Why You Should Care About Keyword Difficulty

Showing up on Google’s first page of a search is the Holy Grail for many businesses and brands, but it takes more than just good luck to get there—it takes hard work, dedication, and a little bit of know-how. Luckily, keyword difficulty can help give you an idea of how difficult (or easy) it will be to rank for specific keywords on Google’s first page.

But what exactly does that mean? How does keyword difficulty affect SEO? And how do you go about finding easy-to-rank keywords?

Let’s dig into the details. Read on to discover why you should care about this metric and how it can help you bring more traffic to your website.

Keyword Difficulty Is Now a Relevant SEO Metric

Keyword difficulty is a metric that’s used to measure the competitiveness of keywords. In other words, it tells you how hard it will be to rank for that keyword relative to other, similar terms. This can help you decide which keywords are worth targeting and which ones aren’t worth your time and effort.

Some factors that affect keyword difficulty include:

• Monthly ad spend (how much advertisers are willing to pay for clicks on their ads)
• Average click-through rate(CTR)
• Average number of competing pages per SERP position

Why You Should Care

Since Google’s algorithm considers this metric when determining a page’s ranking, knowing how difficult it would be to rank for certain keywords can help you prioritize which keywords deserve your attention first. You’ll also have insight into what content types may perform better than others in search engines.

The Benefits of Low-Difficulty Keywords

When identifying low-difficulty keywords, look for opportunities that are less competitive and focus on optimizing your website around them. Long-tail keywords have fewer competitors, so you can start by targeting these. Avoid wasting time and resources trying to rank for competitive terms that may be out of your reach.

In general, low competition keywords that have a high search volume are great to target in the early stages of your SEO strategy.

Higher Rankings

You can’t benefit from your posts if others can’t find them. Ranking high in organic search results brings more traffic from people looking to buy a product or service like yours.

More Conversions

Even if they don’t buy right away, more customers will be exposed to your brand and may convert later on down the line. Plus, they’ll see your awesome posts again and again on the first page of their searches.

More Traffic

More traffic means more conversions, which means more revenue and brand awareness. More traffic also means that your website’s ranking in search results will improve—which also happens to be helpful for getting more clicks and conversions!

Get Your Brand on Google’s First Page

Keyword difficulty should be part of your SEO toolkit, and we hope this guide has given you a good overview of what it is and how to calculate it. Keep in mind, though that while low-difficulty keywords may be easier to rank for and drive more traffic, they’re not always the best option. Visit our web development posts for more information on choosing the right terms for your SEO.