Is the customer searching for a solution, a price or a provider?
A keyword isn't merely a phrase to repeat throughout your website. It's a clue to a customer's need. Someone searching “garden maintenance Szeged” may be looking for a service provider; someone searching “when should you scarify a lawn” may first want to understand the task. Neither query is inherently better: it depends on your offer and which question the page answers.
Information and research
“When should I aerate my lawn?” and “How often is it needed?” belong in a useful guide, not necessarily an immediate quote request.
Specific work and local search
“Lawn mowing Szeged” and “garden maintenance near me” suggest someone looking for a suitable provider and contact information.
Prices and comparisons
“Garden maintenance cost” and “lawn scarifying vs lawn renovation” suggest costs, conditions or selection criteria.
Brand or specific page
Someone searches for the company's name, phone number or known web address. Findability and easy contact matter most.
One query may express several intentions. Inspect the results page, but don't treat it as a permanent ranking: location, date and search context can alter results. If you can't confidently classify the intent, mark it needs checking on your worksheet.
Start by gathering genuine customer questions
Industry jargon doesn't always match how customers speak. Your business might offer “comprehensive green space maintenance”, while a customer searches “who mows lawns in Szeged”. SEO tools can't resolve that gap alone: phone calls, emails and quote requests often reveal it.
- Choose one service you actually provide. Add the geographic area you serve. Don't force local keywords onto a nationwide online service.
- List at least ten real or plausible customer questions. Review recurring phone questions, support notes and general themes in public reviews. Don't copy personal data.
- Translate professional jargon into everyday language. Consider terms for the task, symptom, price, place, timing and comparison.
- Separate evidence from ideas. A question you've heard from a customer is genuine feedback; a Google phrase you invent is a hypothesis to verify.
Google's SEO Starter Guide also recommends considering how beginners and experienced readers describe the same topic. You don't need a separate page for every synonym, or to repeat one rigid word form.
How can you find search ideas without a paid subscription?
Try a few genuinely relevant queries in Google. Notice whether the results favour local providers, price explanations, practical guides or product pages. Search suggestions and related questions are sources of ideas, not reliable monthly search counts. Competitors' FAQ sections can also suggest customer problems worth answering better in your own words, without copying.
A useful question for every idea: Can we actually solve this problem, and do we have a trustworthy answer? If not, don't automatically add the phrase to your plan just because it looks popular. If an existing service page already answers the need, improve it first. Don't create three nearly identical pages for “lawn mowing price”, “lawn mowing fee” and “lawn mowing cost”.
What should you record about the search results? The query, city or country checked, date and dominant result type. Don't claim the observed ranking is the universal Hungarian search order for every user.
Search Console, Trends and Keyword Planner: three different datasets
| Tool | What it helps you understand | Important limitation |
|---|---|---|
| Google Search Console | Observed impressions, clicks, queries and pages for your verified site in Google Search. | The data offers a sample, not every search. Some rare queries may be omitted. |
| Google Trends | Relative search interest by time and location. | Sampled, normalised 0–100 scale: 75 does not mean 75 monthly searches. Low interest may appear as zero. |
| Google Ads Keyword Planner | Keyword ideas, estimates of historical searches and advertising forecasts. | Estimates, not guaranteed organic traffic. “Competition” measures advertiser competition, not SEO difficulty. |
Search Console: if your website is already live, start with the Performance report. See which queries and pages appear together. Remember the limitations of query data. A new site available only on staging has no live search history.
Trends: compare phrases by time period and country, but the normalised interest scale isn't monthly search volume. Keyword Planner: according to Google Ads guidance, access and available features can depend on account setup. Don't build an entire content strategy on one uncertain estimated number.
When it comes to your own business
Keywords aren't the goal – the right customers are
SEO planning isn't about collecting the greatest number of phrases. It's about which questions and services genuinely connect to your offering, and what visitors find when they search.
Example: which customer searches should lead to which pages?
Fictional example: a business called “Mintakert Szeged” is fictional and offers garden maintenance, lawn mowing and lawn care. It is not a Kaluzsa client; the following phrases are not measured searches, and no volume or outcome figures are assigned. This table demonstrates the decision-making method.
| Potential customer phrase | Intent | Do they actually offer it? | Decision / destination page |
|---|---|---|---|
| garden maintenance Szeged | Local provider | Yes | Improve existing garden maintenance page: services offered, service area and how to request a quote. |
| lawn mowing Szeged | Specific job | Yes | Lawn mowing section; separate URL only if there's a distinct need and enough substantive content. |
| garden maintenance price | Pricing / comparison | Yes | Explain genuine pricing factors and the quote process, without invented list prices. |
| when to scarify a lawn | Information | Lawn care: yes | Useful guide, with a natural internal link to the related service. |
| garden design Szeged | Different service | No | Exclude until it's genuinely offered. |
| buy lawn mower parts | Product / online store | No | Exclude; different business model and search intent. |
Clearly, the important decision isn't how often the word “garden” appears, but which existing page actually helps the visitor. A new URL is warranted only for a distinct task, not another form of the same phrase.
How should you decide which topic to tackle first?
Don't ask only how many people may search a term. A popular phrase for work you don't do is a poor target. Start with fit with a real service, then consider whether the reader is likely to make contact, whether you can deliver the requested work and the resources needed for a good answer.
Fix first
A genuine, important service and clear intent already have a page, but it lacks a clear offer, service area or contact option.
Potential new content
A recurring customer question with an authentic professional answer, distinct from existing pages and maintainable over time.
Set aside for now
A service you don't offer, a shallow content idea, insufficient resources to keep it current, or an answer an existing page already handles well.
A simple high / medium / low business relevance label may help, but it's your own decision aid, not a Google SEO score or evidence of search volume.
Copyable keyword-to-page worksheet
Open a note or spreadsheet and complete the same six fields for every idea. The worksheet is finished when the next action is tied to a page and a specific customer answer, not when you've collected a hundred words.
| Customer's phrase / question | Intent | Do we actually offer it? | Existing URL | Missing answer / next action | Priority + reason |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| … | information / price / provider / brand | yes / no | … or none | improve / new content / exclude | high / medium / low, because … |
A 30–45 minute planning exercise
- First 10 minutes: write down real customer questions and everyday wording.
- Next 10–15 minutes: inspect some search results and – if available – your Search Console data.
- Next 10 minutes: match topics to existing pages, proposed new content or exclusions.
- Final 5–10 minutes: choose one useful improvement and note how you'll verify completion.
This is a suggested task schedule, not a research-based average time. A broader range of services may need several rounds.
Five mistakes to avoid
- Relying only on internal industry jargon. Also try the words your customers would use.
- Creating several weak pages for the same topic. Search intent, not phrase count, should define page boundaries.
- Targeting services you don't provide. Traffic alone isn't a customer.
- Optimising keyword density instead of answering questions. Artificial repetition can't replace clear, accurate content.
- Treating one estimate as a certain market size. Trends, Planner and Search Console answer different questions.
Once the list is ready, check whether the page really answers “what, where, for whom and under what conditions?”. The guide to the three areas of SEO offers a next step. If visitors arrive but don't request quotes, see the conversion troubleshooting guide too.
Frequently asked questions about keyword research
Do I need a paid keyword research tool?
Not necessarily. Customer questions, your own website and available free data can be enough to start. A paid tool may help with large datasets or complex markets, but it can't determine business relevance for you.
Do I need a separate page for every keyword?
No. If phrases address the same user goal and answer, one strong, clear page is usually better than many repetitive variants.
Is there an ideal keyword density?
No universally required percentage guarantees rankings. Natural wording and a complete, trustworthy answer matter more.
What is a long-tail keyword?
Usually a phrase expressing a more specific, narrower search need. Not every long phrase is rare, and length alone doesn't prove low competition.
How will I know whether the research was useful?
You'll have an initial improvement list and appropriate destination pages for important services, and later you can observe changes through Search Console, usage data and real enquiries. There are no guarantees.
Sources and professional references
Open official sources
Google Search Central: SEO Starter Guide ↗ – Customer language and helpful content.
Google Search Console: performance data ↗ – Impressions and clicks for your own website.
Google Trends: understanding the data ↗ – Relative, normalised interest.
Google Ads: Keyword Planner ↗ – Advertising-oriented estimates and ideas.
Related Knowledge Base guides
Next step · Kaluzsa
Don't just collect searches – attract relevant prospects
Tell me which services matter most. We can discuss which search topics should shape your website content.