywords formulated as questions.
Under the 'Keyword Summary' tab, go to 'Keyword Magic Tool'. Search for any topic or keyword you have. Then switch from 'All' to 'Questions'.
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Remotely SEMrush Organic Research Tool
Open the Organic Research Tool.
The Organic Research tool allows you to see all the keywords that a given website is ranking for (whether it's your own or a competitor's). For the next set of keyword research tactics that take place in the Organic Research tool, we'll show you some ways to analyze your own website for keyword capabilities.
When blog posts start to get 'old' (this usually happens around 18-24 months), they show up in the search results. Google wants updated content. Here's a chance to regain a Google ranking on page one by updating an existing article.
Under the "Organic Research" tool you can see any keyword that is on a particular website (yours or a competitor's). You can also see where your keyword rankings are today compared to last month.
Filter by keywords in the top 20 positions in Google. That's all your rankings on page one and page two, and you can quickly flag the ones that disappeared from page one (a big, negative impact)
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When you consistently create good content, some keywords will go from unranked (with millions of results before it) to somewhere close to page one, but not quite there. Go back and review these posts. Adding them can give them a boost to jump to page one. Here's a chance to find keywords that are stuck on pages two through five of Google, but can be boosted to page one.
Filter for keywords at positions 11-50 in Google -essentially all of your keywords on pages two through five of the Google results. These are your best possible opportunities! They don't do anything for you right now, but they are very close to bringing in more visitors and leads.
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The top three results in Google consume the most clicks. According to Backlinko's Brian Dean…
The # 1 result in Google gets 31.7% of all clicks.
The # 2 results get 24.7%.
The # 3 result gets 18.7%.
That means a whopping 75% of clicks come from the top three Google results, and so moving an existing rank from position four to position two would almost certainly yield better results than creating a new piece targeting a new keyword. Here's an opportunity to move keywords higher on page one.
Filter by keywords on 4-10 positions in Google. That's all your keywords on page one, but not the money positions (1-3). These keywords may already be among your top performing keywords, but they could be even better.
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This post already exists for this website. An addition and update could raise it a few positions.
Another idea is to try guest posts on related websites that point to this link (to increase the authority of the article).
This is the reverse of the previous idea. In some cases, your keywords were in the top three (or at least higher on page one of Google) but fell back for a number of reasons. This is your chance to regain your previous high rankings. Here's an opportunity to fix page one keywords that have disappeared.
Go to the 'Position changes' tab and filter on 'Declined and lost'. Then sort the position from lowest to highest. This will bring up your keywords that were once high on page one of Google but have recently been rejected.
Blog Post Idea: What Is New York City (NYC) Sales Tax?
A blog post called "The New York Clothing Sales Tax Exemption Defined" is currently ranked for this keyword. It is not a good match for the keyword.
Add a link from that blog post to the new one to pass on some of the authority.
Google's algorithm trusts that if you are a good source of information for things like 'content marketing tips', you are probably a good source for information on 'content marketing plan', 'content marketing examples' and 'content marketing statistics'. "So if you gain more authority on new keywords, you can probably win just as quickly for related keywords. The whole topic could be an opportunity for you. Here's how to find topics where your authority is growing and how to get new keyword opportunities in." Discover those topics
Go to the 'Position Changes' tab and filter on 'New and Improved'. Then sort from the greatest difference to the smallest. This puts the rapidly rising keyword rankings on top.
Then click on a keyword that could have a good chance of growing. This will display the "Keyword Magic Tool" for your chosen keyword. (I“Sales tax chart” n the example above, it is)
Blog Post Idea: The 2020 Sales Tax Table For Every State
Blog Post Series Idea:
The 2020 County Sales Tax Rates For California
The 2020 County Sales Tax Rates For New
York2020 County Sales Tax Rates For Florida (etc.)
A 'featured snippet' is a search result function in Google that attempts to answer a simple question with a few sentences, a call-out box and a link to where the description was taken from. Here's a featured snippet explaining featured snippets:
when you're at the top of the first page, chances are your site will be pulled into this featured box. That's good real estate. Here's an opportunity to get a featured snippet rank by optimizing an existing blog post.
Sort the "On SERP" (Search Engine Results Page) for featured snippets. That filters on the keywords that typically contain featured snippets that appear in search results. Not all searches do that.
Blog Post Idea: 30 Examples of Landing Pages for B2B Lead Generation
Add a 40-60 word definition of a “Landing Page for Lead Generation” at the top of the article below a header with that keyword in it.
A "video carousel" is a Google search results feature that lets you browse relevant videos on the topic. Not all keywords will have a video carousel, which means that Google will do some work to match search intent to the media type.
Here's an opportunity to get a keyword ranked in multiple ways: with a video ranking in addition to your existing blog ranking.
Sort the "On SERP" (Search Engine Results Page) for video carousel. That filters on the keywords that typically show video carousels in search results.
Video blog post idea: what is HubSpot (and what do we use it for)?
Create this video and add it to your existing article associated with the topic. Make sure to post it on YouTube (since Google owns YouTube, I'm sure they prefer YouTube videos over all others).
If you're at the top of page one before a keyword, you are more likely to find keywords that are closely related to that keyword. This is a great opportunity to increase your visits and leads with a high probability of success. Here's an opportunity to get more rankings through related keywords.
Find your existing rankings in the organic research tool. Search for top five positions with good search volume (1,300 in our case for "HubSpot Review" below).
Then, in the same tool, search for a broader term to take advantage of the opportunities. Since we score high on "HubSpot review", I searched for "HubSpot" in SEMrush to broaden the net.
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SEMrush Position Tracking Tool
Follow along in the Position Tracking Tool.
The Organic Research tool in SEMrush analyzes an entire website at once and displays all keyword rankings in Google's top 100 results. Position Tracking, on the other hand, shows your keywords that you are following closely. These are your main keywords, tracked over time to show trends.
In tactic # 6 above, we talked about how to show decreasing keywords in the Organic Research tool. These opportunities are opportunities that you may or may not be aware of, but can bring back lost traffic. When a falling position appears in your Rank Tracking tool, it means that one of your chosen keywords that you want to track is falling. You must start this immediately. This is an opportunity to correct falling positions for your best keywords.
In the Tracking feature, sort by the "difference" column to view the largest declines at the top of the list. If you find one that has fallen, expand the time frame to see how the keyword performed over time. If it's been down significantly for a while, it's time for a rewrite to get the rankings and visits back.
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Position Tracking contains your most important keywords to keep an eye on. If your competitors rank higher than you on your own hand-picked keywords, you'd want to know, right? This is an opportunity to close the gap with some of your competitors.
In the Position Tracking tool, add a competitor's name in the box next to yours. This will increase the visibility of your site on your tracked keywords compared to that of that competitor.
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Above, we've outlined how to find featured snippets in the Organic Research tool. You can also find more specific options in the Position Tracking tool.
Here's an opportunity to get a featured snippet for a high-quality keyword.
In Tracking, go to Featured Snippets. You will see a list of specific opportunities for featured clips that you are not currently ranked for.
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Add a 40-50 word definition of a 'content marketing strategy' at the top of the article below a header with that keyword in it.
SEMrush Keyword Gap Tool
Try out the Keyword Gap Tool to track with.
The Keyword Gap tool allows you to compare multiple website domains at once. For example, you can choose to compare your website with that of your closest competitor. You can then sort the findings in a number of ways to see where you beat your competitor and vice versa in the search results.
In the Organic Research tool section, we talked about keywords that outperform your competitors and follow you specifically. The Keyword Gap tool allows you to compare any keyword rankings across multiple websites. Here's an opportunity to find new keyword ideas by comparing your competitors' sites to yours.
Under Domain Analysis, go to 'Keyword Gap'. Enter a competitor's website next to yours under 'Primary Domain'. Then sort your competitor's rankings from smallest to largest (highest ranking to lowest). This shows all of your competitor's top rankings and where you rank on the adjacent rankings.
Blog Post Idea: A Guide to Alabama's Auto Sales Tax
SEMrush Keyword Summary ToolKeyword Summary Tool
The Keyword Summary Tool lets you analyze a particular keyword by a number of metrics: search volume, keyword difficulty, search volume trends, keyword variations, and more.
The Keyword Summary Tool also shows you the most important statistics for the web pages already ranked for the keyword: page authority score, backlinks, estimated traffic, and the keywords that are ranked on that page. This gives you an informed guess as to why certain sites are at the top of the results pages, so you can see what it takes to beat those sites.
Here's an opportunity to analyze pages that rank high for your industry's top keywords so you can find supporting keywords to pursue.
Under the 'Keyword Analysis' tool, click 'Overview'. Search for an important keyword and then look at the "SERP Analysis" section.
Then click on each link in the "SERP Analysis" section. This will show all the keywords the page is ranking for. These could be support keywords to target if you choose to go after the major keyword or longer keywords for other articles.
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Where To Track Your Keyword Research Process From Here.
That was a lot to digest.
But since each individual tactic can be used on its own, I recommend just picking one of the 18 techniques from this article to find ideas for your next B2B blog post. That should simplify things. Once you've come up with a tactic to try, you have a few ways to go.
As you can see, we've developed all of these tactics to fit specifically into SEMrush, the keyword research tool we use. When you're ready to schedule content, sign up for a seven-day free trial. See how much value you can squeeze out of this post and a week into SEMrush.
Do keyword research in other tools.
Just because we've listed all the steps in SEMrush doesn't mean you should do your research there. We have used many other tools in the past and others that are still part of our process: 1) Keywordtool.io; 2) a combination of Google Keyword Planner and Search Console, HubSpotand spreadsheets; 3) Ahrefs; and 4) Ubersuggest.
See if you can replicate the tactics you just read in your SEO tool of choice.
Do keyword research with a little help from Nectafy.
If all of this seems a bit far off for your content planning, let's talk. This is what we do every day for B2B customers to grow leads organically. We are happy to discuss your goals as a company and how growth content could fit into the plan.
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