How Long Does Keyword Research Take

Last updated on December 10th, 2023 at 07:31 pm

One of the most important elements of SEO is keyword research. So, you shouldn’t ignore it. If you do not carry out keyword research before setting up a website, it will likely not succeed.

It doesn’t matter whether your website is richly designed or in a low-competition niche; targeting keywords with zero searches will result in failure.

This article will explain how long keyword research should take and why it is vital to your overall SEO strategy.

 

How Long Should Keyword Research Take?

No specific answer exists to this question with regard to how long keyword research has to take.

What’s the ideal length of a string?

You won’t get the same answer from everyone. For instance, a blog with a sub-niche that focuses on a vegan salad will require less keyword research to be carried out compared with one on a food authority website.

On average, if you have just set up a new website, you have to invest a week in researching a lot of keywords. Next, you can create blog articles optimized for these keywords.

You can keep carrying out keyword research until you exhaust the keywords or you are happy with the number of articles you have published.

 

Importance of Keyword Research

As I mentioned earlier, keyword research is vital to the success of your SEO strategy.

It lets you discover article ideas that your target audience is looking for. You can’t just guess and randomly write content based on what you think your potential audience searches for. It is basically an effort of futility.

With keyword research, you can get detailed information about a specific keyword. For instance, you will get access to things such as:

• Keyword difficulty
• Cost per click
• Search volume
• Related keywords

It lets you better understand your site’s audience and their search behavior. This creates plenty of opportunities regarding sales, conversion, and link building, which is a key ranking metric.

Keyword research not only helps in learning more about your audience but can uncover how your competitor sites rank for keywords.

This can be valuable since it gives insight into your competitor’s keywords and ways to target them. It can also boost your organic traffic over a period of time.

 

How Often Should I Carry Out Keyword Research?

It is important that you carry out keyword research whenever you need to create content about keywords. The fact is that keyword research never ends unless your niche is very small.

You will always find keywords you can optimize your content for. You only have to do research on them. If you are satisfied with the number of blog articles and pages on your website, you can put keyword research on hold.

However, when keyword research is carried out consistently, it can positively impact your organic traffic.

 

How long can I rank for keywords?

After gathering your list of keywords and creating optimized content, you desire your site to perform well on SERP by ranking on the first page. Ranking is a time-consuming process and is influenced by a number of factors.

A very important factor is your website’s age. Did you launch your website in the last six months? or has it existed for three years?

For a new website, it might take longer than six months to rank. This is because they lack authority, so Google may not want them to show up on the first page.

Another significant factor is keyword competition. If your targeted keyword has a lot of websites competing for it on the first page, but they fail to satisfy the search intent, it is easier to rank for it.

All you need is to optimize your content to satisfy your audience’s query.

Since there are plenty of ranking metrics (external and internal), there is no set timeline whereby your content will begin to rank in Google search results.

But the general rule is that with proper keyword research and quality content, be sure to rank any time within six to nine months.

 

How Long Should Keyword Research Take?

If you already have a great SEO strategy and leverage keyword research tools, the process will be a breeze. For instance, you can use SEMrush or Keyword Everywhere to generate a variety of related words from a single keyword.

While it is possible to end your keyword research at this stage, I advise that you assess user interest in that specific keyword.

For instance, you can visit Google Trends to find data on the popularity of the keyword over a specific period of time.

Not to worry. This will take you 10 minutes or less.

 

Difficulty and Search Volume Research

After you have found information about trending keywords, you have to analyze the search volume and keyword difficulty, which is known to affect a website’s performance on SERP.

If your website is new or doesn’t have high domain authority, it is wise to avoid keywords that are highly competitive.

The process of researching keyword difficulty and search volume is simple and quick. This can be done within 10 minutes or less and is a way of getting insight into the keywords your site can rank for.

 

Effective Keyword Research Tools

 

Ubersuggest

 

 

 

Ubersuggest is an effective keyword tool. It is great for researching and generating ideas.

All you have to do is input a generic search term and access a rich list of long-tail keyword recommendations. Ubersuggest also has features like SEO competition, PPC competition and search volume, which gives you insight into the effectiveness of a specific keyword.

You can also generate related semantical ideas like questions, key phrases and prepositions in relation to your keyword. This will save you time when carrying out your research.

 

KWFinder

 

 

KWFinder is a tool you can freely use for keyword research. It shares some similar features with Ubersuggest.

It has a user-friendly interface and provides a detailed analysis of SERPS, enriched with recommendations and ideas.

This tool can help streamline the entire keyword research process.

 

SEMRush

SEMrush is a popular name in SEO. It has fantastic features that can add value to your keyword research.

Although it is quite pricey, it is definitely worth it if you wish to enhance your research. SEMrush has features like traffic analysis, insight into keyword difficulty and keyword trends.

As mentioned earlier, the tool doesn’t come cheap; however, there is a free trial and discount plan.

 

What is the Time Frame for SEO?

 

Technical Audit: 1-4 months

The next step, once keyword research is done, is to carry out a detailed technical audit to improve the site’s crawlability and indexation.

Google’s search algorithms utilize over 200 factors to rank websites. A few of them are on-page-related. They include site speed, internal link structure, redirects, content quality, headers, meta description, and URL structure.

After doing all the onsite optimizations, search engines will better understand your website and its content.

 

Content Marketing: Continuous

Content marketing leads to inbound links. It can boost your web presence and site’s credibility.

While technical audits and keyword research deliver quality results, content marketing elevates your SEO performance, helping you boost your ranking for the keywords you are targeting.

Through content promotion, you can design data-backed images, visuals, infographics, graphics and illustrations in order to get link placements.

 

How Long Does Keyword Research Take FAQs

 

Is SEO beginner-friendly?

SEO is not difficult to learn, even with the technicalities. It is beginner-friendly. However, you need to invest effort and time to master it.

 

Is coding needed for SEO?

No. SEO generally does not require any programming or coding expertise. Anyone can optimize a page without writing a line of code.

 

Does SEO take long to work?

To see results in SEO, you have to wait for 4-7 months.

 

What are the most popular SEO tools?

Some of the most widely used SEO tools are:

• Google Search Console
• Ubersuggest
• Moz Pro
• Ahrefs
• SpyFu
• SEMrush
• Keyword Everywhere
• KWFinder
• Answer The Public

 

How do I learn SEO?

• Try to sharpen your skills
• Sign up for a course and earn a certificate
• Learn more about search engine indexation and crawling of content
• Understand what search engines prefer
• Look for a tool that works best for you.
• Understand data.

 

Is there an SEO tool from Google?

Google has a lot of SEO tools to assist site owners and SEO experts in boosting your web visibility and ranking.

They include Lighthouse, Page Speed Insights, Google Trends, Google Search Console, Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager.

 

Conclusion

Lastly, keyword research is a continuous process. There are lots of opportunities to research more keywords unless your website is in a micro niche.

The question of whether keyword research is complete is up to the website owner. If your goal is to post 50 blog articles and you get 50 keywords in a single day, then you can say that your research is completed. Now, as you can see, it is determined by your strategy.

However, keyword research should never be done hastily. It is a pivotal aspect of SEO, so you need to handle it meticulously to produce great results.