Google Keyword Planner is often considered the gold standard of keyword research for both paid and organic campaigns. However, since its inception 20 years ago, more advanced and user-friendly keyword research tools have appeared, so it’s always a good idea to take a look at Google Keyword Planner Alternatives.
Whether you’re looking to plan your site’s SEO strategy from scratch or you’re looking to redevelop its keyword strategy, at least several SEO tools will be essential for the planning and execution phase.
Before we dive into a list of Google Keyword Planner alternatives, let’s take a look at what makes it such a popular keyword research tool and a few of its pros and cons.
Google is the most successful and widely used search engine today. If you’re not using data and insights directly from the platform itself, it can feel like you’re missing out on key information for your SEO strategy.
Google Keyword Planner makes it easy to manage your keyword research both for organic search results and paid campaigns directly out of your Google account.
Within Google Keyword Planner, there are 2 different options:
Google Keyword Planner is a great starting point for keyword research however its focus on paid ad campaigns doesn’t necessarily make it the ideal platform if you’re looking to focus on organic search results.
Price: Free.
Best for: Businesses looking to harness the platform for paid Google Ad campaigns as opposed to generating organic traffic.
Wordtracker Scout is a highly effective keyword research tool for figuring out what your top competitors are getting right in their keyword strategy.
While you’ve probably already taken a look at your competitors’ blogs and pages in the hope of sourcing some vital keyword information, it’s a pretty time-consuming task. Without the right tool, it’s also very easy to miss out on key bits of information.
Working as a Google Chrome Extension, Wordtracker Scout functions directly out of your browser. Once installed, all you have to do is visit a competing site’s web pages, hover over the content, click the "W" button and you’ll view a cloud summary of the page’s keywords and insights.
If you prefer to research new keywords for your site, their keyword generator has access to 320 million Wordtracker keywords and an additional 95 million search engine keywords powered by SEMrush.
Price: The Chrome browser extension is free and Wordtracker Keyword Tool allows you to perform 12 free keyword searches a day while access to their keyword generator starts at $27/month for a Bronze Plan with a top tier Gold Plan costing $99/month.
Best for: Businesses looking to perform keyword research into their competitors’ pages while also generating new keyword ideas without an overwhelming amount of data or stats.
SEMrush is a one-stop shop for all of your SEO needs, but when it comes to keyword research, the platform truly shines. Their Keyword Magic tool has access to 20 billion keywords and is the largest keyword database available.
SEMrush is an unbeatable combination of accurate data, insights and detailed filters helping you hone in on those profitable keywords that will drive your organic traffic and push your site up in the rankings.
Accurately separating terms by topic, analyzing each keyword and allowing you to easily export keywords between different features means that SEMrush does the hard work for you.
In 2020, a Bulk Analysis feature was introduced that allows one to analyze up to 100 keywords at a time. New features were also added to the Keyword Overview tool & Keyword Magic Tool that enhance efficiency of determining keyword potential.
Price: Pro plans are $119.95/month. A guru plan is $229.95/month while a business plan is $449.95/month. There are discounts for annual billing and all plans come with access to 40+ different powerful SEO tools.
Best for: Businesses who have an established site or large SEO budget looking to use the best SEO toolkit available.
KWFinder is Mangool’s signature keyword research tool. Claiming that keyword research isn’t rocket science, KW Finder promises to make your life a whole lot easier when it comes to performing keyword research.
Colour coding, easy to read fonts and just generally better visual aesthetics make KWFinder a far more intuitive keyword research tool than many others.
Mangools’ particular strength is helping you identify keywords that will be much easy to rank for taking the guesswork out of keyword research.
Price: A Basic Plan is $29.90/month while a top tier Agency Plan is $79.90/month.
Best for: Businesses who want an easy to use intuitive platform that’s suitable for those without too much SEO knowledge.
If you’re looking for a more user-friendly Google Keyword Planner alternative, WordStream is an excellent choice of keyword research tool. One of the most robust keyword research tools out there, WordStream has access to a massive database of 1 trillion keywords.
Advanced and in-depth enough for pro SEO experts to use, the simple and clear layout makes it suitable for beginners too. The best news about WordStream is that despite the huge amounts of data, the tool doesn’t have premium pricing. In fact, the first 30 searches are free.
Price: Free with limits or custom pricing based on the number of daily searches.
Best for: Users who would prefer a more visually aesthetic and intuitive dashboard than Google Adwords.
Ubersuggest is a great Google Keyword Planner alternative if you’re looking for a keyword research tool to help you decide on relevant content topics too.
Along with many other keyword research tools on this list, Ubersuggest requires you to enter a seed keyword and the platform will then generate piles of suitable keyword suggestions.
Full of suggestions, one of its best features is the related keywords tab which shows you a few demonstrated uses of your chosen keyword so you know how to incorporate it into your content.
Ubersuggest also searches Images, Shopping, News and YouTube along with regular search engines.
Price: Has a free account level which gives you access to most of the keyword data offered by Ubersuggest and also has a free Chrome extension you can use from the SERPs. An Individual Plan is $38/month while a top tier Agency Plan is $130/month.
Best for: Businesses with smaller websites looking to get started with keyword research while trying other SEO tools and using an intuitive visual platform.
Moz Keyword Explorer is a user-friendly intuitive keyword research tool that provides plenty of insightful metrics and complex analysis making thorough competitive keyword analysis a whole lot easier.
Predictive keyword metrics including keyword difficulty, search volume and expected Organic Click-Through Rate help predict your ability to rank and drive traffic.
A SERP analysis feature shows you why pages rank where they do with a breakdown of the link data and elements of each ranking position.
Price: Signing up for a Moz free account allows you to perform 10 free keyword searches per month A Standard Plan is $99/month with other plans ranging in price with a Premium Plan costing $599/month.
Best for: Businesses looking for a comprehensive keyword research tool that comes as a package with other SEO tools. It’s best for businesses that won’t mind paying less and having a few more limitations than other keyword research tools.
A free browser extension, Keywords Everywhere is the ideal Google Keyword Planner alternative if you prefer to do your keyword research while on the go. While you browse the web, the extension pulls up keyword suggestions along with helpful keyword metrics to help guide your research.
Keywords Everywhere comes particularly recommended as a tool for spying on your competitors’ top-performing web pages to find out which keywords they’re using as part of their strategy.
View several different metrics including CPC, monthly search volume, and competition data.
Price: Top up system allows you to purchase credits in exchange for discovering keywords. $10 buys 100,000 credits which equal 100,000 keywords.
Best for: Users wanting a simple keyword research tool that gives them an insight into their competitors’ strategy.
Drawing on a database of 36 billion search queries sourced from 200 different search engines across the globe, it’s safe to say Keyword Discovery is a strong contender and an excellent Google Keyword Planner Alternative.
Keyword Discovery’s unique ‘Spelling Mistakes’ feature allows you to take advantage of commonly misspelt words. Often less competitive than the correctly spelt version, you can use them in your campaigns and still pull in lots of organic traffic.
Their Keyword Efficiency Index metrics help you identify those keywords with a decent search volume but that will still be easier to rank for.
Price: Pricing is dependant on the number of daily searches. A Standard Plan that comes with up to 1500 searches a day and 1000 results is free while if you want access to tools like the Keyword Analyze Tool and the Keyword Competitors Tool, you’ll need to pay for a Professional Plan at $49.95/month.
Best for: Businesses looking for an in-depth keyword research tool with detailed metrics that will help guide their content strategy.
LSI Keyword Generator is a completely free keyword research tool that is best used to help you find profitable keywords that are semantically related.
These semantically related keywords are generally less obvious than the seed keyword and show you niches where your content may be currently missing out on.
Usually less competitive and often more profitable, it pays to use synonyms and long-tail versions of your target keywords.
LSI Keyword Generator’s creative and unique approach to generating keywords will help you create relevant content with new angles that answers users’ search queries.
Price: Plans are based on the number of keyword searches each day. A Basic Plan with up to 100 searches/day is $27/month while a Premium Plan with 300 searches/day is $37/month.
Best for: Businesses and agencies looking for a fresh approach to generating unique keywords that will help keep their content super relevant.
Soovle is one of the easiest to use keyword research tools around. While it’s simple and dated in appearance, it’s a powerful tool that’s best used for quick lookups.
If you don’t want to just concentrate on Google for keyword research, Soovle is a great tool to use since it also uses other search engines for keyword research.
The keyword research tool can also help you identify less competitive long-tail key phrases that will help boost your performance in SERPs.
Price: Free
Best for: Businesses or freelancers looking for some quick keyword ideas to get them started.
Although Google still leads the way as the most used and popular search engine, their keyword research tool isn’t always the best bet if your focus is on driving organic search results.
While the tool may be the best place to start if you’re looking to carry out paid Google Ads campaigns, there are lots of Google Keyword Planner alternatives that are better for organic keyword research. More filters, longer lists and access to other search engines’ data are a few of the advantages of using a Google Keyword Planner alternative from this list.
You're reading Human-Led SEO; a regular column dedicated to illustrating how a searcher-first approach to SEO enables businesses to generate more revenue in less time from organic search.
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