If you haven't been to the free google keyword research tool lately, you are in for a big and pleasant surprise.  For the first time EVER, Google is now showing estimated search traffic.  In the past, we've always had to guess what the real volume was based on Overture or Word Tracker results.  But we never really knew if the Google Search volume was 5x or 10x of what WordTracker told us. 

Well, now we know.  At least approximately. 

Here's where you can use the tool completely free.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

By default, the results will show you:

• The Keyword
• Advertiser Competition
• Approx Search Volume: prior month
• Approximate Average Search Volume

It gets even better.  There is a drop down list of choices where you can show and hide other pieces of data.  The cool stuff you can view is:

• Estimated Average CPC - or Cost Per Click.  Now you can see how much it will cost you without setting up dummy campaigns.  Nice!
• Estimated Ad Position for the Cost Per Click shown.
• Search Volume Trends for the past 12 months.  It's a bar graph that shows the relative search volume for the past year.  Think Holiday season spikes.  Now you can see it at a quick glance.  Traffic and sales taking a dive in the summer?  Just look here and you may find out why.
• Highest Volume Occured in - this shows the month that the most amount of searches occured for the particular keyword.

My suggestion:  Run, don't walk over to Googles free keyword tool and check out some really cool numbers. 

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Pretty cool stuff.  What do you think?

Talk soon…

Dan Buglio