Background on this issue...... I have seen a couple web based tools that give some estimate of the traffic a given keyword recieves per month. I also searched google and this forum for "keyword traffic tools" before posting. One interesting thing, a digitalpoint post was the #1 hit on google Also I see several free downloadable programs that claim to estimate the popularity of a keyword. Now, my questions..... How accurate are these? Has anyone used any of the the downloads that are listed on the Google search results page1? http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=keyword+traffic+tool&btnG=Google+Search What is the concensus on the various methods of keyword popularity? Do you use a favorite tool? Has it been reliable for you? Thanks to all
I found some additional information.... a keyword selector/popularity article http://www.hillsorient.com/articles/2005/04/054.html keyword selector/popularity tools http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ http://www.rightscripts.com/keywordresearch/ http://webtools.live2support.com/se_kwd.php
The Overture tool is far too skewed as is well known and discussed in other threads. Both of these tools use the Overture database: http://www.rightscripts.com/keywordresearch/ http://webtools.live2support.com/se_kwd.php as a result give the same skewed results. Cheers David
Thanks David. I was seeing some erratic results on those tools and suspected some amount of innaccuracy. Although I could not find older posts when I originally researched this, several good threads appear now in the "similar threads" results. I am very relieved to have found the additional information as this subject seems to be one of the most critical aspects of SEO. After all, what is the point of holding a good position on a key phrase if nobody searches it?
For me it is very difficult to rely on any one tool or I should say...any tool. All tools I used till today..show different figures.....I don't know which one is correct. So I only use overture for just a hint of traffic and wordtracker for suggestions. Rest I use my common sense.
I would recommend using a few of the tools to get an idea and taking an average of the traffic. If you have some high rankings you can compare the traffic you get from them with the number of searches shown by each tool and figure out how accurate the tools are from there.
Agreed. I am hoping the tools will be correct in concept, even though the actual traffic numbers may be incorrect. At least they are providing a baseline and some indication of volume of traffic per keyword.
From my understanind that are only 4 main keyword tools with their own keyword databases: Google https://adwords.google.com/select/main?cmd=KeywordSandbox plus as via adwords KeywordDiscovery http://www.keyworddiscovery.com/ Overture http://inventory.overture.com/d/sear...ry/suggestion/ WordTracker http://www.wordtracker.com Most of the other tools use a combination of either the Overture, KeywordDiscovery and WordTracker keyword databases. Cheers David