How to Do Keyword Research for Free
You don't need a paid tool to find keywords your customers search for. Here's a step-by-step keyword research process using only free tools.
Key takeaways
- Start from customer problems and the words customers use, not from tools.
- Google's own features (autocomplete, People also ask, related searches) show what people search.
- Search Console shows queries you already appear for: the fastest wins.
- Google Keyword Planner is free with a Google Ads account and gives volume ranges.
Keyword research is finding the words and questions your potential customers type into search engines, then deciding which ones to target. Paid tools save time, but you can do solid research for free.
Step 1: List seed topics
Write down what you sell and the problems you solve, in your customers’ words. Ask your sales team or check WhatsApp chats and emails: what do people actually ask? These are your seed keywords.
Step 2: Mine Google itself
For each seed keyword, search Google and note:
- Autocomplete suggestions as you type (try adding letters: “seo audit a…”, “seo audit b…”)
- People also ask questions (click a few to load more)
- Related searches at the bottom of the page
- What ranks: guides, products, lists or local results? That tells you the search intent
Step 3: Check Search Console
If your site has some traffic, Search Console → Performance → Queries shows what you already appear for. Sort by impressions and look for:
- Queries with many impressions but a low position (8–20): improve the page
- Queries with no dedicated page: create one
This is often the fastest source of wins.
Step 4: Get volume ranges from Google Keyword Planner
Google Keyword Planner (inside Google Ads, free to use) gives search volume ranges and related ideas. Without active ad spend you see broad ranges (e.g. 100–1K), which is still enough to compare ideas. You can filter by country, for example Pakistan.
Step 5: Use other free sources
- Google Trends: seasonality and rising topics
- YouTube autocomplete: video topics
- Reddit, Quora and Facebook groups: questions in real language
- Free tiers of keyword tools for limited daily lookups
- AnswerThePublic-style tools for question variations
Step 6: Group and prioritise
Group keywords that share the same intent into one page (don’t create a page per variation). Then prioritise by:
| Factor | Question |
|---|---|
| Business value | Would this searcher become a customer? |
| Intent match | Can you create the type of page that ranks? |
| Difficulty | Are the top results beatable? See keyword difficulty |
| Volume | Enough searches to matter? |
Don’t ignore long-tail
Specific, longer queries have less volume but often convert better and are easier to rank for. See long-tail keywords.
Next step
Map each keyword group to one page, then optimise using the on-page SEO checklist.