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137 Experts Reveal Best Tools For Keyword Research in 2021 (With Leaderboard)

January 2, 2021 by Robbie 337 Comments

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Editor's note:
My training program, The SEO Playbook, will re-open soon. Learn more about the course and see what current students are saying here.


Think you need dozens of tools for keyword research? Think again.

I asked 137 search marketing experts a simple question:

If you could only use 3 tools for keyword research, which 3 would you choose?

Keyword research is at the core of any SEO, PPC or content marketing campaign. If you aren't bidding on or using the right keywords, you're not serving the right content to the right audience at the right stage in the buyer journey. This means less traffic, leads, customers...and dollars. 

I wanted to know which keyword research tools the experts were using to get a leg up on the competition and build profitable online marketing campaigns. 

There are a ton of top 10, 20, 30...100 lists out their floating around the web. Often, after reading, you're nowhere closer to finding the best tools for your business. That's why I decided to go straight to the source and ask the experts and see if the best keyword research tool would rise to the surface... 

Here are the top keyword research tools recommended by the experts...

Note: This post has been updated several times since it was originally published a couple years ago. While many responses have been updated and new ones added, there are experts below who did not respond to update their original response. 

Top 10


Best Tools for Keyword Research (As Voted by 137 Search Marketing Experts)

#1: SEMrush (84 votes) ... [Get 30 days of SEMrush PRO for free here]
#2: Google Keyword Planner (59 votes)

#3: Ahrefs (51 votes) [Read full review here]
#4: Keyword Tool.io (19 votes)
#5: Search Console (16 votes)

#6: AnswerThePublic (14 votes)
#7: Buzzsumo and Ubersuggest (13 votes)

#8: Google Trends (12 votes)
#9: Moz (11 votes) 

#10: KWFinder (9 votes)

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Disclaimer: This article does contain affiliate links. If you purchase a tool through one of my links I will receive a small commission at no additional cost to you. Thanks for the support.



The Best Keyword Research Tool For Your Online Marketing Campaigns

Read on to discover each expert's top 3 keyword research tools.

Responses are listed in the order they were received.

#1: Luke Monaghan (Koozai)

If I had to choose three keyword research tools that I use the most regularly, I'd have to choose:

1) SEMrush - Hands down for the competitive insight. Finding what your competition are ranking for is invaluable when building out a strategy to improve organic visibility.

2) SISTRIX - Similar to SEMRush, SISTRIX is great for competitive research, it's also good to identify historical keyword performance on certain domains which is translated into client-friendly visibility chart!

3) Keywordtool.io - for the more long-tail variants of keywords identified by the above tools. SEO has moved on from just targeting an exact-match, vanity keyword, you've got to build long-tail context around such terms.

Luke Monaghan - Koozai

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#2: Gael Breton (Authority Hacker)

Ahrefs is all I need 🙂

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#3: Geoff Kenyon (GeoffKenyon.com)

The three tools that I use most frequently for keyword research are, KeywordTool.io, SEMrush, and Excel.

While each of these are useful tools, they all serve very different purposes. KeywordTool.io is great for discovering variations of keywords to built pages around. Frequently, I use this the most for developing content.

I will use the tool to pull in a lot of keywords related to a theme and group them into relevant topics. These topics will either become their own content page or will be combined with other topics to create a page. KeywordTool.io is similar to other tools out there such as Uber Suggest, which I've used for a long time, but it tends to produce more keywords and it provides search volume for the keywords.

SEMrush is great for competitive keyword research. If you look at the organic competitors section of the tool, it will show you who you're competing with for common keywords. You can then go in to each of those competitors and identify keywords that you might not be targeting now, but you should be.

In addition, you can dig into the paid side of search and find out what keywords your competitors are bidding on, and then leverage those keywords for your own organic benefit if you're not already doing so. Search Metrics does this as well, but I've found SEMrush to provide a greater range of keywords and they save more historical keyword data than Search Metrics.

Excel serves a couple different purposes in my keyword research projects. Most simply, I've found Excel to be one of the most effective ways to simply and actionable present keyword research data. I use Excel to create keyword mapping documents where I provide the URL along with the associated keywords, titles, etc.

I've also found Excel to be very useful when you are working with a site that offers services in different areas. Using the concatenate or & formulas, you can easily create permutations of keywords and geographic regions to generate keywords for different services and geographies served.

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#4: John Doherty (Credo)

Ahrefs, SEMrush and Answer The Public. 

1. Ahrefs is killer for topic research.
2. SEMrush provides me domain-level analysis for competitors.
3. Answer The Public nails question-based keyword research.

John Doherty

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#5: Ana Hoffman (Traffic Generation Cafe)

1. SEMrush
2. Market Samurai
3. Google Ads.

But really, only SEMrush :)

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#6: Paul Shapiro (Searchwilderness.com)

I think people's aresenal of keyword research tools are mostly the same:

1) You need a tool to examine search volume, most likely Google Keyword Planner 

2) A tool to help you generate more keyword ideas. Tools that work with the search engines' autosuggestions are very popular such as KeywordTool.io and Ubersuggest

3) Then people might add a tool broaden the depth of their data, maybe including something like Google Trends or Moz's Keyword Difficulty tool.

Instead of focusing on the 3 tools that everyone needs to cover these important bases, I'll give you my top 3 keyword research tools that you need to go above-and-beyond what everyone else is doing:

1) KNIME - if you want a very open-ended tool that can be used to do all sorts of keyword analysis. It was the focus of my BrightonSEO 2015 talk on doing better semantic keyword research. 

2) MarketMuse - This is a tool that's just taking off, but it's AMAZING. It basiciall crawl your website and/or your competitors' website and find keyword gaps using pretty sophisiticated topic modeling algorithims. It works extremely well.

3) Seed Keywords - Sometimes your keyword research needs a human element and you should be asking your consumer audience how they would search for something. Seed Keywords helps you create a small survey and get that feedback.

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#7: Matthew Barby (matthewbarby.com)

1) Ahrefs
2) Keyword Keg
3) Infinite Suggest

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#8: Chris Dreyer (Rankings.io)

If I was limited to three tools for keyword research, I would use the following:

1) Ahrefs keywords Explorer: We use Ahrefs extensively for link tracking and analysis and their Keywords Explorer is also a useful feature. You can see all of the usual important metrics (search volume, competitiveness, traffic potential, and LSI keywords).

The features that make this stand out are the SERP overview and SERP position history. These reports give you a snapshot of how a site is doing in search for a particular keyword phrase compared with competing domains.

2) SEMrush: Much of our reporting is done out of SEMrush and its Keyword Analytics tool. If you are also doing keyword research for PPC this is a great tool. You can get all the info related to organic search and in addition stuff about ad history and other metrics important to PPC.

3) Search Console (Webmaster Tools): I believe Search Console is overlooked a lot because it’s a free tool provided by Google. Site owners and SEOs that aren’t using this on a regular basis are short changing themselves. There is a wealth of information related to keywords that people are actually using to find your site on this platform.

If you can’t afford using one of the paid solutions out there, this is a perfectly useful alternative. It can help you see what you’re ranking for (and what you’re not ranking for), what pages are associated with which keywords, and your SERP position. All the basics that can help give guidance to your SEO strategy.

Chris Dreyer - Rankings.io

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#9. Adam Connell (bloggingwizard.com)

1) Ahrefs - These guys have an incredible keyword research tool. You can get great suggestions with this tool and some data that I haven’t seen in other tools - for example, you can see the percentage of searches that click (or don’t click) on search results along with return rate etc.

Ahrefs also supports competitor-based keyword research - type in a domain and see what keywords it ranks for.

However, this is much more than a keyword research tool - it’s a complete SEO research tool. And the fact that it has a huge backlink database makes it even more useful.

2) KWFinder - This is my go-to tool for quick stints of KW research, particularly for using Google’s autocomplete and coming up with question based keyword ideas. It’s got a really slick interface and one click SERP analysis.

3) AnswerThePublic – I mainly use the two tools above for KW research but this deserves a special mention. Type in a seed keyword phrase and it’ll spit out a bunch of relevant questions.

Great way to come up with blog post ideas on the fly. Compared to the above tools, this is a bit of a toy but it’s free so it’s an awesome way to get started without using a paid tool.


Adam Connell - Blogging Wizard

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#10. Rich Missey (cars.com)

If I were restricted to three tools, they'd be SEMrush, Ubersuggest, and an internal database.

SEMrush is my go-to for organic landscape keyword research. This is where I start to get a pulse on owned domain rankings, competitor rankings, and adjacent business rankings. It also gives me a ballpark of how competitive a phrase/group of phrases/topic appear to be and how much effort it may take to break into the page 1 landscape.

Ubersuggest is a good place to make me get out of my own head. This is where I go to set aside my own predispositions & expectations and see what else pops into the list. I'll find regional term differences, slang, and get an idea where I'm sinking into technobabble hell.

Once I have a list of phrases, rankings, and volumes from these tools, I'll look to internal tools (maybe Excel, Access, or another database) to organize, classify, and forecast opportunity. This is where I'll estimate a competitor's traffic based on volume & position CTR, set goals for a target position, and estimate traffic based off that position's CTR and keyword volume.


Rich Missey - SEO at cars.com

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#11. Charlie Williams (ScreamingFrog)

1) Google Search Console: One of my favorite keyword sources is the variety of terms you already rank for. There are potentially thousands of interesting angles within your key topics to consider (especially if you use the API), plus Google already thinks you are relevant!

2) Competition analysis: I want to know what the entire potential search market is for my site. And to do that, I need to see what the rest of the market targets, and how the public finds them.

There’s a host of excellent tools for analysing your competition like this; take your pick from Ahrefs, Searchmetrics, Infinite Suggest, Sistrix, STAT, PiDatametrics and more.

As a bonus, they’ll give you plenty of context for your keywords, such as difficulty or if a rich snippet appears.

3) Something to scrape Google suggest: Finally, one of my biggest sources of inspiration is finding the common ways your audience searches within your niche through Google’s (or Bing’s, or Amazon’s) suggested answers.

Some of the best tools I’ve found for this are Infinite Suggest, AnswerThePublic and KeywordTool.io.

There’s plenty of other fantastic tools where you can put in a subject and know you’ll get a great spread of ideas.

Some of my other faves are SEOmonitor’s Topic Explorer and KeywordShitter (sorry about the name…) with the Keywords Everywhere Chrome extension installed.


Charlie Williams - Screaming Frog

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#12. Christine Churchill (keyrelevance.com)

I am a big proponent of using multiple keyword tools and using them synergistically. For example I might take keywords from the Google Keyword Planner or SEMRush and run a few of the top terms into Google Trends to check out seasonality and trend lines.

I also warn people to never just take keywords out of a tool and implement them directly without reviewing them. Over the years I have seen people do some crazy things like take output from the Google tool and dumping them into their PPC campaigns with disastrous results. Scary but true!

My top favorite keyword tools (outside of the Google Planner tool and using your brain) that most people overlook are:

1. Google Trends – Provides years of historical trend data straight from the source.

2.) SEMrush – Fast, efficient results. I like the competitive insights it provides and the site audit information.

3. Ahref’s Keyword Explorer – Provides a useful cross-section of trend and competitive data. Unlike Google’s Keyword planner (which is more of a PPC tool), Ahref’s tool provides an SEO estimate of keyword ranking difficulty.


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#13. Everett Sizemore 

1) Answer The Public
2) Google (SERPs, trends, people also ask, GSC, AdWords...)
3) Moz


Everett Sizemore - Go Inflow

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#14. Melissa Fach (Pubcon)

The SEMrush Keyword Magic Tool
SEMrush Keyword Research
SEMrush Keyword Competitors report


Melissa Fach

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#15. Ian Cleary (Razor Social)

1) Inboundwriter - Inboundwriter helps at the ideation phase. I enter in my proposed title for a post and Inboundwriter will indicate how likely it is that I will rank on Google for these keywords. It will also tell me the related keywords that I should consider in my content.

2) SEMrush - Find out what keywords your competitor is ranking on so you can create better content and take some of your competitors traffic.

3) Google Keyword Planner - Find out an estimate of searches for particular keywords. Not always accurate but useful to review alongside the other tools.


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#16. Brian Dean (Backlinko)

1) SEMrush
2) SEOcockpit
3) Longtail Pro


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#17. Liz Cortes (RebelFish Local)

1) SEMrush
2) SEOcockpit
3) Longtail PRO


Liz Cortes

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#18. Jon Morrow (Smart Blogger)

1) SEMrush
2) Ahrefs
3) Search Console


Jon Morrow

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#19. Kevin Indig (kevin-indig.com)

I like Wikipedia, Ahrefs/SEMrush, and Veescore.

Why? Because traditional keyword research is pretty much dead. Instead, I try to understand what's important about a topic, what the related sub-topics are, and what search volume on other platforms like Youtube looks like.

Thus, I like this setup of Wikipedia (if you can take a manual look), keyword tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush, and a YouTube keyword tool like Veescore.


Kevin Indig

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#20. Georgi Todorov (Digitalnovas)

1) SEMrush - that's an awesome tool. I love their Keyword Magic Tool, it helps me check keywords per country.

2) Ahrefs - Ahrefs is great for finding low-hanging fruits. I use it to find blogs with lower authority that rank for some high volume keywords. Next step is to create a similar piece of content.



Georgi Todorov

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#21. Ilan Shabad (One Egg)

1) SEMrush - I normally start my keywords research with SEMrush by extracting keywords from the client's website and several of their competitors.

2) Google Keywords Planner - I use this to help expand my initial keyword list & generate additional keyword themes. I will also pull the monthly search volume & avg. CPC per target GEO.

3) Ahrefs Keywords Explorer - I use this tool for the keyword difficulty score, search volume & SERP export for each keyword to help eventuate the off-page competition.


Ilan Shabad

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#22. Erin Munson (Launch That)

SEMrush - This one is probably my favorite. I feel like there are so many different tools within SEMrush that I rarely need to use anything else. The only thing I don't really like is that the results you get between the Keyword Overview Tool and the Keyword Magic Tool don't always match up with each other.

However, the Keyword Magic Tool is still in Beta, so maybe that's something they're working on. Just take it with a grain of salt, I guess.

Ahrefs - When I want a second opinion on something or want to use some different tools, that's when I come to Ahrefs. I also really like Ahrefs for keeping track of which featured snippets you have and which ones your competitors have that you might want to go after.

Ryte - This site used to be called OnPage but now is Ryte.com. It's a German company so I feel like a lot of American SEOs that I talk to haven't heard of it. As with most sites, the generic version of their tool is free or you can pay for the pro version.

I just have the free version right now so I don't know all that the pro one can do. But even the free version has A LOT of tools you can use, I haven't even figured them all out yet. But one that I have used is their Content Optimizer. You can take a new or existing content piece of yours, and compare it to one of your competitor's pieces on a similar topic, and see where you might be lacking based on the keywords that are used in each piece.

The first time the site analyzes your site, it will take a while (could take several hours according to them), so make sure you leave time for that. But after that, it automatically tracks information about your site and you don't have to do that long analysis again.


Erin Munson

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#23. Brendan Hufford (Clique Studios)

If I only had 3 keyword research tools, I'd use tools that focus more on topical research and search intent instead of "keywords."

The best content ranks for thousands of keywords and we're seeing more content that seems to be written to nail a top keyword, but totally misses the long tail. Also, simply doing the research and putting the keywords (and related keywords) in the right places won't help you rank if you don't match the search intent.

We recently wrote about digital marketing and produced a 6k word article about how we teach it as instructors at the University of Chicago. But, no matter how many links we build to it, it'd never rank. When you look at the intent of that search, people want a quick bullet-point list and our epic manifesto wasn't matching.

The tool that I've found to be best for that effort is Ahrefs. I use it to look at content that's held consistent rankings over past updates, reverse engineer what it ranks for, and then I spend the rest of the time using my favorite SEO tool (my brain) to analyze it for levels of search intent (link to image that shows it:

Search intent pyramid


Other tools that smart folks like John-Henry Scherk have recommended to me to continue building better content are Market Muse and Clearscope.


Brendan Hufford

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#24. Jacob King (jacobking.com)

1) Google Keyword Tool - still calling it tool, not buying into their Adwords keyword planner BS

2) SEMrush

3) Excel and then Scrapebox keyword scraper for some suggestions merging prefixes and suffixes too


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#25. Andrea Lehr (Fractl)

1. SEMrush: This is a staple for most of the SEO world and for good reason - I use it for everything from keyword research and analysis to competitive audits in hopes of finding new opportunities to rank.

2. BuzzSumo: It's one of the first tools I use for content ideation, but it's also great in revealing what your target influencers are already sharing.

3. Buzzstream: Outreach is a huge part of SEO because it's what gets your content links. Their platform helps me organize my campaigns while also keeping track of any influencer relationships--an essential ingredient to generate high-quality links.


Andrea Lehr

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#26. Eli Schwartz

Ahrefs is my favorite tool for getting a sense of what keywords my competitors rank for, how long they have ranked, and finding general keyword ideas.

Rank Ranger for really drilling into search console to see what keywords are performing for the site.

The Google Keyword Planner - is my all around most trusted source for relative traffic data on keywords.


Eli Schwartz - Survey Monkey

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#27. James Norquay (Prosperity Media)

Great tools for keyword research in 2018:

1. SEMrush - Great tool for PPC & SEO Analysis.

2. Ahrefs - Has provide great additional data in he last year with the tool. The data set they have is growing daily for Keywords.

3. Keyword Keg - Another great tool for doing analysis on top search terms.

4. Keywords everywhere chrome plugin - great tool for looking at auto suggest search terms.


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#28. Kristi Hines, Freelance Writer

My favorite three keyword research tools are Google AdWords Keyword Planner, Ubersuggest, and HitTail.

1) Google AdWords Keyword Tool allows you to export up to 800 suggestions for most seed keywords and phrases. You can then use them to optimize your main business pages as well as come up with great topic ideas.

2) Ubersuggest shows you what Google suggests when you start typing in keywords. These suggestions can point you to some great long-tail keyword phrases and content ideas.

3) HitTail connects with your Google Webmaster Tools to help you find the (not provided) keywords that people are searching to find your site - keywords you may not be using as much as you should.


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#29. Nick Eubanks (IFTF)

1. Term Explorer
2. SEMrush
3. SerpWoo


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#30. Suganthan Mohanadasan

1. KWFinder
2. Ahrefs
3. Keywords Everywhere


Suganthan

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#31. Connor Wrenn (SEO @ Bankrate Inc.)

SEMrush: Outside of GSC, this is the handiest tool for keyword prospecting at a reasonable price. Now, if only they could brush up their backlink profiler...

Ahrefs: The index I trust most for backlink research. Plus, the keyword tracking here is getting better every day, even though you have to pay more to get full access to it (in that sense, SEMRush will continue to kick its butt). SERP snapshots and featured snippet reports are a big plus here.

NetPeak: You've got to have a crawler tool in there somewhere, and I know enough folks will already vote for Screaming Frog (as they should). However, I don't see NetPeak getting a lot of love, and it should.

For starters, NetPeak reports on over 60 issues across 50 different parameters, and it prioritizes those issues for you, making is easy to deliver the most important insights at the beginning of a campaign. It's in-app filtering capabilities are also very flexible; I can easily generate custom report before I have to export anything into Excel.

And those are just the unique features; it has a lot of the same options you expect out of Screaming Frog, like custom search, custom user agent, and other crawler customizations.


Connor Wrenn - Bankrate

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#32. Mike Ramsey (Nifty Marketing & Nifty Law)

1) Google Keyword Planner - There is no better tool for giving somewhat accurate data and ideas. Especially when it comes to local keyword research. Being able to look at a broad keyword like "lawyer" and then narrow the search field to a specific city or market is one of the best uses that only this tool can provide.

2) SEMrush - This tool offers fantastic competitive research around domains to find what keywords could be driving traffic for your competitors. Looking at paid keywords ad spend can also help you know which keywords might have monetary value worth pursuing organically. If a competitor is willing to spend a high ad budget on terms and you think they do a good job running their ad campaign, then its a good indication it is worth organic ranking effort.

3) BuzzSumo - This tool can allow you to take a keyword or concept you are interested in and see what type of content has performed the best around social and link building on the subject. I find this tool to be incredibly useful for finding what type content people seem to care about for specific keywords.


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#33. Mark Preston (Mark Preston SEO)

1. Ahrefs Keyword Explorer
I have tested every keyword tool going over my 20 year career in this industry and I personally prefer Ahrefs as it gives me an accurate view on the real traffic potential by using the data to make a simple calculation.

2. AnswerThePublic
It may seem strange but I like Answer The Public as it gives me an insight into the industry by researching what questions are being asked within each niche. I can then run a tailored campaign.

3. Google Trends
In every single one of my SEO training sessions. Every single time I demonstrate Google Trends, it creates a light-bulb moment as most people realise they are targeting the wrong audience. So many things can be gained by using Google Trends during the keyword research.


Mark Preston

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#34. Bill Sebald (Green Lane SEO)

We use Keyword Planner of course (#1). But we're also very fond of Grepwords (#2) and a few Google Suggest tools (choosing the one that best fits the client needs at the moment (#3); our list is here. I'm very fond of Grepwords' extensions for giving search metrics on tools like Ubersuggest.


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#35. Nichole Elizabeth DeMeré

I use multiple keyword research tools at the same time, for a few reasons. They work to cross-check each other using their different databases. Each offers something a little different, giving me insights the others don’t.

I use Ahrefs to find ideas for keywords to add into content, and content to create around keyword opportunities. I like how Ahrefs shows keyword difficulty, search volume, traffic potential (how much organic search traffic it’s possible to get when you rank #1 for a parent topic keyword) and lets you group keywords together to create lists. It’s really useful.

But, I also use SEMrush - it has the largest keyword database on the market (9.4 billion keywords and counting) and is my go-to for inspiration and brainstorming content strategies.

And finally, I use Moz to track keyword rankings and compare them with Ahrefs, Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools. The three together give me a crystal-clear picture of what people are searching for, and which terms are ripe to leverage for maximum results.

If I only used one of them, my strategies wouldn’t be nearly as effective.


Nichole

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#36. Jesus Meca (Real Focus Marketing)

1) Ahrefs
2) SEMrush
3) Keyword Researcher Pro (best auto-complete I've found so far).


Jesus Meca

#37. Takeshi Young (keshkesh.com)

1) Linkdex
2) AdWords keyword tool
3) Internal search logs


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#38. Aleyda Solis (aleydasolis.com)

1) SEMrush
2) SISTRIX
3) KWFinder


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#39. Kevin Cotch (TopRank Marketing)

If I could only use three tools for keyword research I would use SEMrush, AdWords Keyword Planner, and AnswerThePublic.

SEMrush does a good job providing search volume and keyword difficulty metrics for competitive keywords.

I use the AdWords Keyword Planner for long-to-medium tail keyword phrases that SEMrush doesn't have in its database yet.

The last tool I use for keyword research is AnswerThePublic to find more long-tail keyword phrases that people are actually searching on Google.


Kevin Cotch - SEO professional

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#40. Larry Kim (WordStream)

Like countless others, I still use Google Keyword Planner for keyword research in SEO. Google is the one with the vast majority of the search data, so even after all these years, they're still the best place to go to find high-level keyword data.

Once you have all of these great keyword ideas though, how do you prioritize them? I use the secret formula you can find under #3 here (well, it was secret until I shared it with my readers) to assign an actual value to each keyword phrase, factoring in search volume, competition and suggested bids.

Once I have all of this insight in hand, I head over to BuzzSumo to see what angles and headlines are working really well on any given keyword topic. It helps you to see what's already been done, so you can make sure your take on it is unique and interesting.


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#41. Cyrus Shepard (cyrusshepard.com)

Top 3 keyword research tools:

1. Keyword Planner
2. Ubersuggest w/ Grepwords Chrome Add-on
3. Mozbar (for competitive analysis)


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#42. William Harris (Elumynt)

From an SEO perspective, my favorite tool is Ahrefs. I love the way it presents the data, shows the volume for many platforms including YouTube, and organizes it in a way that I personally find very useful.

My second must-have keyword tool is the Google Keyword Planner. It's not meant for SEO, but it can be a powerful tool if you know how to use it.


If you want to know what Google thinks is associated, how much people are paying to show up for those keywords, etc. then it helps to go straight to the source.

My final one is BuzzSumo. It's not a "keyword" tool in the traditional way, but it can help me figure out what other sites are doing, if those blog articles are getting a lot of shares, and really frame things in the form a question.


#43. Gabriella Sannino (Level343)

We use a lot of tools for keyword research, up to and including good old fashion competitive research, but if I had to narrow it down to three, I'd say Google Keyword Planner, Keyword Tool.io and Ahrefs, in no particular order.

Google Keyword Planner is great for finding a starting keyword bucket and estimated cost for PPC campaigns
Keyword Tool.io also helps with building a keyword bucket and estimated traffic.

Google Keyword Planner and Keyword Tool.io are the "big picture" tools - gives you a good starting point. Ahrefs takes those bucket terms (and helps you find more) and gives you the close up view. Keyword Difficulty, for example, is a very useful metric to review when choosing similar terms.

We always start with manual digging, but by the end of the keyword list, we've used these tools the most.


Gabriella Sannino

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#44. Josh Laughtlan (jtree.net)

If I could only use 3 tools for organic keyphrase research (what a glorious world it would be) my 3 punch keyphrase research combo would be Google Autocomplete, Keyword Planner and AuthorityLabs Now Provided reports.

Given you have a good idea of where to start and are fairly confident you are speaking the same language as your client, jump start research by generating related keyphrases and long tail variants with the ever so easy to use Google Autocomplete. This tool makes predictions based on what you are typing that are a reflection of Google search activity.

Google's Keyword Planner can then be used to pull historical search volume for any newly discovered Autocomplete phrases in addition to conducting further keyphrase research.

AuthorityLabs Now Provided reports deliver the final blow of the combo by identifying keyphrases classified as "not provided" by Google (AKA hidden) that already send traffic to the site. This process also helps identify new keyphrases to send back to Autocomplete and Keyword Planner for further research.


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#45. Annie Cushing (annielytics.com)

1) SEMrush
2) Soovle
3) Ubersuggest


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#46. Eric Siu (Single Grain)

1) SEMrush
2) Ahrefs
3) Moz


Eric Sui - Single Grain

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#47. Shane Barker (Shane Barker Consulting)

1. SEMrush - Very intuitive and by far the best tool to research competitor keywords. Great for finding keywords you’re not currently targeting, but should be.

2. Google Keyword Planner - It gives excellent keyword ideas and also detailed traffic estimates, which can be useful for understanding the value each keyword might be to you.

3. Wordtracker - It’s very easy to use, helps discover great ideas for longtail keywords for search engines besides Google (Amazon, Bing, the App Store, etc.)


Shane Barker

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#48. Harris Schachter (Optimize Prime)

It's hard to boil it down to just 3 keyword tools, so instead I'll describe 3 categories of resources.

1. The first is the literal keyword tools, my favorites include BrightEdge's Data Cube, Wordstream, Ubersuggest and others. These tools give you the actual search phrases, either with or without search volume.

2. The second category are keyword tools based on the competition. One of the first things to determine is not only who the business competitors are, but who the SEO competitors are. Keyword research can be done by simply doing research on high-performing competitors. Some of my favorite domain-based keyword tools are SEMrush, SpyFu, and BrightEdge's Data Cube.

3. Finally, there's just good old research through trends and news. Google Trends, keeping up on industry news of the business, and even newsjacking (if there are relevant topics). These all require different resources depending on the business, but once you find the leaders in their news you can not only leverage them for keyword research but also glean insights into how you can become an industry leader yourself (and dominate SEO).


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#49. Ben Wood (Hallam Internet)

Google Keyword Planner
Ahrefs
SEMrush


Ben Wood

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#50. Conor Doyle (iProspect)

SEMrush
Google Keyword Planner
Ahrefs


Conor Doyle

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#51. Alan Silvestri (Growth Gorilla)

1) Ahrefs: This is my main keyword research tool and hub. I use it to gather keyword data, gauge the difficulty and competition, and keyword tracking.

2) Keyword Shitter: I LOVE the name and it’s a super simple, free and easy tool to get all of the Google suggest keywords.

3) Google: This is pretty straight forward but it’s the main reason I like it. I search for my main seed keyword in Google, and use the keywords that Google itself highlights in bold on the search results, plus the “Searches related to” section at the bottom to get keyword variations or LSI. That’s basically what Google is telling you that topic is about. No need for a thousands other tools. I use these to optimize the on page of my target pages as well.


Alan Silvestri

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#52. Reginald Chan (BloggingXL)

1) Long Tail Pro
2) Google Keyword Planner
3) BuzzSumo


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#53. Maggie Cerciello (SEER Interactive)

I use Infinite Suggest as a staple for any keyword research. The tool pulls in related searches for each query, and it allows me to go down the rabbit hole and get as specific as I can. The end result is a well-rounded keyword set that uncovers relevant queries and topics that I didn't know of before!

I also rely on SEMrush's Keyword Magic Tool. It strings together queries to uncover both head terms and valuable long tail queries. This is a wonderful tool especially for exploring topic clusters.


Maggie Cerciello - Seer Interactive

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#54. Dave Michaels (Sage Groove)

My priorities in keyword research:

*Getting a clean list of relevant long-tail keywords for niche content topics, low competition keywords, and stronger semantic SEO.
*Getting accurate search volumes and keyword difficulty.

1. KWFinder: I’m impressed with KWFinder. They get their keyword data from Google (as well as Moz and Majestic). The recommendations are all solid and include separate keyword types (most notably questions) with associated search volume and a robust Keyword Difficulty ranking. Covers local and international markets.

2. LSI Graph: LSI Graph is free and easy to use. It provides latent semantic indexing keywords to support your focus keyword. It’s also helpful for generating new ideas for content.

3. Adwords Keyword Planner: I always like checking Keyword Planner to confirm search volumes and it’s a good alternative for finding competitor keywords.


Dave Michaels

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#55. Tom Demers (Measured SEM)

If I had to stick to three I'd opt for Ahrefs, Google's Keyword Planner, and Google.com.

Personally I like the difficulty scores from Ahrefs and have been using their "Keyword Explorer" more recently to put difficulty data next to terms.

I use Google's Keyword Planner frequently to get additional ideas and volume estimates.

I use Google.com to see the search suggestions that are returned, related searches, and "People Also Ask" features to get an idea of other terms and topics that Google finds relevant (and likely that they know are being searched for) related to a core topic.


Tom Demers - Cornerstone Content

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#56. Brian Lang (Web Developers Etc)

Google tools (Keyword planner will show the main keywords worth targeting and webmaster tools will show keyword data from your site). 

Forums / communities (because they're a great place to see what topics people are talking about).

SEMrush (shows competitor keywords that are driving traffic to their sites).


Brian Lang - Small Business Ideas

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#57. Tadeusz Szewczyk (OnReact)

Google Trends - The data is meant to be used by real people not marketers. It's a bit vague but uncensored and not meant to drive sales of Google Adwords. It lets me see whether a keyword has a downwards curve over the years or seasonal ups and downs.

SEMrush - They give a quick overview of what a keyword is all about in a larger context with some ready-made insights into potential combinations and competition.

Ubersuggest - It allows me to get lots of relevant keyword phrases without a lot of fuss. I just need to pick the most accurate from then on and find some common sense combinations.

After I used those I just have to test the list I got with Google Keyword Planner and find out whether they really is demand for them. The job is almost done.


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#58. Bill Gassett (Max Real Estate Exposure)

1) Ubersuggest
2) Buzzsumo
3) WordStream 


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#59. Brian Jackson (Kinsta)

If I could only use three tools for keyword research they would be the following:

1) Ahrefs to quickly see “the big picture” when it comes to any keyword I'm researching. I can instantly see the top holders in the SERPs. I then immediately take the top holders list and go check out their sites. I need to make sure I can beat them content-wise, otherwise I will search for another keyword to try and rank for, or perhaps go down the long-tail route. The Ahrefs tool and data quality get better and better every year. It's one of my favorite tools.

2) SEMrush is my go-to tool for any PPC keyword research. Being able to see ad history or what a competitor is doing on their paid campaigns is priceless when it comes to generating new ideas. The keyword difficulty estimation in SEMrush in my opinion is probably one of the most accurate.

3) KWFinder is one of the "newer" kids on the block, but it's probably just about the easiest way I have found to find new long-tail keywords quickly. A couple of things I like about this tool is that it allows me to create lists of keywords. So I can group up my different sites by lists and revisit them at a later date. I can export the data to CSV and start building out campaigns. It also keeps a nice scrolling list of the last 20+ keywords you have looked up. The SEO difficulty indicator comes in very handy as well! As far as ease of use goes, KWFinder wins hands down.


Brian Jackson

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#60. Aaron Agius (Louder Online)

1) Ahrefs
2) Long Tail Pro
3) SEMrush

Bonus points - this post is awesome.


Aaron Agius - Louder Online

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#61. Emily Yost (SuperScript Marketing)

1) Ahrefs - Great tool for competitor research and content gap analysis. I also find the KD score very useful, as it's based on a domain's backlink profile.

2) Google Search Console - I think a lot of SEOs overlook the power of GSC keyword data. I regularly dig through GSC for KWs with high impressions but very low CTR - this gives great insight for gaps in your KW targeting.

3) Ubersuggest - An oldie but a goodie, UberSuggest is my go-to for longtail KW discovery (bonus: it's also wildly entertaining to see what some people have search for).


Emily Yost - Superscript Marketing

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#62. Loz James (Content Champion)

It’s easy to get sidetracked with all the great keyword research tools available, but I always find myself coming back to the same three:

1) Google Keyword Planner
2) Market Samurai
3) Wordtracker

The last two on this shortlist are paid tools - so going the Google route is a good idea if you’re just starting out.

There’s a load you can achieve with the keyword planner, but I just like to cross check across a few tools to achieve the best results.


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#63. Andrew Shotland (Local SEO Guide)

1) SEMrush
2) Google Analytics & Google Webmaster Tools
3) Clearscope


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#64. Sujan Patel (wheniwork.com)

1) SEMrush
2) Buzzsumo
3) Google Keyword Planner


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#65. Sam McRoberts (Vudu Marketing)

1) SEMrush
2) AnswerThePublic 
3) KeywordTool.io 

BuzzSumo, while not a KW tool, is also invaluable as it helps you really explore content that performs well by topic.


Sam McRoberts - Vudu Marketing

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#66. Alexandra Tachalova 

1) SEMrush
2) Ahrefs
3) Keywordtool.io


Alexandra Tachalova

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#67. Will Blunt (Blogger Sidekick)

1) KWFinder
2) Buzzsumo
3) Google search


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#68. Niall Devitt (Tweak Your Biz)

1) Google Keyword Tool
2) Google Trends
3) WordTracker


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#69. Sue Anne Dunlevie (successfulblogging.com)

I only use Ahrefs.


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#70. Sam Hurley (Optim-Eyez)

LongTail Pro — Awesome for uncovering hidden keyword gems otherwise overlooked. Includes plenty of comparable metrics. Great for article topic planning.

Scrapebox — Great to use in combination with LongTail pro and other tools. Collect masses of 'Google Suggest' queries at once! (And it still feels kind of 'hacky'. In a good way!)

SEMRush — Needs no intro 🙂 Beautiful interface and highly intuitive with tonnes of competitor analysis. Very large keyword data set used by millions.


Sam Hurley

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#71. Joshua Hardwick (The SEO Project)

1) Ahrefs Keyword Explorer
2) Google Trends
3) Answer The Public


Joshua Hardwick - The SEO Project

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#72. Leslie Handmaker (Vantiv)

1) SEMrush
2) BrightEdge
3) Google Keyword Planner


Leslie Handmaker - Vantiv

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#73. Bob Gladstein (Overdrive Interactive)

1. AdWords Keyword Planner - It's still the standard, although Google keeps making changes that just aren't helpful. I get that they want us to treat closely-related keywords in such a way that we're not creating multiple pages when we should just have one, but I'd appreciate it if they'd still break down the volume for each keyword that makes up a group (or at least list the keywords they're clumping together into a group).

They also seem to be getting this wrong often enough that I've got less confidence that the keywords that make up these groups really belong there. I recently tried to check the volume for the keyword [active monitoring] (the practice of checking on a network by injecting test traffic and seeing how it's handled, as opposed to passive monitoring) and the Keyword Planner gave me the volume for [activity monitor] (aka Fitbit).

2. Answer the Public - very useful for discovering long-tail searches, especially if you're building a FAQ section or targeting quick answers.

3. Ahrefs - I've only recently started using ahrefs for keyword research, but I'm liking it so far, especially when it gives me data on keywords that Google insists on changing on me.

4. (Bonus) Google Search Console's Search Analytics Report (or "Performance" in the new GSC) - Great for finding queries that are getting you impressions, but not clicks, or queries you only get impressions for when they're branded.


Bob Gladstein

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#74. Tahmid Jawad (Salient Marketing)

1. Google Keyword Planner - Simple yet the most powerful tool for keyword research.
2. AgencyAnalytics - Keywords ranking monitoring plus search volume both present in a single place.
3. Google Webmaster - Search Queries.


Tahmid Jawad - Salient Marketing

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#75. Jordan Kasteler (Hennessey Consulting)

1) Moz Explorer - great for finding questions related to topics.
2) Google Keyword Planner - great for finding what people are willing to pay for those keywords.
3) Keyword.io - great for finding longtail keywords


Jordan Kasteler - SEO expert

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#76. Joe Howard (WPBuffs)

BuzzSumo: Seeing what kind of content has been performing well over the past week, month or year is essential to predict what kind of content will attract traffic in the future. BuzzSumo does just this, and gives me other essential social and traffic data as well to inform our content decisions. Very slick.

SEMrush: I like to check out the content my competitors publish and see where they're winning links from so I can see if I can get some of my own. SEMrush makes this super simple, and their export function allows me to play with the data as much as I want. Awesome.

Mozbar: This is a great tool for keyword research! In Google search results, you can see the DA of every website listed and find searches without a lot of competition. Great for finding low-hanging fruit and areas for SEO gain. We use it regularly to find keyword opportunities for our content team. Boom!


Joe Howard

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#77. Nate Oulman (Real Estate Sandpoint)

All three of these tools in 2019 will help you get ahead of your competition

1) Ahrefs - I love there style, function and how I can break down any competitor website profile.

2) SEMRush - Pricing is not bad, and they have really upgraded the backend over the last few years.

3) Moz - Awesome link profile structure and shows a more realistic DA the incoming domains have.


Nate Oulman

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#78. Kurt Frankenberg (shoestring101.com)

Because I run several local businesses and help others to promote theirs, my first, second and third SEO tool is a little off the beaten track:

It's actual human interaction, plus a yellow pad to jot down responses. Let's take for example the little screen repair company I founded as a 30 Day Challenge over on Shoestring101. At first I just wanted to make a business with my 14 year old to show him no one needs to give you a job...you can MAKE a job.

So we started with physical signs and free listings in local directories.

But once we got some actual paying customers we started asking them how THEY might go about finding us if they had used the internet.

So far, "repair screen door" and "repair window screens" is the top response.

These can be further refined by asking customers that already found us, HOW they found us.

In the phone script that I use to close local leads, one of the questions is, "How did you find out about us?" If the answer is "internet", which it almost always is...the followup questions are "what search engine did you use?" and "what keywords did you enter?"

It's these, actual-paying-customer-generated keywords that have been most useful. Better than Market Samurai, better than any Google tool, whatever they're calling it now 😉

Thanks for asking, Robbie! I wouldn't want to tell you that my SEO first, second and third tool was effective without offering compelling proof, so here it is:

If you type in "hack local seo" into Google, you'll find my landmark post, 7 Ways to Hack Local Search SEO for a Free Front Page Listing. In that post I show how I get unlimited leads for my screen repair company and my martial arts studio. See, after getting the right keywords, ya gotta know what to do with 'em.


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#79. Joe Williams (Tribe SEO)

1) Keywords Everywhere: a free Chrome plugin that injects keyword search volume data into free Google Keyword Planner accounts, it also gives search volumes for my Google searches and has a nifty bulk upload search volume feature.

2) SEMrush: the daddy keyword research tool for competitor keyword research. It's worth checking out the Guru subscription plan which has historical keyword data and Google positions as far back as January 2012 and this comes in handy when trying to work out when a search engine penalty happened for a potential client.

3) Ahrefs: probably my favorite all-in-one SEO tool and they are edging closer to overtaking SEMRush as my preferred keyword research tool of choice as well. It has just about everything you need from competitive keyword research, a vast database of keywords and accurate search volumes.


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#80. David Schneider (Ninja Outreach)

1) Long Tail Pro: This is the case primarily if I am looking to build a niche site. I don't build niche sites anymore and am no longer a user of LTP, but I do think it is a great software and have no problem recommending it.

2) Google's Adword Keyword Planner: Again this isn't something I would go to often BUT it is free and if I am just looking to get an idea of the volume, since in many cases that is the key metric for me, I would probably go here.

3. Ninja Outreach: Full disclosure this is my own tool, and it is actually an outreach tool, so you may be wondering how it plays into Keyword Research. The fact is there are quite a few data points that NinjaOutreach gets for me that I find useful in keyword research, such as the articles that are ranking for the keyword in Google, their domain authority, their page authority, the number of backlinks they have, and other social and contact data. It's pretty valuable stuff, especially if there is going to be an outreach campaign tied into the keyword research. I wrote a great article with Jake from LTP showing the combination of the two tools.


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#81. Jay Markwood (Whereoware LLC)

SEMrush
MOZ Pro
Google Adwords Keyword Planner


Jay Markwood

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#82. Umar Khan (Social Cubix)

1) SEMrush
2) Keyword Snatcher
3) Keyword Toolio


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#83. Ariel Kozicki (Wpromote)

1) BrightEdge
2) SEMRush
3) Google Keyword Planner 

Although really I could get away with using BrightEdge alone. Nothing beats the Data Cube!


Ariel Kozicki

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#84. Hamish Elley-Brown (Online Republic)

1) Google Keyword Planner
2) LSI Keyword Generator
3) Google Adwords


Hamish Elley-Brown

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#85. Ryon Flack (Bruce Clay, Inc.)

1) AdWords Keyword Planner – It is always best to get data directly from the source. Also, Google's data tends to be more comprehensive and precise/accurate.

2) Search Console – GSC is a great source for keywords once your site has been live for a while. This is also one of the few good sources for long tail keywords.

3) Bing Ads Intelligence – This tool is useful for harvesting keyword data. You can often compare it with Google’s and one big advantage is that it can integrate directly into Excel.


Ryon Flack

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#86. William Kammer (Levy Online)

1) SEMRush
2) AdWords
3) AnswerThePublic


William Kammer

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#87. Saurabh Bisht (Yellow Pages)

1) SEMrush - I believe that among all the 3rd party software, SEMrush has the largest keyword database. Their search volume data is pretty accurate and aligns with the Google keyword planner. Also, based on the type of content that needs to be produced (i.e. informational, transactional, etc.), one can utilize different filtering options available in it.

2) Ahrefs - This is my go-to tool to check if the given keyword performs better for organic results or PPC and whether that search translates to any clicks. It also shows the keyword volume share among different countries. This really helps in deciding if you are targetting the right country, especially for an affiliate or e-commerce site.

3) Keyword Everywhere - Works best when some manual research is required using google auto-suggest. It provides 'Related Keywords' and 'People also search for' terms right next to the Google SERP results and gives the search volume on the fly in Google auto-suggest box. 


Saurabh Bisht

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#88. Jason Acunzo (sorryformarketing.com)

I actually don't use any keyword tools aside from Google Trends, but only rarely do I even use that. I try to talk to many of our target audience members (entrepreneurs) as I can. I attend events, I have phone calls, I sit next to them while working. Generally speaking, I think it's a waste of time to START with keyword tools instead of actual customers. Yes, you can target people in broad swaths and get a high level sense for what's interesting and trending, but at least in the case of our business at NextView Ventures, it's way more powerful to talk to actual "customers" you serve.


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#89. Lisa Barone (overit.com)

Can't go wrong with the Google Keyword tool, SEMRush and Google Trends. The Keyword tool for volume estimates, SEMRush to see what keywords competitors are ranking for/targeting, and Google Trends to make sure the traffic is actually coming from countries I'm trying to target. Gives a relatively accurate picture of when to expect traffic spikes and seasonality insight.


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#90. David Arrington (Profit Pursuits)

1) If you don't have a budget you can still learn some useful information with the Google Keyword Planner. In addition to the search traffic for your list of keywords, take a look at the trends to see what's likely to remain popular in the future.

Next, take note of the Adwords competition and bid price. If people are bidding on the keyword there's a better chance of converting people to your list or products. The related keywords tool is also great to get alternative ideas. Finally, plug your top keywords into Google to spy on the competition and see the total number of results.

2) If you have some budget it's hard to beat SEMRush. You get a full keyword research suite and competitive intelligence tool in one convenient package. Check out Robbie's in-depth guide to learn how to get every ounce of functionality out of this tool.

3) For a simple interface that still packs in all the important data, go with Long Tail Pro. I especially like the keyword competitiveness feature, and the ability to check for keyword title competition. This goes deeper than just listing the total search results, allowing you to see how many people have specifically targeted your keyword.


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#91. Venchito Tampon (Digital Philipines)

1) Ahrefs
2) KeywordTool.io
3) Google (Related Search Suggestions feature)


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#92. James Richardson (Optimising)

1. Ahrefs: Solid data for the Australian market (Which is sometimes difficult to get)

2. Google Keyword Planner: Standard. 

3. Phone: We find the best way to do keyword research is to really get to know the business either by phone, or in person. Sometimes you can get some gems out of them that you would not otherwise think of sitting in front of your keyboard.

4. SEMrush: I'm a little late to the party but its hard to beat SEMrush for a great multi purpose tool. I've only just started using this more regularly and been loving it.



James Richardson

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#93. Joseph Morales (The Marketing Joe)

If I had to use only 3 keyword research tools, I'd use the following.

1) Keywordtool.io (fantastic tool for auto suggest on Google)

2) Soovle. It's a little unconventional and kinda archaic looking, but a fantastic tool that pulls keywords from various search engines.

3) SEMrush. Another fantastic tool with so much available at your fingertips, you won't want to leave. Ha!



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#94. Kevin Gamache (Boise Search Strategist)

1) Moz Keyword Difficulty Tool
2) SpyFu Competitive analysis
3) Brightedge Data Cube 

Those 3 get me what I need for keyword research.


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#95. Patrick Coombe (Elite Search Strategies)

I use 1 and only 1 tool for keyword research: Google Keyword Planner. I've never seen the use for any other tool. They all seem to confuse things and most of them get the data from GKP anyway. There are a few good ones on the market, but I really just don't have the need for more than one keyword research tool.


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#96. Lauren Bridges (Lamark Media)

1) KWFinder
2) AnswerThePublic
3) SEMRush


Lauren Bridges - Lamark Media

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#97. Jacob Wulff (Thrive Internet Marketing Agency)

1) AdWords Keyword Planner is the clear front runner, but may prove limited in terms of data.

2) SpyFu is also a serious contender as it provides a slew of competitor keyword data to analyze.

3) KeywordTool.io which is both affordable and provides many metrics that Google's option doesn't include.


Jacob Wulff - Thrive Agency

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#98. Carina Parry-Stevens (Fast Web Media)

If I could only use 3 tools for keyword research, it wouldn't be a difficult decision for me to make.

The first one is Google Adwords Keyword Planner - it's the king of keyword research tools as far as I'm concerned. The downside is, you have to have put at least one PPC campaign live to use it.

Keywordtool.io is good for generating keyword ideas to target. It's not the most accurate in terms of search volume, but great for maximizing a blend of keywords in your SEO copy.

A more recent tool I've come to really rate is SEMRush's Keyword Magic Tool. I like the fact you can build lists, the search volume seems accurate and the keyword difficulty rating is particularly useful.


Carina Parry-Stevens - Fast Web Media

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#99. Jason Mun (Bespoke)

KeywordTool.io - Great tool to get suggests data along with monthly search volumes FAST - Ability to get question based queries easily for content ideas as well. 

SEMrush - Great for gathering keyword ideas of competitors. Love the Domain vs Domain feature where you can find common intersect keywords between websites.

Their Keyword Magic tool is fantastic. Great features and one-click to get question based content ideas. 

Ahrefs - Their keyword explorer is also awesome. A great tool to analyse a specific keyword and get semantically relevant keywords from a seed keyword - Content explorer within Ahrefs is another of my favourite when planning content for clients. I can use this to see high performing articles and analyse what keywords they are ranking for.


Jason Mun - BespokeCX

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#100. Jignesh Gohel (olbuz.com)

By considering the latest enhancement in SEO industry, we really need to take care of various points while doing keyword research.

For example, mobile traffic, voice search queries, local business related queries (near me) and search intent. Here if we choose the keywords based on its difficulty and volume, chances are there, we may miss some great opportunities.

My strategy is very simple, I generally use a combination of tools to filter out keywords + manual analysis from the Google search result data.

If I have to name the 3 keyword research tools, I would include:

1. Google Keyword Planner
2. SEMrush
3. Ahrefs and Ubersuggest (tie)


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#101. Chris Dyson (Triple SEO)

1) SEMrush
2) Keyword Shitter
3) Serpwoo


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#102. Stoney deGeyter (Pole Position Marketing)

  1. Google Adwords Keyword Planner for keyword ideas
  2. Keyword Explorer for discovery and data
  3. Microsoft Excel for data organization, filtering etc.

Stoney deGeyter

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#103. Stuart Walker (Niche Hacks)

Ahrefs.


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#104. Carrie Hill (Ignitor Digital)

I've actually stopped using keyword tools for the most part.

That said, I do use the SEMrush Keyword Magic tool a bit but find that talking to clients, and having them talk to their customer service people & customers does MUCH more than a tool does.

Using the words that customers use to describe a product or service matches with how queries are typed into search boxes. I also use search suggest and the featured snippet PAA boxes. This helps with connecting entities together when you interlink pages.

For example:

Doctor > plastic surgeon > rhinoplasty > nose job > non-surgical nose job > Juvederm| Botox| Bellafill.

Then tying all those entity keywords in with local/geo keywords: nearby, near me, Colorado, Denver, Aurora, Saddle Ridge.

Then tying those with descriptors to create a keyword map: best, reviews, recommended, highest rated, top results, before and after.


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#105. Craig Campbell (Craig Campbell SEO)

1) Ahrefs
2) SEMrush
3) Serpstat


Craig Campbell

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#106. Nefer Lopez (Growth Hacker Kitchen)

Here are my top 3 keyword research tools:

1) Google Keyword planning tool.
2) Keywordtool.io
3) Buzzsumo - it's not a keyword tool, per se, but I like the social validation of certain keyword themes I have in mind.


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#107. Paulo Barroso (Digital Altitude)

1) Google Keyword Planner
2) Spyfu
3) Semrush


Paulo Barroso

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#108. Joe Putnam (iSpionage)

The three tools I would use for keyword research are:

1) iSpionage
2) KWFinder
3) Google Keyword Planner


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#109. Justin Herring (YEAH! Local)

1) KWFinder.com for niche and local keyword research.
2) Google Search Console for keywords you didn't know your were ranking for.
3) Ahrefs for competitor keyword research.


Justin Herring - founder of Yeah Local

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#110. Shane Melaugh (IM Impact)

I'd use SEOcockpit and I really don't know if there's anything else I'd need in addition.


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#111. Zac Johnson (Blogging.org)

1) Ahrefs 
2) Majestic SEO
3) SEMrush


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#112. Jason Acidre (Xight Interactive)

1) SEMRush - their pro version can certainly provide a lot of useful data (which can help you lead to practical insights) in terms of keyword research and competitive intelligence.

2) Google Keyword Planner - I'd also suggest Keyword.io, they have tons of other relevant suggestions (based on Google and Youtube's autocomplete search/suggest feature.

3) Google Analytics - really useful especially when you've already built enough traffic to better understand user behavior for certain key terms you're aiming to get more value from (particularly long-tail keywords).


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#113. Ann Smarty (SEO Smarty)

1) Serpstat
2)
SpyFu
3)
Text Optimizer


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#114. Ryan Stewart (Webris)

1) SEMrush
2) Google Keyword Tool
3) Google Analytics (Queries and Search Terms report)


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#115. AJ Ghergich (ghergich.com)

1) SEMrush
2) KeywordKeg
3) AnswerThePublic


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#116. Stephen Jeske (CanIRank)

CanIRank is the only tool I use or need for keyword research. Two things I particularly like is that it assigns a ranking probability for each keyword I'm researching, plus it has a heat map that shows me what I need to do to compete with those entries on the first page of Google.

That way I can focus on going after keywords for which I have a realistic chance of ranking, and concentrate my efforts on doing things that will really move the needle.

AnswerThePublic is a great tool too, if you're looking for a starting point for content ideas. It's like Google's autosuggest on steroids, with some really neat data visualization.


Stephen Jeske - Can I Rank

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#117. Wade McMaster (We'll Build Your Blog) 

1. Google
2. SEMrush
3. Ubersuggest


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#118. Sean Si (SEO-Hacker)

Google Keyword Planner - It helps to have the data straight from the search engine itself. With this tool, I am confident that the data is valuable and accurate. Lastly, the reports are easy to pull up as you can have it straight to a Google Spreadsheet or a CSV file.

SEMrush - Their tool is constantly evolving to cater keyword research. What I like about SEMrush is the options they present you with. It's easy to navigate and packed with features that you don't see in other keyword research tools. Their database provides many choices that are essential for SEO.

KWFinder- This is a simple tool that even a rookie SEO Specialist can use. It does all the work for you and this is vital especially for those who are looking for time-efficient tools to use for their research.


Sean Si

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#119. Helen Pollitt (Reflect Digital)

Keyword Hero - this beta product is proving to be the most exciting keyword tool entering the market. Designed to recover the lost "not provided" organic keywords from Google Analytics, my testing so far has suggested it does exactly that!

Using information from a range of sources, including Google Search Console, clickstream data and browser plugins, we might truly be on the cusp of a keyword revolution.

Keywords Everywhere - this simple but crucial Chrome and Firefox extension gives information on search volumes of keywords straight onto some of your most frequented data websites, including Google search, Majestic's anchor text report and Google Trends. So convenient.

Authoritas - specifically the keyword potential report. This handy report looks at existing keyword data in your account and automatically suggests keywords where an improvement in their rankings could lead to significant gains in search traffic. It's a great way to focus your keyword research and identify where to spend your time and energy.


Helen Pollitt

Top

#120. Jan-Willem Bobbink (notprovided.eu)

1) SEMrush
2) SearchMetrics
3. Keyword Tool.io


Top

#121. Tyler Tafelsky (Yisoo Training)

For more data-driven keyword research processes, Ahrefs and Google's Keyword Planner are my go-to tools. However, I do think Google Predictive Search can be a valuable and often overlooked keyword research tool, especially considering the value of long-tail keyword targeting.

With the competitive nature of SEO becoming more and more fierce, most websites need to incorporate lesser competitive long-tails into their strategy, as short-tail counterparts may take years to achieve top rankings.

Using Predictive Search can help you pinpoint those perfect phrases that might not be evident from using Keyword Planner or Ahrefs alone.


Tyler Tafelsky - SEO Consultant

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#122. Jon Dykstra (Fat Stack Blog)

I use two keyword research tools. They are:

Ahrefs: This tool provides loads of data and metrics for discovering new keywords, researching the competition and pointing out keyword gaps on my own sites. It's amazing and is the one KW/SEO software program I use for every website I own.

Keywordshitter.com  is my favorite tool for finding long tail KW opportunities as well as looking for KW phrases which can be used to create multiple pieces of content targeting many similar phrases.

For example, I recently discovered using this tool that people search for a topic within one of my niches with a phrase including "... starting with A", "... starting with B" and so on.

That made it easy for me to create 26 pieces of content, each targeting searches for aspects in my niche based on the the first letter. This is just one of many examples of how I use Keywordshitter.


Jon Dykstra - online entrepreneur

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#123. Miles Anthony Smith (Kompelling LLC)

For organic search keyword research, the best bang for your buck is SEMrush, hands down. It allows you to spy on what keywords your competitors are ranking for and with what content. Plus, you can drop in specific keywords, and it will show you lots of related ones. Then you can sift and sort by many fields and export.

It even has a site audit tool that you can use so as not to have to pay for a separate tool. On top of that, you can see what competitor's ads are (display, PPC, or PLA) and piggyback off of their success.

I use Buzzsumo for topical research to see which ones are trending on social media (like infographics, how-to's, listicles, etc.).

And for non-Google keyword research (like Amazon, YouTube, ebay), I use keywordtool.io. I also recommend you stay away from Google Keyword Planner for organic search since it can be misleading; it really should only be used for paid keyword research.


Miles Anthony Smith

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#124. Jack Saville (Bynder)

Moz Keyword Explorer is my first port of call for keyword research. It is great at giving rough keyword volume data and is great for offering keyword suggestions.

For more specific keyword volume data I call upon Google Keyword Planner.

Then for even more accurate keyword volume data I ask our PPC team to bid on a word and use the impressions and impression share metrics to get an accurate monthly search volume figure.


Jack Saville - Bynder

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#125. Ryan Scollon (www.ryanscollon.co.uk)

Tool #1 would be Answer The Public. It gives loads of great suggestions, and even covers prepositions, questions and then goes through each letter from A-Z to find any other keyword ideas.

Tool #2 would be Google search. You can't get much better than that. There is the autosuggest when typing in a search term, but you can also find a list at the bottom of the search results called 'Searches related to ..' and it will give you around 8 other suggestions.

Tool #3 would be Adwords keyword planner. It's my least favorite out of the three, but I do like how it groups keywords together. So say you were looking at keyword ideas for wedding rings, it will show different groups such as 'Gold rings' and then show you a bunch of terms related to that group.


Ryan Scollon - Bowler Hat

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#126. Ryan White (Banc)

SEMrush - The Keyword Magic Tool is absolutely amazing. Gives you an amazing selection of specific filters to help you easily find and filter the correct keywords which turns keyword research into a fun task whilst still giving you in-depth data.

Search Console - Absolute beast when trying to find out what keywords are actually being used when users to access your site and can give you a bit of an insight on how to improve performance of individual pages.

Sistrix - This tool lets us know exactly how competitors are ranking for specific keywords. With this we are able to gauge the difficulty and opportunity of each individual keyword


Ryan White

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#127. Dave Rigotti (Bizible)

Bizible
SEMrush
Excel


Dave Rigotti - SEO expert

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#128. Antony Robinson (Pure Optimisation Ltd)

My three goto tools are SEO Monitor, DeepCrawl and Ahrefs.

SEOmonitor:
I utilise SEO Monitor for three main reasons;

1. SEO Monitor has an incredibly insightful keyword/content research tool providing a prioritised list of opportunities.

2. For new business pitching it provides a great commercial modelling tool for traffic uplift of non-brand organic terms.

3. SEO Monitor's primary function of rank tracking and reporting suite facilitates user free reporting direct to clients.

Deepcrawl:
I find this to be simply the best technical SEO Tool on the market for monitoring crawl-ability, crawl budget and SEO improvement opportunities. Of all the tools the agency uses, this is without doubt our most important.

Ahrefs:
As every SEO knows, monitoring a client's backlink profile is an integral and essential function. The link data AHRefs provides is as robust as any yet is significantly more cost effective.


Antony Robinson

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#129. Mackenzie Peters (Gustin Quon)

Google Keyword Planner + keywordtool.io to get a baseline/set of keywords to work with then SEM Rush for competitive research & so much more.


Mackenzie Peters

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#130. Adrian Berry (CTI Digital)

AdWords
SEMrush
Answer The Public


Adrian Berry

#131. Natalie Athanasiadis (Ormi Media)

SEMrush: This is a great tool to find out what your competitors are ranking for so that you can be highly strategic and increase your visibility in those areas to increase your market share.

Google Search Console: This is sometimes passed over for other paid platforms but there is a wealth of knowledge in here. Google also Beta testing a brand new Search Console design that allows for year on year comparison of keyword rankings which could provide even further value.

Google Trends: Lastly, Google Trends can give you some incredible insights relating to specific industries. A great platform to incorporate into your content planning.


Natalie Asanathiadis

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#132. Freddie Chatt 

1) Ahrefs - Their keyword explorer is flawless, accurate and provides a great indication of difficulty. A great source of discovering additional keywords to help structure the content you are creating.

2) Keywords Everywhere - Incredible Chrome plugin for a quick snapshot in all the tools you use regularly as an SEO. Also shows the related keywords and 'people also searched for' queries and volumes directly within the SERPs. All for a super-affordable price.

3) AnswerThePublic - If you want to know all of the questions ever asked around a topic. This is the perfect tool - great for content creation.



Top

#133. Evgeniy Garkaviy (Online Strategist at Hopespring)

1) Google Keyword Planner: This tools is fantastic because it can help me to identify long tail keywords for my niche. It is official Google’s tool and it has the recent trends and keyword variations. For example you may think that this keyword is great “buy ipad air in liverpool” but Google may suggest “iPad air sale Liverpool”. Yes, not often it is accurate but when I’m using it alongside the other tools – I can get clear idea.

2) SpyFu: I suggest to have paid account on SpyFu. I just need to find my competitors who using Adwords and review them using this tool. It will show me what ads and keywords they are using. Note that my competitor who paid for that particular keyword knows exactly that it is important for his business including recent trends. Also using SEO feature you can input any URL and find our which keywords they are ranking for.

3) Yandex Wordstat. It is very similar to Google Keyword planner. Yandex is Russian search engine but it does not mean that you can use it only for Russian keywords. In Russia many people use this search engine for US searches too. And Wordstat can show me what keywords they were using to find my niche.

4) SEMrush.
I started using SEMrush a long time ago. At the moment it has a lot of resources for both free and paid quality keyword research.

Recently I had a dilemma with one of my projects, it is related to ecards and many people still using word “cards” instead of “ecards” but Google Keyword Planner and some other tools showed almost the same information for both keywords. At the same time I did not want to have many words “cards” and “ecards” on the landing pages. Semrush helped very much. I found correct data and made a nice PPC campaign.


Top

#134. Hayden Miyamoto (nohatdigital.com)

1) Long Tail Pro 

LTP differentiates itself from other KWs tools because it provides you with an idea of how difficult a keyword is to rank for - it doesn’t just spit out KW ideas endlessly. There are definitely reasonably good free keyword tools out there, but in my opinion Long Tail Pro (Platinum version) pretty much pays for itself over time.

2) SEMrush

SEMRush is great for scoping out the competition and for finding keywords that other sites in your niche are ranking for. It’s a little more expensive for the average user, but if you’re playing at a high level, it’s indispensable.

3) Ubersuggest 

Ubersuggest is useful as a way to find a ton of KWs at once - the only issue is that you have no idea whether those KWs are competitive or not. In tandem with LTP though, ubersuggest is great - I can just import a ton of KWs at once and then see if they’re worth targeting or not.


Hayden Miyamoto

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#135. Spencer Hawes (nichepursuits.com)

1) Long Tail Pro 

Obviously, I’m the creator of LTP, so there may be a little bit of bias in this - but I stand by LTP 100%. In fact, I use it frequently for my own KW research, and on my Niche Site Project 3.0, I’m encouraging my latest mentee to use it as well.

2) Google Trends 

I’ve found google trends to be an interesting way to see if a keyword (and by extension a niche) is growing or shrinking, and whether it’s seasonal or not. I can’t think of any other tool out there that can reliably tell you this information, so that’s really useful. Also, if you’re building a site, especially an authority site, getting onto something that’s trending upwards is a fantastic idea.

3) SEMrush 

SEMrush is a very useful tool for both researching competitors when starting a site or for growing an established site. I really like to find weaker niche sites that still seem to be ranking for lots of keywords; SEMrush helps me see what they are ranking for and what I can potentially target. You can also see what keywords you’re on the cusp of ranking for with your established site - another very useful feature.

You can even see things like whether or not your competitor’s are running paid traffic. SEMRush is just so versatile, and it has a lot of functionality that’s really useful if you already have a successful site going.


Spencer Hawes

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#136. Adam Chronister (Enleaf)

At Enleaf we use a lot of different tools and tactics for keyword research.

Some of our favorite tools and tactics include using SEMrush utilizing its Keyword Analytics tools. (Related Keywords, Keyword Difficulty, Keyword Magic Tool, etc) in addition to this, we still use Google Keyword Planner and often contrast and compare what we get there with what we pull out of SEMrush.

Then, probably the most accessible tool we use is good old Google. We will often use Google Auto-Suggest and the Search Related To features to help generate seed words in our initial keyword research phase.


Adam Chronister

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#137. Robbie Richards (robbierichards.com)

1) SEMrush - there are several ways I use the platform to find high-intent keywords.

First, I'll analyze which keywords are driving the most organic traffic across different subfolders. For example: I can quickly see which keywords and URLs within an product category subfolder are driving the most traffic to an ecommerce website.

Similarly, I can analyze the reviews subfolder of a large affiliate site, and layer on additional keyword filters, to find the best mid-funnel intent queries.

Second, I use the Keyword Magic tool to quickly find hundreds of targeted long tail keywords touching every stage of the funnel.

Third, I can perform domain, subfolder or URL-level keyword gap analysis to uncover missed opportunities. This works for both primary and secondary keyword analysis. 

Fourth, run organic-paid gap analysis to see which terms competitors are bidding on that I have no organic visibility around. These are often less-obvious buyer intent keyword targets.

2) Ahrefs - the Keyword Explorer has come a long way over the last year or so. In addition to the different keyword reports - Questions, Phrase, Newly Discovered etc - and the robust gap analysis capabilities, I now find myself relying on the link data inside the SERP Overview reports to more accurately qualify keyword opportunities. 


Robbie Richards headshot

Top

THAT'S A WRAP!

A big thanks to everyone who contributed to the roundup. Please share if you found it useful!

137 Online Marketing Experts Reveal Top Keyword Research Tools

Click to Tweet

And, just to recap, here are the results one more time...

Top 10


Best Tools for Keyword Research (As Voted by 137 Search Marketing Experts)

#1: SEMrush (84 votes) ... [Get One Month of SEMrush PRO for free here]
#2: Google Keyword Planner (59 votes)

#3: Ahrefs (51 votes) [Read full review here]
#4: Keyword Tool.io (19 votes)
#5: Search Console (16 votes)

#6: AnswerThePublic (14 votes)
#7: Buzzsumo and Ubersuggest (13 votes)

#8: Google Trends (12 votes)

#9: Moz (11 votes)  

#10: KWFinder (9 votes)


If you could only use 3 tools for keyword research, which 3 would you choose?

Let me know in the comments below...

Filed Under: SEO

Comments

  1. Abdul says

    April 22, 2015 at 2:12 pm

    HI Rob,
    Great to hear from all these experts sharing their favorite Tools for doing keyword research.
    I have a question though,You haven’t included your 3 favorite tools.It would be interesting to hear yours as well.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 22, 2015 at 6:17 pm

      Yeah, I thought it might look weird if I included myself 🙂 My top 3:

      1) SEMrush
      2) Google Keyword Tool
      3) Google suggest

      Reply
      • Asif Ali Bhatti says

        April 21, 2020 at 8:30 am

        I Agree Rob.

        Reply
  2. Loz James says

    April 22, 2015 at 3:00 pm

    Hi Robbie

    Excellent roundup 🙂 Thanks for including me amongst so many talented experts.

    Looks like I’ll be checking out SEMrush and Keyword Tool.io.

    Best wishes

    Loz

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 22, 2015 at 6:15 pm

      Thanks for contributing, Loz!

      Reply
  3. Ahmad Ali says

    April 22, 2015 at 4:13 pm

    Another tool, Webbee Spider, which scrap competitor’s keywords from titles, h1 and anchor texts. A combination of semRUSH, Keyword Planner and this tool can be used for keyword research. See the comment by some Moz contributor. http://moz.com/blog/keyword-research-in-90-minutes#comment-321375

    Reply
    • Abigael says

      November 12, 2018 at 2:06 am

      Webbee Spider sounds interesting. Will definitely check it out. To complement SEMrush and Keyword Planner, I used Keywords Heaven and their keyword tools.

      Reply
  4. Ann Smarty says

    April 22, 2015 at 7:01 pm

    That one massive list of tools! May take an hour of just scrolling! Thanks for including me, Robbie!

    Reply
  5. Takeshi Young says

    April 22, 2015 at 8:57 pm

    Never heard of keyword.io before, good stuff!

    Reply
    • rino says

      May 5, 2016 at 5:30 am

      its a good keyword checker tool.hope you notice it

      Reply
  6. Jignesh says

    April 23, 2015 at 4:57 am

    Such a great list and learned about some interesting keywords research tools too. I will definitely give a try to some of them.

    Thank you for including my favorite tools 🙂

    Reply
    • Marge says

      April 21, 2016 at 7:04 am

      IMHO you’ve got the right anwser!

      Reply
  7. Enstine Muki says

    April 23, 2015 at 9:32 am

    Wow! Google Keyword Planner just coming under SEMrush
    It’s really a great free tool isn’t it?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2015 at 11:58 pm

      It’s definitely a handy free tool 🙂 I’m a HUGE fan of SEMrush too. A few newbies in there I need to explore…

      Reply
  8. Sonia Pitt says

    April 23, 2015 at 4:25 pm

    Big post and a fantastic roundup. I found couple of new tools but my all time favorites are Google Keyword-planner, Ubersuggest and Google Webmaster Search Queries. SEMRush is also good for this job. But I am now thinking of exploring couple of new tools. Thanks for sharing this post and the resources.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2015 at 11:57 pm

      No worries Sonia 🙂

      Reply
  9. Enrico Cotulelli says

    April 23, 2015 at 5:40 pm

    The Keyword Planer is my standard Tool for Keyword Research. But the usability ist not the best. SEMrush ist faster, but for the german market not so precise as Sistrix.
    In Germany i would say Sistrix and Keyword Planer.

    Reply
  10. Sue Anne Dunlevie says

    April 23, 2015 at 8:43 pm

    Thanks so much for including me with this great group of bloggers, Robbie!

    Great info that I will recommend to my readers and clients.

    Sue

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2015 at 11:56 pm

      Awesome, thanks Sue!

      Reply
  11. Brandon Diaz says

    April 23, 2015 at 9:20 pm

    Nice roundup Rob,

    Nick Eubanks surely knows his stuff

    If I’m forced to add another tool besides the ones he mention, I’ll just add Scrapebox and voila!

    Keyword research magic 😀

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2015 at 11:56 pm

      Scrapebox would be a solid addition for sure. Thanks for stopping by Brandon 😉

      Reply
  12. Matt says

    April 24, 2015 at 11:17 am

    Thanks Robbie 🙂

    Matt from Keyword Eye here – happy to get a mention towards the end of this post. I’d love to get some feedback on our tools from yourself and your readers. Some of our tools are powered by Grepwords / SEMRush – we’ve also got Google, YouTube & Amazon autocomplete tools too.

    We do need to get our name out there a little more – would really like to get more mentions on keyword tool lists like this in the future.

    Reply
  13. Mohanraj says

    April 28, 2015 at 7:11 pm

    SECockpit is something i never heard before. Since Brain dean suggesting this i’m going to give it a try. Thanks for such kind of posts.

    Reply
  14. Stephen Delisle says

    April 30, 2015 at 10:49 pm

    Great post Robbie!

    Can’t wait to check out some of these tools.

    Like you and many on this list, I’m a big fan of SEMrush. I’m far from being a power user so I’m really looking forward to reading your new eBook “The Ultimate SEMrush Playbook”.

    And after reading all those expert testimonials on SEMrush, may I suggest adding another CTA for the book at the end of the post. I think it would have a killer conversion rate.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 30, 2015 at 11:09 pm

      Thanks for the recommendation, Stephen! Just added a form to the bottom. We’ll see how it goes 😉

      Reply
  15. Marco Gouveia says

    May 17, 2015 at 8:52 pm

    Very good article about keyword research tools!

    Many Thanks 😉

    Reply
  16. Harry Shepherd says

    May 27, 2015 at 3:32 pm

    This is really a helpful page. It is first time I come to know so many tools I was not aware of. I using Google keyword planner but now I will try some other I found here. Thanks

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 28, 2015 at 1:52 am

      Awesome, thanks Harry! Which tools are you going to give a try?

      Reply
  17. Felix Rizo-Patron says

    May 31, 2015 at 6:54 am

    Hello! thanks for the information on the SEO tools used by experts.

    I have a question relating the Google Keyword Planner: it contains information on the keywords used on Adwords right? how is this helpfull for getting information on SEO keywords? For that I would use Google Trends… what am I getting wrong?

    I mean: keywords for Adwords is different from keywords for SEO… right?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 1, 2015 at 12:02 am

      Hey Felix,

      The Google Keyword Tool is SUPER helpful for building a foundation for your keyword research strategy. At the end of the day, these search numbers are coming straight from the horses mouth. You can filter down to a hyper-local level and see which keywords are getting the largest search volume. Plus, with it’s integration with PPC you can get a quick idea about commercial intent by looking at the bid and competition metrics. How much are people bidding on KWs, higher = more likely to generate a return. Usually its aligned with search intent. That said, the trending data is a little less reliable. I would still use Trends to analyze the popularity/ seasonality of KW search volume.

      To answer your final question, yes but not really. You can definitely use AdWord keyword planner tool to get solid organic search volume estimates. However, don’t just stop there. Leverage other tools to find longer tail variations you can map against various stages of the buyer journey. I like to use SEMrush, Keyword Tool.io and Google autosuggest.

      I hope that helps!

      Reply
      • Felix Rizo-Patron says

        June 1, 2015 at 6:24 am

        Robbie, thank you very much for the reply. Right now I am quite frustrated because I get very different results in Keyword Planner and in Google Trends. SEMrush is not available for Austria yet but I will check keyword tool.io or other services offered as sistrix.de or xovi.de
        Thanks!

        Reply
        • Robbie says

          June 4, 2015 at 3:52 am

          Hey Felix,

          Definitely recommend leveraging both tools. Pay more attention to Trends for seasonality etc..

          Reply
  18. Josh Agusti says

    June 17, 2015 at 4:27 pm

    Great Top 10 keyword research tools list. Thank you for posting Robbie! I really appreciated the feedback from the experts. There are a definitely a few tools here worthy of taking note of. I have also been using DYNO Mapper (http://www.dynomapper.com) as a keyword research tool. DYNO Mapper is a visual sitemap generator that delivers keywords on all pages of any site. The user simply inputs any existing URL into the system and it will scan thousands of pages.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 18, 2015 at 12:48 am

      Thanks Josh, I’ll have to check it out.

      Reply
  19. Hanif Sipai says

    June 20, 2015 at 6:15 am

    Really an Awesome List to go through. Thanks for sharing the nice article.

    Reply
  20. Pedro Pereira says

    June 22, 2015 at 2:19 pm

    Really awesome list of tools to explore! Thanks Robbie 😀

    Reply
  21. Sunil K Chaira says

    July 6, 2015 at 6:44 am

    Keywords research is one of the most important factor topics for every webmasters. Thanks for sharing such a great source of information. I know this blog is going to help many bloggers and webmasters.

    Reply
  22. Anant says

    July 18, 2015 at 4:51 am

    Hello Robbie,

    Keyword research is very important part of online marketing. Generally I used Google Adwords, SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Ubersuggest for keyword research. I have heard some new keyword reseach tools from expert which i will try to use such as a Grepwords, Linkdex, SerpWoo, Longtailpro. Thanks to all expert and Specially thanks to Robbie

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 22, 2015 at 4:25 am

      Thanks Anant!

      Reply
  23. sanu dutta says

    July 23, 2015 at 2:45 pm

    It’s always great to read the views of experts. The positive aspect I found on this article is KWFinder, a great tool to find long tail keywords with SEO/PPC competitiveness.
    Dropping Long Tail Pro for some time now.

    Great Share!

    Reply
  24. Anh Nguyen says

    August 5, 2015 at 2:51 am

    Great article, Rob.
    I like how there are 58 different preferences from people working in the field.
    Although it’s a pain the you are asked to sign into Adwords in order to use Google’s keyword planner. I am just starting my website however and don’t have a lot of contents yet so I think it’s better to add more contents before using PPC.
    As of now I will check other keyword tools.
    Thanks!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 9, 2015 at 2:36 pm

      Hey Anh,

      Depending on your niche, it may not make sense to use Google PPC to start. Instead, set up your facebook custom audiences.

      Reply
  25. souvik ghosh says

    August 17, 2015 at 7:25 pm

    After using keyword research tool, if we had to use a keyword in a certain time, and then after doing research again, there is a change in the keyword word combinations, do we need to rename the url of the page that already exists?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 19, 2015 at 2:56 pm

      Hey Souvik,

      Before you go changing the URL structure, focus on optimizing the other on-page elements such as Title tag, alt tag, body copy, internal links etc..for the new target keyword. The URL shouldn’t be a make or break.

      Reply
  26. jagmohan singh negi says

    October 9, 2015 at 3:06 am

    thanks Buddy ,,,such a great post i found on your site.its my first time on your site but i bookmarked you.same as your experts i also like
    1. SEMRush
    2. Google Keywords Tool

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 10, 2015 at 4:28 am

      Thanks Jagmohan! What’s your favorite feature of SEMrush?

      Reply
  27. Micky says

    October 12, 2015 at 2:29 pm

    I personally use Rankscanner.com – even though it’s for tracking keywords, it’s also quite good for developing new ideas for keywords to rank for on Google as it suggest new keywords when you add keywords yourself.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 14, 2015 at 11:10 pm

      Sweet, I’ll have to take a look. Cheers Micky!

      Reply
  28. Didik Wahyudi says

    November 5, 2015 at 10:20 am

    The Keyword Planner is the last resort for looking at long-tail keywords for SEO. _my personal opinion

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 6, 2015 at 2:35 pm

      Hey Didik, I agree. GKP is not a great tool for unearthing long tail variations. I like to go old school and use Google’s autosuggest and related search features. I’ll also look at SEMrush related searches, ubersuggest and possibly Scrapebox.

      Reply
  29. Suresh says

    December 27, 2015 at 5:48 pm

    Robbie,

    I came across such a good tools to try them out. Surpised to see, no one suggested a windows software called “Keywordxtreme”. Quite a old tool but it does extracts the data from the related keywords in tier level.

    One base keyword we can get huge keywords.

    Thanks Again.
    Happy Holidays, Robbie.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 5, 2016 at 6:15 am

      I’ll check it out Suresh! Thanks for the heads up 🙂

      Reply
      • Suresh says

        February 16, 2016 at 5:33 pm

        You’re welcome, Robbie.

        The same thing we can see in the “Scrapebox keyword scraper” too.

        Reply
  30. Patricksl says

    January 4, 2016 at 6:59 am

    How about KeywordXP? I’ve just downloaded its trial version.. Looks good to me.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 5, 2016 at 6:10 am

      I haven’t tried that one. I’ll have to check it out 🙂

      Reply
  31. Liz says

    January 8, 2016 at 6:42 pm

    Any thoughts on the HubSpot keyword tool? That is what I’m using now, but I always like to be aware of what’s available.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 19, 2016 at 1:23 am

      Hey Liz, TBH I haven’t used the Hubspot KW tool much.

      Reply
  32. Rupesh says

    January 10, 2016 at 1:05 pm

    Hi Robbie,

    First of all thank you for sharing all these experts favorite keyword research tool with us. It is very helpful for me and also for the newbie bloggers to know that which keyword research tool is use pro bloggers.

    Personally, I like Long Tail Pro, Semrush and Google Keyword Planner.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 19, 2016 at 1:22 am

      Thanks for the feedback, Rupesh!

      Reply
  33. Habib says

    January 14, 2016 at 2:29 pm

    I think Long tail pro is the best for competitor analysis.

    Reply
  34. Ajat Sanjaya says

    January 24, 2016 at 3:11 pm

    I will try all the link above. Thanks for share

    Reply
  35. Ramo Demha says

    February 11, 2016 at 2:38 am

    Loving this post, The way I am going to rank up this music site desiblock.com. The two which I liked and the ones that I am going to use are.

    Semrush
    Moz (They have a toolbar which is free)

    Hoping to see what else worked for people.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 12, 2016 at 2:42 am

      Hey Ramo, let me know if you have any questions about Semrush. I use the tool every day 🙂

      Mozbar is definitely a handy little tool.

      Reply
  36. Netgott says

    March 1, 2016 at 7:03 pm

    This list is such amazing! Most of them are really useful. Thank you!

    Keep with the good work, Robbie.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 11, 2016 at 6:57 am

      What is your favorite tool, Netgott?

      Reply
  37. Anuj godara says

    March 7, 2016 at 4:55 am

    Thanks for Best information…………

    Reply
  38. David says

    March 14, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    Great article, my favorite SEO “spy tool” is OpenSiteExplorer, but I always check other tools like Market Samurai and SEMrush and than I have a broad idea about the SEO competition. Again, great article. There are tools that I never heard about and I’m looking to check it out. Thanks

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 15, 2016 at 5:06 pm

      Cheers David!

      Reply
  39. Tony Hsieh says

    April 1, 2016 at 3:23 pm

    I wonder which of the tool(s) people consider to be the best at predicting keyword difficulty?

    I have tried quite a few but have not come across to one that seems to both give accurate prediction and at the same time scalable.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 8, 2016 at 4:01 pm

      Great point, Tony! I think this would be a good topic for an upcoming blog post 🙂

      Tools help, but I lean heavily on manual review (not real scalable, I know). But, once I have found a decent opportunity using a tool like SEMrush, I’ll run the query through Google and analyze the first page results by MOzbar domain authority. Not the most accurate metric, but a solid directional cue.

      Reply
  40. Nathan - IncomeBully says

    April 2, 2016 at 3:31 am

    Man, glad I came across this. I’ve been looking to compare different tools, and thought I had a good grasp on everything that was out there.

    1 year after this blog post, I didn’t know much about keywordtool.io or SERPwoo.

    Me personally, I like long tail pro, SEMrush, and one of my favorites but never talked about is answerthepublic. It’s like ubersuggest but imo better.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 8, 2016 at 3:58 pm

      Sweet, thanks Nathan! I’ll have to check out Answerthepublic 🙂

      FYI – another monster SEO roundup going live next week. Keep an eye out!

      Reply
  41. Mohammed says

    April 3, 2016 at 1:22 pm

    Thanks For Sharing… Good info

    Reply
  42. Vincent D. says

    April 15, 2016 at 9:47 pm

    You forgot RankBrain.me gives thousands of Google suggestions with SEO attributes for free.

    Reply
  43. Josh Du says

    April 16, 2016 at 1:35 am

    This is an awesome list…Thanks!

    It’s a shame that Keywordtool.io needs a premium membership to access certain data though. I think RankBrain.me actually offers all of the same information but for free.

    Reply
  44. Bruno Amaral says

    April 21, 2016 at 10:53 am

    Long tail pro is a great tool, however a bit slow”ish” in my opinion…

    Thanks for the share!

    Reply
  45. Froggy says

    May 4, 2016 at 7:08 am

    Nice suggestions from expert. But for me “Google Keyword Planner” and “Uber Suggest” ROCKS!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 6, 2016 at 10:52 pm

      They definitely have a place 🙂

      Reply
  46. Salman says

    May 4, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    Yeah Semrush & google kw planer is best. & Always use this tools.

    Reply
    • anuja says

      December 20, 2016 at 12:14 pm

      Now i am using ahref. But i want to know about other things.Through this i found them.Thank you for sharing this article with us. I hope you update us like to this

      Reply
      • Robbie says

        December 27, 2016 at 3:34 pm

        Anuja, I’m using Ahrefs now more and more as well. They’ve made some great improvements to the tool, especially from a keyword research standpoint.

        Reply
  47. Dion Oasis says

    May 11, 2016 at 12:23 pm

    I always use longtailpro for keyword analysis, combined with the GKT itself. SEM rush is also good, I used it 2 years ago but have to unsubscribe since I use longtailpro.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 6, 2017 at 2:09 am

      I use LTP too. But, to be honest, if I had to choose between it and SEMRush, I’d go with the latter.

      Reply
  48. prateek says

    May 26, 2016 at 5:09 pm

    Good suggestion but can you tell me the free version of any keyword tool to find long tail keyword.
    thank you!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 9, 2016 at 4:59 am

      Prateek,

      Check out Ubersuggest. I really like that tool. Favorite good long tail options, download as text and re-upload into Google Keyword Explorer. Look for new keyword ideas with the ad group themes.

      Reply
  49. George Raboy says

    May 31, 2016 at 8:07 am

    Great coverage!
    But few points missing!

    (I’ll be talking about actual SEO tools for actual work, so copywriters can go for smoke and don’t comment)

    Now, since you can’t use Moz KWE tool (yet) for it’s poor accuracy, your choice is a tool that a) updates regularly, and b) user-friendly.

    That’s why Serpstat + Semrush + Google Planner is my top choice.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 9, 2016 at 4:58 am

      Thanks for the input, George!

      Reply
  50. vineeth mungath says

    May 31, 2016 at 5:49 pm

    This is good study. But there are more tools for 2016 .Google Keyword planner, Ahref works for me.

    This post is really useful for beginners like me. Thank you

    Reply
  51. andrew nguyen says

    June 18, 2016 at 3:27 am

    I tried this tool rankbrain.me, long tail keyword tool. They have everything in 1 place and it’s cheap. You can search long tail suggested keywords for free. It also supports more languages.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 17, 2016 at 9:03 pm

      Thanks for the input Andrew!

      Reply
  52. Solidworks says

    June 18, 2016 at 7:51 am

    That was a great article.I learn lot of new things about keyword research tools.Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  53. G. Coem says

    July 7, 2016 at 2:24 pm

    Great post, thanx a lot!

    SEMRush – for spying ccompetitors

    Ahrefs – for managing backlinks

    Screaming Frog – for audit

    Similarweb – for traffic figures

    Serpstat – for URL analysis

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 17, 2016 at 8:47 pm

      Cheers George! Appreciate the insights.

      Reply
  54. Janelle Lineisy says

    July 16, 2016 at 7:45 am

    Surprised to see Moz tools not enlisted, but you have an amazing set of tools still. Keyword IO and SERPstat are handy. Can’t say much about Keyword Eye – haven’t used it yet.

    Reply
  55. virender says

    July 29, 2016 at 9:04 am

    Really an Awesome List to go through. Thanks for sharing awesome article.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 30, 2016 at 3:28 am

      Thanks Virender!

      Reply
  56. Michael Birch says

    August 1, 2016 at 9:14 am

    Hey Robbie,
    Great list. Do you also do reviews on separate SEO tools and platforms? I like your blog and though we could reach some agreement. Email me, thanks)

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 30, 2016 at 4:12 am

      Hey Michael,

      I do review select tools. But, only the ones I personally use to run my sites.

      Reply
  57. Farhan says

    August 1, 2016 at 8:04 pm

    Looks like SEMrush wins it big time. I personally love the tool myself. Won’t call it crystal accurate as I do see some discrepancies in the rankings as well as some traffic figures. For advertiser research it works like a charm.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 30, 2016 at 4:11 am

      Farhan, I’m with you. It’s my #1 tool when it comes to competitor PPC analysis.

      Reply
  58. Rohan Karmakar says

    August 3, 2016 at 3:35 am

    Wow it’s just a awesome article. I really love it man. Thanks for such a valuable post.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 30, 2016 at 4:10 am

      My pleasure Rohan!

      Reply
  59. UMBS Studio says

    August 10, 2016 at 9:56 am

    I don’t this any point remains in this amazing guide of long tail keywords tools. Thanks for sharing. I’ve to bookmark to check it again and again

    Reply
  60. Rohit says

    August 12, 2016 at 8:50 am

    Very informative and Best article as always.Robbie you are genius.
    Thanks

    Reply
  61. Monte Solidaridad says

    August 24, 2016 at 9:57 pm

    Hi really interesting your info, hope i can implement with success greetings from Mexico.

    Reply
  62. Posicionamiento Web says

    August 30, 2016 at 9:42 pm

    Very good list.
    I use:
    Google Keyword Planner
    google Trends
    Ubersuggest
    simply economy, and because I’m freelance.
    thanks for sharing.
    regards
    Andres from Chile

    Reply
  63. Gonçalo Costa says

    August 31, 2016 at 12:01 am

    Most of these are still very useful today. Awesome post!

    Reply
  64. Himanshu Agrawal says

    September 9, 2016 at 2:17 pm

    Following all Tools are Great But i use Google Keyword Planner.
    Thanks for sharing this information

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 28, 2016 at 1:02 pm

      Just Google Keyword Planner?

      Reply
  65. King says

    September 12, 2016 at 2:38 am

    Would you recommend hiring a pro to do the link exchanges, or would you do
    it personally?
    Added a post on my Facebook, hope you dont mind!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 28, 2016 at 1:00 pm

      I don’t usually do link exchanges.

      Reply
  66. Matt says

    September 18, 2016 at 2:36 am

    Thanks for this article Robbie. As someone who has only been doing SEO for a short time, I really learned a lot from this and will be coming back again and again to this post for reference. Great stuff man

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 28, 2016 at 12:54 pm

      Cheers Matt! I’m planning to ramp up the content production more in the near future with a closer focus on SEO.

      Reply
  67. VT says

    September 25, 2016 at 12:59 am

    Wow so much great stuff, going to start getting familiar with semrush today!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 28, 2016 at 12:48 pm

      Awesome, let me know what you think VT.

      Reply
  68. mahfuzarss says

    September 25, 2016 at 9:48 pm

    Thanks for sharing this informative articles.

    Reply
  69. pcmate says

    November 3, 2016 at 7:40 am

    Hi there Robbie,

    This is what I call an expert roundup, you have added here everything about kw research that we do not have to look another article again.

    Cheers,

    Clay Smith

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 21, 2016 at 2:52 am

      Glad it was helpful Clay!

      Reply
  70. Gaurav Verma says

    November 4, 2016 at 6:35 am

    SEOCockpit , KWFINDER, LONGTAIL PRO and SEMRUSH are the best tool for keyword research and find profitable long tail keywords in any niche

    Reply
  71. Jens says

    November 13, 2016 at 8:49 pm

    Hi, I’d like to point out a new tool called supersuggest.com (disclaimer: I made it).

    It features 200+ Million keywords. Give it a try.

    @Robbie: Interested in writing a review?

    Cheers

    Reply
  72. HR Yadav says

    November 14, 2016 at 12:14 pm

    Really great article, well written and well explained. Very much helpful for newbies like me.

    Many many thanks for sharing.

    Reply
  73. Kalifa says

    November 15, 2016 at 12:51 pm

    hi
    great article
    i want seo tool online that can give accurate results to find what my competitor rank for ?
    no proplem if it is paid or free

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 21, 2016 at 2:42 am

      SEMrush or Ahrefs 🙂 ^

      Reply
  74. Rajesh Kumar says

    November 19, 2016 at 12:00 pm

    Nice collections of tools with detailed information.

    Reply
  75. seo3k says

    November 20, 2016 at 7:49 pm

    keyword tool io is the best for me , kwfinder is other good solution.

    Reply
  76. Ydoxy says

    November 26, 2016 at 8:58 am

    Excellent list. I read many post for the keyword research tool. but you are sharing many tools for the keyword research. good sharing.

    Reply
  77. Durga chalisa says

    November 29, 2016 at 7:21 am

    Good article! Which tools do you use on daily basis for optimization?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 2, 2016 at 4:09 am

      I use SEMrush, Ahrefs, Screaming Frog most often.

      Reply
  78. seo techniques says

    December 9, 2016 at 7:46 pm

    Hi there Robbie,

    I’m just updating my old post about seo techniques and I’ll be sure to give you a credit for a method that I’m going to add there. This post is just so awesome that I couldn’t go without commenting.

    Regards,

    Clay Smith.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 15, 2016 at 4:44 am

      Cheers Clay! Let me know when it goes live and I’ll check it out.

      Reply
  79. Jhones David says

    December 14, 2016 at 2:55 pm

    I am using Kwfinder for planning the low competition keywords. I want to add another layer for finding keywords. Please tell me about LongtailPRO & Jaaxy which one should I go for

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 15, 2016 at 4:37 am

      I’ve heard good things about KWFinder. Haven’t used it much myself. As for Jaaxy, never used it. However, I do Longtail PRO https://www.robbierichards.com/review/long-tail-pro/ 🙂

      Reply
      • Jhones David says

        December 15, 2016 at 6:19 pm

        Thanks Robbie
        I will also read your review about Long Tail Pro.

        Reply
        • Robbie says

          December 27, 2016 at 3:42 pm

          Let me know if you have any questions 🙂

          Reply
  80. Scotty B says

    December 15, 2016 at 2:28 am

    Awesome article! Won’t the latest Rankbrain update in Google Search throw off these exact keyword matching tools a bit? Just a thought…

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 6, 2017 at 1:11 am

      Interesting thought. How do you think this will affect the tools?

      Reply
  81. skyhost says

    December 26, 2016 at 6:31 am

    i am using web master keyword tool but this is amazing

    Reply
  82. mehak says

    January 10, 2017 at 3:18 am

    keyword planner is a best tool ever

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 16, 2017 at 5:04 am

      Good, but not the best ever 🙂 Agree to disagree.

      Reply
  83. Henry says

    January 29, 2017 at 6:20 pm

    Hi Robbie

    I havent seen anyone mentioning “keywords shitter” 😀 ….. yeah I know it sounds funny but it is a very helpful tool and it’s free 🙂

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 10, 2017 at 4:33 pm

      Cheers Henry! Checked out the tool. Definitely a little gem 🙂

      Reply
  84. Sienna Eskildsen says

    February 1, 2017 at 5:47 am

    The Google Keyword Planner one of the best tools for keyword research and it’s integrated with many more features. that is Keyword research is one of the most important, valuable, and high return activities in the search marketing field. Ranking for the right keywords can make or break your website.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 10, 2017 at 4:32 pm

      Agreed 🙂

      Reply
  85. carl adam says

    February 11, 2017 at 6:12 am

    That one massive list of tools. Thanks for sharing, Robbie

    Reply
  86. precious says

    February 12, 2017 at 10:45 pm

    I prefer google keyword planner

    Reply
  87. Sourabh verma says

    February 15, 2017 at 11:50 am

    Superb post and awesome research. i appreciate your work. Thanks by the way

    Reply
  88. Shanjei G says

    February 27, 2017 at 5:36 pm

    Began using Semrush just recently. It is so useful. Thanks for the list. Will help me a lot!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 6, 2017 at 12:52 am

      Awesome! Great tool. I use it every day.

      Reply
  89. David Lewis says

    March 3, 2017 at 10:00 am

    Thanks for sharing helpful tools. I really liked all the tools and are really helpful.

    Reply
  90. Pranav Misal says

    April 8, 2017 at 5:00 am

    Thanks for this useful article on keyword research tools. I use “Market Samurai” free version.
    Once again thanks for this article.

    Reply
  91. Peter Larsen says

    April 27, 2017 at 1:20 am

    A nice collection of keyword research tools there. One you must check out is the new ahrefs keyword explorer. It’s my goto tool at the moment and along with semrush, you can find some juicy winnable keywords to use on your projects.

    Thanks for the post Robbie

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 5, 2017 at 4:10 am

      Cheers Peter! Yeah – I use both tools in tandem every day for keyword research.

      Reply
  92. Manish says

    April 27, 2017 at 5:10 am

    I always use and recommend Ahrefs and semrush for my keyword research, well long tail pro is also a best alternative.If you can’t buy semrush or pro research tools, you could do the basicresearch with google keyword planner.Well Thanks for the article.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 5, 2017 at 4:10 am

      Cheers Manish! Good old Google suggest works ok too 🙂 Ubersuggest, Keyword tool.io are ok too.

      Reply
  93. Murad says

    May 6, 2017 at 5:00 am

    Thanks Robbie for Sharing Very Useful Article. I think Google Keyword Planner and Semrush is one of the best Keyword Research Tool and I always used. It gives me a great result. Thanks again. I already talk about in my blog about popular Keyword Research Tools.

    Reply
  94. Afdall says

    May 14, 2017 at 12:03 pm

    Thanks for great information. I have Arabic affiliate website and these information will help.

    Reply
  95. Alex Furfaro says

    May 20, 2017 at 9:26 pm

    Ahrefs has been my favorite for a long time. Surprised it didn’t make the top 10. The only thing I’m not confident in is their keyword difficulty ratings. I’ve seen a number that just don’t make any sense have a 0 ranking meanwhile other tools like SEMrush and KW Finder say difficulty is 25 for example. Otherwise the tool is great.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 21, 2017 at 11:53 pm

      Hey Alex – I agree Ahrefs has come a loooong way in the last couple years. I use the tool (with SEMRush) pretty much every day now.

      Reply
  96. Arun Kumar says

    May 29, 2017 at 10:15 am

    Thank you so much for sharing this wonderfull article.Now i can figure out wich is best keyword research tools. All this experts tips are very helpfull for me. Once again thank you so much robbie.

    Reply
  97. alex says

    May 30, 2017 at 12:13 pm

    Hey Robbie,

    First thing first – great post. I had a doubt about kwfinder.com as very few people know about it. so, i am glad that it is in top 10.

    I am using google keyword tool and kwfinder.com. I like and prefer kwfinder as their UI is easy. I have also used ahrefs.

    Issue is KD in both tools vary a LOT. So i am now confused about which one to use or follow. any suggestion ?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 18, 2017 at 2:06 am

      Hey Alex – this is a good question. No tool is going to be spot on. My advice is to not look too much into the accuracy of the metrics, but look at it more as a relative measure. I’m finding Ahrefs to be a good barometer for keyword competitiveness, but I’ve also heard great things about KW Finder lately. I think it’ll more come to personal preference. Both are solid options.

      Reply
      • Jacob Clear says

        September 16, 2017 at 10:27 pm

        Good point in regards to looking at all the tools as a relative measure. From my experience, Ahrefs has been a great tool to use. Thanks for sharing!

        Reply
  98. Arun Sengupta says

    June 14, 2017 at 10:53 am

    Wow… that is a long list of professional people giving their suggestion on one blog post 😀
    Pretty neat idea and very well researched to make it easier for us amateur bloggers 😀
    Thank you so much for this effort and making it available for us to learn from it !!!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 18, 2017 at 1:52 am

      You’re welcome, Arun! Glad you found the article interesting 🙂

      Reply
  99. Yasar says

    June 30, 2017 at 4:55 am

    Thank you so much for this inspirational post.

    Can you please suggest me a free keyword research tool that has powerful features?

    Yasar,

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 3, 2017 at 3:49 am

      Hey Yasar,

      Google Autosuggest, Ubersuggest and KeywordTool.io are good ones to check out.

      Reply
  100. Arun Dominic says

    July 9, 2017 at 9:18 pm

    I use market samurai, its great and I also tested LTP and Semrush

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 13, 2017 at 12:33 am

      Haven’t done with MS. But – I use SEMrush and LT 🙂

      Reply
  101. IT Expert says

    August 16, 2017 at 8:35 am

    I use market samurai and thanks for sharing this excellent article.

    Reply
  102. Denny Farhan says

    August 25, 2017 at 3:11 am

    Google Keyword Planner is really helpful to start SEO project sir. Thanks for this review.

    Reply
  103. Shaikh Masood Alam says

    August 29, 2017 at 7:31 am

    I use Google Keyword Planner, SERPStat and Longtail pro for SEO purpose.

    Google Keyword Planner is still the best keyword finder tool.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 1, 2017 at 1:44 am

      Hey Shaikh! Have to respectfully disagree about Google Keyword Planner 🙂 Solid, but not the best for organic KW research.

      Reply
  104. Adesanmi Adedotun says

    August 30, 2017 at 2:22 pm

    Hi,

    For free keyword research tool with no premium offer. I prefer using KEYWORD EVERYWHERE browsers extension. It’s support Chrome, Firefox and Mozilla browser.
    You just have to check it out.
    In addition, Spyful is also a good research too just like keyword finder (kwfinder).

    Reply
  105. Rajat Shankhdhar says

    September 1, 2017 at 8:18 am

    Hi Robbie,

    First of all, I would like to thank you for providing me such a great valuable information about keyword analysis tool.

    The best part, it’s directly comes from experts and i am getting whole information from this one place.

    Thank you for sharing…

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 8, 2017 at 11:28 pm

      Thanks Rajat!

      Reply
  106. AJ says

    September 6, 2017 at 2:05 pm

    My number 1 choice is Google keyword planner, it’s free and I like the features. I’ve also used SEMrush but you need the paid account to have its full features.

    Reply
  107. Ajay Kumar says

    September 7, 2017 at 1:57 pm

    AHREFS and SEMRUSH are my favorite keyword research tool to manage my PPC campaigns. I also prefer uber suggest as it gives me a considerable amount of LSI keywords idea which sometimes proves profitable for my business.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 8, 2017 at 11:21 pm

      Agreed, Ajay! I use both tools pretty much every day 🙂

      Reply
  108. Anna Jean says

    September 8, 2017 at 1:17 pm

    Nice thing that you added what other experts prefer and I’ve seen that my top 2 are mostly used by them. I have been using SEMrush and Google Keyword Planner.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 8, 2017 at 11:20 pm

      Thanks Anna! Yes – always better to get a sample and see which tools rise to the top 🙂

      Reply
  109. Dave Dally says

    September 8, 2017 at 8:04 pm

    Great article, my favorite SEO “spy tool” is OpenSiteExplorer, but I always check other tools like Market Samurai and SEMrush and than I have a broad idea about the SEO competition. Again, great article. There are tools that I never heard about and I’m looking to check it out. Thanks

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 8, 2017 at 11:20 pm

      Cheers Dave!

      Reply
  110. softfiler says

    October 28, 2017 at 6:57 pm

    I have used semrush, majestic, keywords reveler, ahrefs and some other tools as well. But no doubt ahref is the best.

    Reply
  111. Adam Smith says

    November 1, 2017 at 4:02 am

    Actually, I am using KWfinder to search for low competition keywords but it gives only 2 trials per day, could you suggest me other free trial tools.

    Thank you.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 1, 2017 at 9:30 pm

      Hey Adam,

      Checkout out:

      SEMrush
      Ahrefs
      Keywordtoolio.io
      AnswerThePublic

      All offer some form of free variation.

      Reply
  112. Arun Kumar says

    November 14, 2017 at 5:50 am

    Very interesting list and all these tools are very powerful beginners. Am so happy read this list learn about other authority bloggers and their supportive tools. Thanks a lot for creating very powerful guide.

    Reply
  113. Ahmed says

    November 22, 2017 at 5:05 pm

    hi
    great article
    i want seo tool online that can give accurate results to find what my competitor rank for ?
    no proplem if it is paid or free

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 7, 2017 at 3:15 am

      Ahmed, my 2 favorites are SEMrush and Ahrefs. Either is great.

      Reply
      • Ahmed says

        December 14, 2017 at 12:33 pm

        Thanks Robbie for recommendation
        but , which one are better for non-USA data ? because i target Middle East so i need data for this area not USA or Europe

        Reply
  114. Yasar Ali says

    November 25, 2017 at 1:31 pm

    Thanks, Dude, for the comprehensive list of best Keyword Research tools.
    I use GKP, Moz Keyword Research & SEMRush keyword tool and I think these are something that are enough for me to find long-tail, high-volume and less competitive keywords in minutes.

    Thanks again.

    Yasar

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 7, 2017 at 3:13 am

      Thanks Yasar! SEMrush and Ahrefs for me 🙂

      Reply
  115. bob hamersma says

    December 11, 2017 at 6:16 pm

    Working in the Netherlands i use:

    Semrush: an all in tool with lots of european databases
    Screaming Frog: for a quick check on everything
    Seo Power Suite: dutch language version (thanks)

    and coffe, lots of coffee

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 8, 2018 at 2:43 am

      Haha thanks Bob!

      Reply
  116. Hugo Damásio says

    January 3, 2018 at 3:59 pm

    This round-up of SEO tools is pure gold! Thank you Robbie!

    Reply
  117. James says

    February 20, 2018 at 1:49 pm

    hi to all,

    my favorites tools

    SEMrush
    Ahrefs
    Moz
    Woorank

    Reply
  118. Saitheja Guntuka says

    March 2, 2018 at 11:41 am

    Excellent Article from Robbie ! Really appreciate work,

    And, Almost all the blogging Experts recommended by one of my favourite Tool Semrush. It is perfect for all kinds of Keyword and Traffic analysis

    Thanks again! I follow your site and learnt a lot here.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 22, 2018 at 3:14 am

      Thanks mate! Appreciate it.

      Reply
  119. Prasenjit Dutta Chowdhury says

    March 15, 2018 at 2:16 pm

    A great roundup you have done Robbie. I have checked some of the leader websites did not open or some of already moved the domain. you can update it or recheck.

    I have done the list that will help you to quickly update them.

    1>
    #4: Ana Hoffman (Traffic Generation Cafe)

    2>
    #19. Nick Eubanks (seonick.net)
    1. Term Explorer

    3>
    #51. Joshua Hardwick (The SEO Project)
    2) Term Explorer

    4>
    #78. Chris Dyson (Triple SEO)

    5>
    #84. Paulo Barroso (Digital Altitude)

    My Suggested 3 tools are:

    1> KWFinder
    2> SEMRush
    3> Ubbersuggest

    Additionally:
    Google Keyword Planner
    Google trends
    Google search related
    Google Suggest
    Google webmaster tools

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      March 22, 2018 at 3:03 am

      Thanks mate! Appreciate the heads up on the broken links.

      Reply
  120. liam Jason says

    April 3, 2018 at 12:04 pm

    Thank You for the long list of tools. Great insights on the tools as discussed above. Gonna be of great help while working on my private blog. Thank You for the lovely written article as it has helped me a lot on the insights discussed as above.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 4, 2018 at 11:41 pm

      Thanks Liam!

      Reply
  121. Bill Widmer says

    April 12, 2018 at 12:57 pm

    The fact that “Google Keyword Planner” hit the #2 spot makes me question the expertise of this list. GKP sucks for keyword research, especially after the updates.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 13, 2018 at 1:29 am

      Bill,

      Agree with that GKP is not great for keyword research. At the bottom of my list. I think a lot of people are still using, especially if they are running paid ad campaigns as they can get access to volume data.

      Sometimes the ad group ideas tab can give some helpful groupings. But, for the most part is extremely limited and biased.

      Reply
  122. Gabriella Sannino says

    April 12, 2018 at 2:55 pm

    Always a pleasure being part of your round-up! Grazie mille ?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 13, 2018 at 1:26 am

      Thanks for contributing, Gabriella!

      Reply
  123. Dmitry Klushnik says

    April 13, 2018 at 10:04 am

    Hello from Ukraine 🙂
    My favorite tools is:
    Ahrefs
    Key Collector
    SerpStat

    Reply
    • Richard Bay says

      May 16, 2018 at 5:23 pm

      True @Dmitry as well here most of the keyword tools have used are:
      Ahrefs
      Key Collector and
      SerpStat

      Reply
  124. Tai khoan says

    April 24, 2018 at 7:49 am

    Great article, I personally try to use variations of different back link checkers in order to get more accurate picture, it seems they all pick them up differently as the number always varies. SEM Rush is still my favourite though, cant beat the level of detail that tool provides. I’m only a beginner but I’m starting to learn so much!

    Reply
  125. Jobayer Rahman says

    April 26, 2018 at 12:09 pm

    Great article and thanks for your sharing. But the main problem is that I am a beginner and most of the tool are paid. As a beginner, it is difficult to manage this types of tool.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 13, 2018 at 11:23 pm

      Check out Ubersuggest. Neil Patel has opened up the data there a lot more now.

      Reply
  126. Harman Gomez says

    May 5, 2018 at 1:56 pm

    For me it has always been Semrush, but lately I am getting addicted to Kw finder as well.
    Thanks for the article as It confirms that I am using the correct tools.

    Reply
  127. Aayush says

    May 9, 2018 at 9:47 am

    Ahrefs and kwfinder work best for me.Btw thanx really helpful article 🙂

    Reply
  128. Webtraffic.agency says

    May 11, 2018 at 3:19 pm

    Hi there,

    Our favourite tools are –

    1: Ahrefs

    2: Moz

    3: Spyfu

    Reply
  129. Mua chung says

    May 14, 2018 at 4:29 am

    I recently decided to go with ahrefs after using spyfu for a couple years and trialing secockpit. I was a moz client for awhile too about a year ago. I found spyfu data to be sketchy (or just plain wrong) fairly often, and moz, I don’t know, just didn’t seem like they were really into supporting what I wanted to know. secockpit was achingly slow for a trickle of data. ahrefs isn’t nearly so graph-y as spyfu, but they are so blazing fast and the data is so deep. I enjoy it a great deal, even if it is spendy.

    Reply
  130. Amy Rose says

    June 4, 2018 at 11:04 am

    The site mentioned by Ian Cleary “Inbound Writer” is gone. Someone has put a blog on that. So, kindly remove or replace the link if you find something good of similar kind.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 13, 2018 at 11:09 pm

      Thanks for the heads up, Amy!

      Reply
  131. Techsable says

    June 11, 2018 at 9:03 pm

    Hello Robbie, You Nailed it.

    After reading this whole post, I got to know about semrush and when I start using this tool, Obviously free trial. I think this the best SEO Tool.

    Thank you! For this Valuable post.

    Reply
  132. IAS says

    June 12, 2018 at 5:18 am

    Thanks a lot. This is a great list of keyword research tools. I found Google Keyword Planner the best to find niche keywords and KWFinder for getting some good LSI keywords for long tail keywords searches.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 13, 2018 at 11:04 pm

      Interesting! I personally can’t stand Keyword Planner anymore. I never use it for organic KW research anymore.

      Reply
  133. Naseer says

    July 9, 2018 at 12:13 pm

    I think Ahrefs is best for seo keywords tool. other tools are also best but are too much costly. I am also using free keywords tool like keyword.io, neil petail and google keyword planner.

    Reply
  134. Ratul Roy says

    August 10, 2018 at 8:54 am

    Thanks a lot for your information.Personally I like to use Ahrefs and Moz.

    Reply
  135. Adam says

    August 29, 2018 at 7:24 pm

    Good sharing, among all backlink checkers I like ahrefs the most. I think it’s the best and the most powerful among it’s competitors 🙂

    Reply
  136. Webzysis says

    September 5, 2018 at 9:10 am

    Thanks for sharing the information.I like the semrush for keyword research most for finding organic keywords. I like its ranking difficulty function.KWfinder is my next favorite tool.

    Reply
  137. andy says

    October 15, 2018 at 8:15 pm

    Great article, i usually like to use Ahrefs and Moz to do this sort of thing 🙂

    Reply
  138. Rajan Arora says

    October 24, 2018 at 5:35 am

    I personally use Ubersuggest and Google’s keyword planner for my research. Keywordtool is also good one but I’ve seen glitching fluctuations in the results. Anyways, great post!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 31, 2018 at 2:47 am

      Thanks Rajan!

      Reply
  139. Natural says

    October 25, 2018 at 4:02 pm

    Thank you for these information, I think ahrefs is the best.

    Keep up the good work.

    Reply
  140. Hanna Mariya says

    October 29, 2018 at 7:08 am

    Informative article, i currently use ‘ahrefs’ and it is one of the best tool. Thanks for sharing this.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 31, 2018 at 2:40 am

      Thanks Hanna!

      Reply
  141. Kmeta says

    November 2, 2018 at 10:16 am

    I’m I fun of Joshua Hardwick, read all his articles! It was interesting to know about his fav tools.
    Thank you for your great work, this is a really huge and helpful experts poll.

    Reply
  142. Credito Hipotecario says

    November 5, 2018 at 11:47 pm

    Great list. Like others have mentioned here, we use:

    – ahrefs (amazing tool!)
    – google keyword planner
    – uber suggest
    – majestic

    Reply
  143. Zino Ostendorf says

    November 10, 2018 at 12:04 pm

    I have to say that Ahrefs pretty much changed the way I’m doing business. Also saw Tim Soulo speak on CMSEO, cool guy.

    Also, Google Search Console is a valuable source of keywords that you already rank for or can rank better for with improved SEO tactics.

    Extensive round-up provided, thanks for that.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 14, 2018 at 12:18 am

      Cheers Zino!

      Reply
  144. Kevin Battle says

    November 11, 2018 at 10:06 am

    Hello Robbie,

    Keyword research is the most important part of digital marketing. Nice discussion, but how can I keywords research without registration using free online keyword research tools to get the effective results? Thanks to all expert for attending this session.

    Thanks, Robbie Richards.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 14, 2018 at 12:18 am

      Hey Kevin! If you’re looking for a decent free alternative, check out Ubersuggest and/or AnswerThePublic.

      Reply
  145. Helen says

    November 14, 2018 at 8:37 pm

    Thumbs up for the share! I only use Ahref keyword explorer as i am friendly with that tool. Will try out these tools, still I guess I am gonna stick with Ahrefs.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 22, 2018 at 8:15 pm

      Thanks Helen!

      Reply
  146. Saayed says

    December 2, 2018 at 1:59 pm

    Hey Robbie, Really amazing and helpful information about Best keyword research. Thanks for sharing this content with us. i follow your all information and apply in my website. My Fev Tools

    #1. KWFinder
    #2. SEMRush
    #3. Ahrefs

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 12, 2018 at 3:17 am

      Thanks for sharing, Saayed!

      Reply
  147. Flujo de caja says

    January 15, 2019 at 5:52 pm

    Hi Robbie, thank you for putting together such a great list. Very useful for figuring out what everyone out there is using and finding useful.

    I mostly use

    #1. Ahrefs
    #2. Ubersuggest
    #3. AntRanks

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 18, 2019 at 2:22 am

      Thanks Flujo!

      Reply
  148. Lisa George says

    January 25, 2019 at 10:15 am

    Hi Robbie

    Awesome Post and Amazing Keyword Research Tools List.

    Really appreciate the way you have written and explained.

    I Preferred:

    1. Google Keyword Planner Tool

    2. Ubersuggest

    3. Google Keyword Suggestion Box

    Thanks for sharing it with us. Worth reading it.

    Good work..!!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 26, 2019 at 5:12 pm

      Thanks for weighing in on the topic, Lisa!

      Reply
  149. Dennis Hamming says

    January 25, 2019 at 7:32 pm

    Little disappointed that KWfinder only received 8 votes, definitely my go to tool

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 26, 2019 at 5:12 pm

      Thanks Dennis. It definitely seems to be gaining popularity. Maybe in the next revision it’ll jump up more 🙂

      Reply
  150. Sehaj Preet says

    January 26, 2019 at 3:12 pm

    Thanks for sharing this informative article with us.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 26, 2019 at 5:11 pm

      Thanks Sehaj!

      Reply
  151. Abdur Raqeeb says

    January 27, 2019 at 11:46 am

    Thanks for sharing, its very helpful

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 30, 2019 at 5:09 am

      Thanks Abdur!

      Reply
  152. Vikas says

    January 29, 2019 at 7:20 am

    Hey Robbie,

    I am very lazy boy to research keywords. And I was still searching for best keyword finder on the internet.

    I used google planner, Ahrefs and many more but I found every tools are giving different data.

    I listened more about KWfinder. I planned to use this in next month.

    Thanks,

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 30, 2019 at 5:08 am

      Thanks Vikas! Each tool is essentially running off a different index/ data, so the results will be different. All the top ranked tools will serve you well. Just a matter of preference. I personally use SEMrush and Ahrefs.

      Reply
  153. Shruti Vaidya says

    February 11, 2019 at 9:18 am

    Thanks a lot Robbie for sharing this blog with us. SEO majorly depends on these two major factors- Keywords and Backlinks. For thorough keyword research and competitor analysis, use of accurate and easy-to-use keywords research tools and essential in order to grow your business or generate traffic to your website.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 19, 2019 at 3:05 pm

      Thanks Shruti!

      Reply
  154. toptarify says

    February 18, 2019 at 5:54 pm

    Hello!

    Thank you for the article. Robbie, which tool is better for you at this moment? Ahrefs or Semrush?

    Ahrefs seems to have a lot more keywords data. Don’t you think so?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 19, 2019 at 2:59 pm

      I use both tools for different use cases. Are you doing link building?

      Reply
      • toptarify says

        February 21, 2019 at 1:56 am

        Thanks for the answer!

        No, I do not work with link building. I need a tool for working with keywords data.

        Do you think I should get a subscription to Semrush or Ahrefs?

        Reply
        • Robbie says

          February 24, 2019 at 11:40 pm

          If you’re doing KW analysis for SEO and PPC, I’d prob go with SEMrush. If just SEO, and maybe the need for link building, probably Ahrefs.

          Reply
  155. Canelo Forum says

    April 22, 2019 at 2:50 am

    Nice thing that you added what other experts prefer and I’ve seen that my top 2 are mostly used by them. I have been using SEMrush and Google Keyword Planner.

    Reply
  156. Caelan Cheesman says

    April 25, 2019 at 12:52 pm

    What a great article Robbie – must have taken ages to write!

    I personally use Ahrefs BUT I must admit that Ubersuggest, which you have in your article, is an amazing tool to use if you are starting out.

    The are thousands of free SEO tools available to us online, however, most of them are total rubbish or are so restrictive that you have to upgrade to the paid version in order to get any benefit from it at all.

    Well done to Neil Patel and his Ubersuggest and thanks for this informative article.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 25, 2019 at 1:45 pm

      Hi Caelan! Thanks for weighing in. Agreed – Ubersuggest is a handy free resource.

      Reply
  157. Amit Vats says

    May 7, 2019 at 3:55 pm

    whoah, this blog is excellent I really like reading your posts.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 10, 2019 at 1:28 pm

      Thanks Amit!

      Reply
  158. Jenny says

    May 22, 2019 at 10:47 am

    Thanks Robbie for sharing the keyword research tools.
    I have started to use the ubersuggest for keyword research, as google keyword planner work for them, they are managing the ppc campaign on google adword.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 29, 2019 at 1:57 pm

      Cheers Jenny!

      Reply
  159. Tom says

    June 5, 2019 at 11:10 am

    Thanks for you article. In Poland we can use only ahrefs. Semrush have low database.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 20, 2019 at 1:04 am

      Thanks for the insight, Tom!

      Reply
  160. Gogyanpedia says

    June 14, 2019 at 6:40 am

    It is an Extremely very very good article and it will help people who want to make their career in Digital Marketing. But you know that Semrush and Ahref tools are very Expensive.

    Anyway, I like your writing Skill. Good Job!

    Reply
  161. Rishi Karia says

    June 19, 2019 at 11:53 am

    Thanks Robbie. Sharing useful detail keyword research tools. Great resource that will be bookmarked and referenced I am sure of that.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      June 20, 2019 at 12:50 am

      Thanks Rishi!

      Reply
  162. KARAN VEER says

    July 4, 2019 at 9:44 am

    thanks, Buddy,,,such a great post I found on your site.its my first time on your site but i bookmarked you.same as your experts i also like
    1. SEMRush
    2. Ahrefs

    Reply
  163. Mohammad Mustafa Ahmedzai says

    July 4, 2019 at 9:54 am

    Ubersuggest is also a good tool. I have been using this for a long time. Thanks for this awesome list.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 16, 2019 at 11:54 pm

      Thanks Mohammad!

      Reply
  164. raja says

    July 9, 2019 at 5:11 pm

    Thanks for This useful article. I use only ahrefs and keyword planner

    Reply
  165. Karan says

    July 11, 2019 at 5:12 pm

    Your blog is excellent I really like your post man

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 16, 2019 at 11:46 pm

      Thanks Karan!

      Reply
  166. Alexey says

    July 14, 2019 at 2:37 pm

    Hello, Alexey!

    I download your free ebook Semrush Playbook guide.

    But I see that the ebook was written in 2017. Please, tell me. Information in book actual for 2019?

    Or an ebook is old and don’t relevant for 2019?

    And sorry sir for my bad English. I’m still learning.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      July 16, 2019 at 11:44 pm

      Hi Alexey! It is a bit outdated now, but I’m currently working on a new updated versions that should be live soon. The tactics outlined in the ebook should still be actionable for the most part.

      Reply
  167. Ana says

    July 24, 2019 at 3:29 pm

    Thanks for the list. is there a tool you recommend for seeing how many words of content the top 10 competitors are using?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 1, 2019 at 10:22 pm

      Webpage word counter 🙂

      Reply
  168. Jonathan says

    July 25, 2019 at 5:51 am

    Thanks for the great post. I used ahref before, but now I think I have more reference to use.

    Reply
  169. Muhammed says

    August 23, 2019 at 4:26 am

    I’m actually using this whole list. But best of all google keyword planner

    Reply
  170. Yogesh Singh says

    August 23, 2019 at 4:59 am

    Nice article, i am a big fan of your blog and articles.
    If my website is 4-5 page of google, than how i can rank my website in google first page without getting clicking, because most users click for the first page 1-5 results.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 29, 2019 at 11:40 pm

      Check out this post for some ideas 🙂 https://www.robbierichards.com/seo/first-page-of-google/

      Reply
  171. Sachin Shaji K says

    August 27, 2019 at 7:31 am

    Good article! Semrush, Ahref, Moz and good old search console are my top favorite tools.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 29, 2019 at 11:36 pm

      Thanks for weighing in, Sachin!

      Reply
  172. Daniel says

    August 29, 2019 at 1:00 pm

    Took me about 3 hours to read and check them out. Super guide.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      August 29, 2019 at 11:33 pm

      Thanks Daniel!

      Reply
  173. Rohit says

    September 26, 2019 at 5:38 am

    Checked your detailed, it’s super helpful. Good Job Buddy

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 26, 2019 at 2:07 pm

      Thanks Rohit!

      Reply
  174. SEOFlips says

    September 26, 2019 at 7:41 pm

    Great List and glad to discover the tools used by SEO professionals.
    Unfortunately the list contains very few FREE tools and most of them are paid.
    Would love to see a dedicated article on the FREE SEO tools.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 28, 2019 at 3:29 pm

      Good feedback. Thanks Sam!

      Reply
  175. Sagar Birangal says

    September 30, 2019 at 4:22 am

    Nice post! I have been using also Ahrefs that the best one to me. its better than Moz and semrush.
    Thank you for doing all the research and sharing it with us Robbie!

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 11, 2019 at 1:30 pm

      Thanks for sharing, Sagar!

      Reply
  176. Helena Orstem says

    October 8, 2019 at 7:54 pm

    Good article! Semrush, Ahref, Alexa and good old search console are my top favorite tools.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 11, 2019 at 1:23 pm

      Awesome! Thanks for sharing, Helena!

      Reply
  177. tim viec lam says

    October 10, 2019 at 9:37 am

    Thanks for sharing articles
    My favorite:
    Ahrefs is incredible keyword research tool. I preferred and using it everyday.
    And, I also like
    SEMrush: this is a great tool. You can get all the info related to organic search…

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      October 11, 2019 at 1:22 pm

      Thanks for sharing, Tim!

      Reply
  178. Matthew Gallant says

    October 24, 2019 at 4:22 pm

    Hi Robbie!

    Thank you for this massive piece of content. Weird I`ve never seen this article before.
    Personally I prefer Serpstat and SEMrush. Our agency has switched to both of them from MOZ Pro.

    Moz Pro was an amazing tool but get outdated and at the moment seems useless if you compare against their competitors.

    It would be nice to see comparison of the best rank trackers.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 16, 2020 at 7:15 am

      Hey Matthew! Thanks for weighing in. I don’t have a direct comparison, but SEMrush was voted the top rank tracker too: https://www.robbierichards.com/seo/best-rank-tracker/

      Reply
  179. Mark says

    October 29, 2019 at 6:22 pm

    I don’t think anyone can beat semrush. It is my all-time favorite.

    Reply
  180. Rafal Borowiec says

    November 6, 2019 at 10:03 pm

    Great article:
    My choice is ahrefs when you do research international but we have also in Polan Senuto.com . In my opinion best tools for keyword research in Poland

    Reply
  181. Judd Dunagan says

    November 9, 2019 at 12:51 pm

    My favorites are SERanking, SEM Rush, SerpStats, and Moz. I bounce between those for different clients.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 10, 2019 at 2:08 am

      Thanks for weighing in, Judd!

      Reply
  182. Altay Gursel says

    November 13, 2019 at 2:24 pm

    I think SEMrush is hands down the best. However, I am a little surprised nobody mentioned Keywordseverywhere in this really comprehensive post.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      November 18, 2019 at 11:25 am

      Keywords Everywhere is definitely a handy little tool 🙂

      Reply
  183. Talha jamil says

    December 3, 2019 at 6:30 pm

    Keywords Everywhere is definitely a handy little tool 🙂

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 16, 2020 at 7:14 am

      100% Great little tool 🙂

      Reply
  184. geekymr says

    December 7, 2019 at 10:44 am

    What is your opinion on the group buy SEO tools because my budget is low? DO you think it is worth to buy group buy SEO tools?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      January 16, 2020 at 7:13 am

      What do you mean by group buy tools?

      Reply
  185. Gregory Cooper says

    December 18, 2019 at 10:50 pm

    One of the most interesting posts I’ve seen in a wee while. I’ll need to keep coming back because there is a lot I want to be nosey at. Thanks for posting, nice work.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 20, 2019 at 12:04 pm

      Cheers Gregory!

      Reply
  186. Gautam says

    December 19, 2019 at 11:00 am

    Hey Robbie!

    That’s a well-detailed post. I have been using Ahref for few months and it turns out to be a nice one but now I want to explore SEMrush and others after reading this.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      December 20, 2019 at 12:03 pm

      Thanks Gautam! Both are solid tools. It really comes down to preference. Each tool has its strengths.

      Reply
  187. Alina Smith says

    December 30, 2019 at 10:46 am

    Hey Robie,

    Thanks for writing this detailed post and views from industry leaders. I have been using SEMrush and SEO Screaming Frog Spider but haven’t explored such feature of Screaming Frog. I will surely give it a try if that works from me1

    Thanks

    Alina

    Reply
  188. David says

    January 1, 2020 at 1:10 am

    Hi Robbie, I see most of you are in the top 3 (ahrefs, semrush and google trends)

    maybe we could add
    similarweb to find related sites to send them an email to get a guest post 🙂

    Reply
  189. Stephen Thomas says

    February 28, 2020 at 10:38 am

    Took me some time to read the full post 🙂 Thank you for your efforts!

    I like KWFinder, even though it has only 10 votes. Google Kwd Planner is my first choice, though.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      February 28, 2020 at 9:45 pm

      Thanks for weighing in, Stephen!

      Reply
  190. Bikramjit says

    April 13, 2020 at 8:29 pm

    Hi Robbie!

    I have been using ahrefs tool from the last 3 4 months and it seems good. but I have a doubt between Moz and Semrush and ahrefs. I am confused between these three. can you suggest which one should I use for better results?

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2020 at 9:46 am

      Are you doing both SEO and PPC?

      Reply
  191. syed says

    April 18, 2020 at 5:22 am

    I prefere Ahref or Moz is very good compare to other keyword tools. Ahref and moz also gives multiple tools like back link search, domain internal links and top keyword ranking on website.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      April 23, 2020 at 9:40 am

      Thanks for weighing in, Syed!

      Reply
  192. Exalt says

    May 3, 2020 at 1:46 pm

    I am using google keyword tool and kwfinder.com. I like and prefer kwfinder as their UI is easy. I have also used ahrefs.

    Reply
  193. varun shanbhag says

    May 5, 2020 at 2:37 pm

    I would like to suggest two tools …one is paid and the other one is free.
    1) Ahrefs
    2) Keywordseverywhere

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      May 7, 2020 at 7:10 am

      Thanks for weighing in, Varun!

      Reply
  194. afdhal says

    May 8, 2020 at 2:55 am

    Great port, I’m using ahref since 2017 which relly satisfied with it. Lately I tried SEMrush which really got me interested to consider it my first option.

    keywordtool.io also good tool for keywords.

    Thanks

    Reply
  195. Alexis says

    May 12, 2020 at 6:42 am

    Keywords everywhere used to be my favorite until recently when the developer decided to take it from a free to a pay-as-you-go model. However, SEMRUSH still with its free plan is just sufficient for me right now.

    Reply
  196. zahnarztinungarn.org says

    May 22, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    My favorites are SERanking, SEM Rush, SerpStats, and Moz. I bounce between those for different clients.

    Reply
  197. PPC Dude says

    August 13, 2020 at 7:52 pm

    I’ve been using Ahrefs primarily now for the last one and half year and I’m pretty much satisfied. Apart from that I prefer Google Search Console. Very reliable. You’d know what users are actually searching with.

    Reply
  198. syed says

    August 15, 2020 at 12:40 pm

    Agreed with Ilan Shabad.. I feel personally Google keyword, Ahref and semrush are best order should be 1st ahref, 2nd semrush and google keyword. (Uber suggest also works better).

    Reply
  199. Anika says

    August 19, 2020 at 6:33 am

    google keyword planner, ahref, semrush,Ubersuggest, MOZ are the best tools for SEO

    Reply
  200. Emily Clark says

    August 19, 2020 at 7:24 am

    For me, it has always been Ahrefs and Semrush, but lately, I am getting addicted to Kw finder as well.

    Thanks for the article as It confirms that I am using the correct tools.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 2, 2020 at 10:02 am

      KWFinder is a solid keyword research tool! Thanks for weighing in, Emily.

      Reply
  201. Shivaharsh Murugan says

    August 31, 2020 at 5:56 am

    All time favourite is to use Ahrefs ( Keep the KD column intact) & Use Vlookpup function to get the somewhat accurate volume from Keyword Planner for respective countries

    Reply
  202. Vinod Mohite says

    September 1, 2020 at 5:02 pm

    Nice Article on Keyword Tools

    My Top 3 would be

    Google Search Console : It helps in analysing your existing Keywords which your brand is able to rank and accordingly plan your back link activities

    Google Keyword Planner : It shows up relevant Keywords to your theme and as its a Google Tool you can expect the stats in terms of volume to be correct as most of the users use Google.

    Ahrefs – If you are planning to have a FAQ section, Question answer section then ahrefs is a great tool. Also it provides the Ranking competitiveness of each Keyword which helps in determining which Keyword should you target.

    Reply
  203. Rohan Gillett says

    September 17, 2020 at 11:35 pm

    You’ve compiled a big list and a lot of good advice from different people for us! Thanks very much. I’m another person who uses Google Search Console and find it very useful.

    Reply
    • Robbie says

      September 20, 2020 at 7:53 am

      Thanks for weight in here, Rohan!

      Reply

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Hi, I’m Robbie. Founder of robbierichards.com, Creator of The SEO Playbook training program, and Co-Founder of Virayo, a B2B search marketing agency.

I live and breathe SEO, and love teaching others how to get results for their business and/or clients. Enjoy!

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