Keyword research for small businesses, without paid tools
You do not need an expensive subscription to learn what your customers type into Google. Four free sources will tell you most of it.
Keyword research sounds technical. In practice it is one question: what words do people use when they need what you sell, and are you using those same words on your website? Here is how to answer that without spending anything.
1. Your own inbox and phone
Read the last twenty enquiries you received. Write down the exact phrases customers used to describe their problem. This is the most valuable keyword list you will ever have, because it is real demand in real language — and it is almost never the language on the business's own website.
2. Google's own suggestions
- Start typing your service plus your town into Google and note every autocomplete suggestion.
- Scroll to 'People also ask' and write down each question — those are ready-made page sections or blog posts.
- Check 'Related searches' at the bottom of the page for phrasing you had not considered.
3. Your competitors' page titles
Search your main service and open the top five local results. Look at the blue headline in the search result and the main heading on the page. Those are the phrases they are deliberately targeting. You are not copying them — you are learning the vocabulary of your market, then finding the gaps nobody covers.
4. Free Google Search Console
If your site is already online, Search Console shows the searches that already put you in front of people. Sort by impressions: anything where you appear often but rank around positions 8 to 20 is a page worth improving, because the demand is proven and you are already close.
Turn the list into pages
Group the phrases by intent, not by wording. 'Emergency plumber', 'burst pipe help' and 'plumber open now' are one page, not three. Give each intent one clear page, use the phrase naturally in the page title, the main heading and the first paragraph, and answer the question properly. That is ninety percent of small business SEO.
One thorough page that genuinely answers a question will out-rank five thin pages that repeat a keyword.
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