Is Google KW tool accurate ??

I find it hard to believe the tool is any where near accurate I rank at # 8 for a KW "free adult" - no quotes and only get a few hits a day from it. When you go on the KW tool is shows the following numbers for that KW

Local Search Volume Last Month 2,740,000

Global Search Volume Last Month 3,350,000

Would the #8 site for that KW only get like 25 hits a day when is is searched for over 90,000 times a day ?

 

Try using the EXACT match type. It may be that there are many long tail searches. Top ranked sites get most of the cliks, #8 position could get max 5% of first page clicks.. It also depends from page title and description shown in serp's.

 

In a market like that, you probably have a bunch of sellers doing the search...thus they are looking for their own ads. I can tell you I have not been able to show the cpc price as being terribly accurate.

 

if u'r not in the top 3, then u'r getting a very small fraction of the hits. The fraction depends on how good the top 3 hits are, and chances are that they are very good.

 

im pretty sure they are pretty accurate..cause its coming from google

 

There are times when you have to apply a bit of commonsense to how people look for things
Nobody is looking for free adults. They're looking for free adult downloads, or dvds, or movies. if your ad - or title and snippet in organic - doesn't suggest what people are looking for, and the other ads/snippets do, they get the clicks, you don't.

 

And the fraction volume highly depends on the niche!
The Google Adwords Keyword Tool is pretty accurate. Agree with @magda.

 

Try doing an exact match search.

 

Yep, look at an exact match search. The keyword tool is pulling back broad match numbers, so those searches aren't just for that specific keyword.

 

The tool was pretty accurate to me. I have been using for more than a year already.

 

I find it's often about 30% out, both under and over.

 

All keyword research tools are not accurate. It only gives you an idea of the traffic you can expect to get from certain SERP pages.

 

Let's do the math.

90 000 searches a day.

For how many of those searches will the user hit a sponsored result and not an organic result? For simplicity, let's say 10%.

That leaves 9000 clicks/day for that search.

If you get 25 of those clicks, you are getting a CTR of about 0.27%.

That is very low, but it is certainly possible if you are ranked very lowly, and perhaps if your ad is not good.

So I don't think there is any evidence here that the KW tool is inaccurate.

 

There is when you're keyword is on Adwords and you're ranked 24/7 throughout the month (no Rank/Impression loss) and the impressions figures are off, what the KT says.

Which is what it's like for my my most popular keyword.

Like I say, I'm finding it's often around 30% off.

 

Fair enough, in that case there is very good evidence the KW tool is inaccurate. I don't think the example in the OP was enough to establish that though.

As an aside, I don't think being 30% off is that bad. If it was orders of magnitude off, that would be misleading, but 30% isn't too horrible a margin of error in this case (imho).

 

I looked at last months data and for one of my keywords the tool says it had 27,100 searches.

Checking my Adwords account, it had 18,562 impressions and I'm pretty sure it was online all day every day, but without sorting a report out, that can't be taken as gospel.

Like you say, I think it's close enough.

I'm ranked naturally for a keyword phrase that the KT says had, 9,900 searches last month. I'm ranked 5th, and only get around 10 visits a day. I'm not sure if that's about right or not.

 

You're getting 300 visits a month - a CTR of about 3%. Sounds plausible.

 

It's close enough to be honest...

It's a really helpful tool, I use it all the time... just don't assume you'll be getting that exact amount
of volume!

James