Keyword research is a crucial part of any effective SEO strategy. Understanding keyword difficulty and competition is what separates successful SEO campaigns from those that fail to gain traction. This comprehensive guide will teach you everything you need to know about assessing keyword difficulty using the best tools available in 2024.
Keyword difficulty refers to how hard it is to rank for a particular keyword in search engines like Google. The keyword difficulty score or keyword difficulty index gives you an indication of the amount of SEO difficulty or keyword competition for ranking well and driving organic traffic for that keyword.
Keywords with low difficulty scores are easier to rank for, while keywords with high difficulty scores require more on-page optimization and off-page SEO work to rank well. Assessing keyword difficulty is a key part of keyword research and helps inform your content strategy and SEO approach.
Understanding keyword difficulty is crucial in SEO because it helps you:
Ignoring keyword difficulty leads to inefficient SEO campaigns that either target over-competitive keywords or miss out on easy wins. Getting keyword difficulty right means doing keyword research that drives real SEO results.
There are a few key factors that determine SEO keyword difficulty:
While these factors can be manually gauged to an extent, the best way to get an accurate keyword difficulty score is to use a dedicated keyword difficulty checker or keyword difficulty tool.
Manually calculating keyword difficulty for multiple keywords across Google's hundreds of pages of results is extremely tedious and time-consuming. This is why using a keyword difficulty checker is so important for efficient and effective keyword research.
Here are some key benefits of using a keyword difficulty tool:
A good difficulty checker will crawl Google's result pages and analyze ranking domains, backlinks, and other factors to generate keyword difficulty scores almost instantly. This makes keyword research much faster.
Keyword research often involves checking the difficulty of hundreds or thousands of keywords. No one has the time to manually analyze Google results for so many keywords. Difficult tools can process these keyword lists with ease.
The best tools classify keywords as low, medium, or high difficulty. This helps you identify low-competition "just right" keywords as well as high-difficulty keywords to avoid or target later.
Features like filtering keywords by difficulty score and search volume help you zero in on subsets of keywords to focus your SEO efforts.
Some tools provide historical difficulty scores so you can see how competition has changed for a keyword over time. This helps forecast future difficulty.
Leading SEO tools like Ahrefs and SEMrush integrate difficulty databases into their keyword research so you can analyze difficulty alongside other metrics.
In short, a good keyword difficulty tool is invaluable for any data-driven SEO strategy today. The time and efficiency gains allow you to research keywords smarter, not harder.
Now that you’re convinced you need a keyword difficulty tool, here is a handpicked list of the top 5 keyword difficulty checkers recommended for 2024 based on accuracy, features, and value:
Ahrefs has one of the largest keyword databases covering over 500 million keywords. The Ahrefs Keywords Explorer provides highly accurate difficulty and search volume estimates powered by its huge keyword index.
With its full set of SEO tools, Ahrefs makes it easy to research keywords based on difficulty and other metrics all in one place. The historical difficulty data is also useful for identifying easy-to-rank keywords.
SEMrush is another robust SEO toolkit that factors in keyword difficulty for keyword research and tracking keyword rankings. Its difficulty scores are generated from metrics like estimated traffic and a number of results for the keyword.
Useful features include a comparison of keyword difficulty between locations, filters for low and high-difficulty keywords, and CSV export for analyzed keywords.
Moz's Pro subscription includes a keyword difficulty analysis tool that assigns keywords a score from 0-100 based on ranking difficulty. It examines multiple search result factors including page authority and spam to calculate these scores.
Though not as deep as Ahrefs or SEMrush, it's a handy basic difficulty checker, especially if you already use Moz for link analysis and site audits.
Neil Patel's free keyword research tool Ubersuggest makes it easy to check keyword difficulty along with volume, CPC, and other metrics. The difficulty percentage indicates how hard it will be to rank for a given keyword.
Ubersuggest's keyword discovery is also useful for finding long-tail variations of base keywords to research further. Its free access and intuitive interface make it one of the best free difficulty tools.
Keywordtool's keyword difficulty checker analyzes search engine data to rate keyword difficulty on a scale of 0% to 100%. Aside from difficulty percentages, it also shows historical volume trends and cost-per-click data for keywords.
The tool allows analyzing a few keywords for free before requiring a paid subscription for broader keyword research with filters and CSV export. It offers excellent bang for buck as an affordable paid tool.
These 5 leading difficulty analysis tools will arm you with all the data you need to identify the right keyword targets and develop an effective SEO content strategy. Each has its own strengths, so consider your budget and specific needs when choosing one.
Now that you know how to measure keyword difficulty, let's look at how you can use difficulty data for smarter SEO keyword targeting.
Review keywords with low difficulty percentages and search volume in the thousands to find hidden gems competitors may have missed. Creating content for these terms can help you gain initial organic visibility.
Use keyword research tools to find long tail variations and synonyms for your core keywords that have lower difficulty. Targeting these enables you to comprehensively cover a topic.
Analyze historical difficulty data to identify increasing or decreasing competition trends for your main keywords. This helps plan optimization and content efforts.
Keywords labeled as “High Difficulty” are unrealistic short-term ranking goals, while “Medium Difficulty” terms should be targeted further down the roadmap once you build more authority.
Segment your keyword list into difficulty tiers so you can allocate SEO resources accordingly, rather than spreading them thinly across keywords.
If you have no content targeting low and medium-difficulty keywords related to your business, those present opportunities to fill gaps and improve organic visibility.
See what keywords your site ranks for versus competitors. Review which high-difficulty keywords they rank for that you could target in future content.
Evaluating keyword difficulty is just one part of robust keyword research. But it is undoubtedly one of the most important ones for any effective SEO strategy. Mastering the use of difficulty checker tools will help you streamline research, identify the best keywords to target, and expand your organic reach.
A: Keywords with difficulty scores between 0-50 are considered easy to medium in difficulty. Target these keywords first to rank quickly and establish organic visibility. Keywords with scores above 60 have high difficulty, so you may need to build more authority before ranking or approaching them in a later SEO stage.
A: The best keyword difficulty tools use extensive search data and algorithms to generate quite accurate scores. However, SEO is complex, so scores should still be considered estimates. Track actual search performance over time rather than relying entirely on scores.
A: Yes, as competition and search behavior change, keyword difficulty changes as well. Tracking difficulty periodically helps you identify trends and modify keyword targets. High-volume keywords tend to increase in difficulty over time.
A: The number, authority, and optimization level of pages already ranking for that keyword have the largest influence on difficulty. More authoritative sites like news publications make a keyword tougher to rank for.
A: Not necessarily - low-competition keywords often have lower search volume. You can target some higher-difficulty keywords but will need to put in more optimization work to rank for them. Use low-difficulty keywords to gain initial traction.
A: Ideally, check keyword difficulty at least once a quarter as part of your ongoing keyword research process. For keywords you are actively targeting, more frequent monthly checks can help spot positive or negative trends.
A: Not directly, but you can make keywords easier to rank for over time by optimizing pages targeting them. Improving your site's authority through links, content quality, and authority also helps drive down relative keyword difficulty.
Keyword difficulty analysis is an essential part of modern SEO strategies. By leveraging the best keyword difficulty checker tools and incorporating difficulty data into your keyword targeting, you can maximize your ranking potential.
Focus on low and medium-difficulty keywords first to gain traction, then use comprehensive optimization and content strategies to tackle high-difficulty keywords over time. With the right keyword research process, you can drive targeted organic traffic much more efficiently.
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