Keywords for a website: how to choose queries for a page and check demand

What keywords for a website are

Keyword, key query, search query: what’s the difference

These terms are often used interchangeably, though they refer to different things:

• Search query — what a specific person actually typed into the search box, with all their wording and typos included. The user formulates it.
• Keyword, or key query — the phrasing you chose for the page so it answers people’s queries. You choose it.
• «Keywords» and «key queries» are synonyms in practice. A «word» almost always means a multi-word phrase. Other names turn up too: key phrase, SEO query, search key.

The relationship is simple: a keyword is your guess at how people will phrase their task. You can only verify it with data on real search queries.

A page’s primary and supporting queries

Primary query — the most precise phrasing of the page’s task. The page’s title in search results (Title) and the main heading on the page itself (H1) are built around it.

Supporting queries — synonyms, clarifications and questions about the same task: a different word order, a clarification by method or condition, «how,» «how much,» «can I» questions. They don’t need a separate page — the page addresses them in its sections and answers.

If a «supporting» query actually describes a different task, it’s already a candidate for a different page.

Targeted, off-target and irrelevant queries

• Targeted — the person’s task matches what the page delivers. The person is searching for a service, and the page offers it.
• Off-target — same topic, different task. For example, the person wants to do something themselves, while the page offers to do it for them. This kind of query may fit a different page on the site, such as a blog article.
• Irrelevant — the words match but not the meaning. The phrase «keywords» itself is a good example: people search it both for the SEO term and for the concept from Russian-language school grammar exercises (identifying «key words» in a sentence). For a page about search, the second meaning is irrelevant.

How to choose keywords for a single page

Start with what the page offers

State the page’s task in one phrase: what the person gets once they land on it. Then ask yourself how someone who doesn’t know your internal terminology would name that task. The service name in your price list and the client’s own words often don’t match.

Write down two to five base phrasings — short phrases to start the research from. This isn’t the final list yet, just entry points: each one still needs to be expanded and checked.

If the page already exists: which queries it already ranks for

For an existing page, start with search engine data. It shows the phrasings people already use to find the page.

• Google Search Console. The Performance report shows the search queries for which the site appears in search results. To narrow the data down to one page, add a «URL containing» filter, or click the row for the page you need in the table — the data filters down to it. After that, grouping by query leaves only that page’s queries.
• Yandex Webmaster (Yandex’s counterpart of Google Search Console). The «Manage search query groups» tool shows which queries the site’s pages appear for in search, and the reverse — which pages appear for each of those queries.

What to do with the result:

• queries the page already ranks for but doesn’t address — candidates for supporting queries;
• queries unrelated to the page’s task — a reason to check whether another page on the site already answers them (more on this in the section on checking search results and ownership).

How to expand the list of phrasings

Base phrasings and your own site’s data don’t show the full demand. These help add more variants:

• search suggestions. Yandex generates them automatically from user query statistics; Google, from real user queries. Suggestions depend on who is looking at them: Yandex’s can be personalized, and Google factors in language, location and query history;
• related queries in Wordstat — the «Top queries» tab has data on queries similar to the one you entered;
• questions from page titles in search results — how other sites phrase the same task.

Yandex Webmaster also has a separate tool, «Search query selection and market analysis» (in beta status as of the check date). According to the documentation, it helps you find matching queries from a keyword and surface additional queries with non-obvious phrasings.

Another source of phrasings is the queries for which competitors’ pages show up in search. For more on where else to look for query phrasings for a site, see the article on the keyword map.

Example: a service page and a blog article

This is a hypothetical example, for illustration. A company cleans carpets and has both a service page and a blog on its site. The topic is the same, but the pages’ tasks differ — and so do their primary queries.

	Service page	Blog article
Page’s task	book carpet cleaning	clean a carpet yourself
Primary query	«carpet cleaning service»	«how to clean a carpet at home»
Supporting	«carpet cleaning service with pickup,» «how much does carpet cleaning cost»	«how to remove a stain from a carpet,» «what to use to clean pet hair off a carpet»
What not to take	«how to clean a carpet at home» — that’s the article’s task	«carpet cleaning service» — that’s the service page’s task

Hence the rule for articles: choose keywords from the question the article answers, not from the service name. For an article, the primary query is usually a question or a «how to,» while for a service page it’s the service name in the client’s own words.

How to check demand for keywords

Demand is how often people search for a phrasing. It’s measured by search volume: the number of queries over a period, according to the search engine’s data.

Wordstat: how many times a phrase was searched on Yandex

Demand on Yandex is checked in Wordstat: it shows statistics on search queries to Yandex. The main figure it gives is «Number of queries» — the total count of queries containing the given phrase.

The word «containing» is key here. The number for «carpet cleaning service» includes both «carpet cleaning service with pickup» and «carpet cleaning service at home.» Longer phrases are already counted in the shorter phrase’s number, so you can’t add their numbers to it — some queries would end up counted twice.

To phrase a query more precisely, Wordstat has operators. How they work is covered in the article on Wordstat operators for narrowing down search volume.

Keyword Planner: demand on Google

Demand on Google is shown by Keyword Planner, a Google Ads tool. According to Google Ads documentation, it helps find new keywords and gives data on the number of monthly searches for each keyword. To access its core features, you need to finish setting up a Google Ads account and provide billing details.

Keyword Planner is an advertising-platform tool. For choosing queries for a page, all you need from it is the demand data.

Region, device and seasonality

In Wordstat, results can be filtered by region and by device type: desktop, smartphone, tablet. You can view demand dynamics month by month, which shows whether interest in a phrasing grows in a particular season.

Check demand in the region where the business operates. A phrasing can be popular nationwide and rare in your city — or the other way around.

Search volume is a demand estimate, not a traffic forecast

The number in Wordstat or Keyword Planner tells you how many times a phrase was searched. It doesn’t tell you how many people will actually click through to your page.

For a decision on a single query, this means:

• high search volume doesn’t make a query the primary one if what people search it for isn’t what the page offers;
• low search volume doesn’t make a query useless: a narrow phrasing often has a precise task behind it, and it fits well as a supporting query;
• if no search volume is shown but the query precisely describes the page’s task, you don’t have to drop it — write it down with the note «demand not shown.»

Does the query fit this page: checking search results and ownership

Demand shows that a phrasing is being searched. The next two checks show whether it fits this particular page.

Does the type of page in search results match your page

Open the search results page for the query in the right region and see what’s ranking at the top: articles, catalog pages, service pages. If company pages dominate the top but you have an article, the query doesn’t fit the article as a primary query, and vice versa. For more on what type of page the search results expect for a query, see the article on search intent.

Does another page on your site already answer the query

Before assigning a query to a page, check whether it’s already taken:

• search your own site for pages with the same topic and similar headings;
• in Yandex Webmaster, check which pages of the site appear for this query; in Search Console, filter the report by query («Queries containing») and see which pages show up for it;
• if the site keeps a «query → page» table, check whether the query is already assigned to a different page.

If the query is already taken, you either leave it alone or make a separate decision about which page should answer it. The rule is simple: one task, one page. A page’s primary and supporting queries should all belong to one group of queries for one task — that group is called a cluster. For more on how to check that queries belong to the same group, see the article on clustering.

How to check a keyword for a page, step by step:

1. State the page’s task in one phrase.
2. Write down candidates: base phrasings, variants from suggestions and related queries.
3. If the page already exists, add the queries it ranks for in Search Console and Yandex Webmaster.
4. Check the search volume of each candidate in Wordstat or Keyword Planner; in Wordstat, filter by the right region.
5. Open the search results and compare the type of pages at the top with your page’s type.
6. Check whether another page on the site already answers the query.
7. Make a decision — take it as the primary query, take it as a supporting one, or skip it — and write down the reason.

Result: the page’s keyword list

The result of the research is a list, or set, of the page’s keywords: a table where every query has a role, check results and a decision. Below is a template filled in for the hypothetical service page from the example above; the values are for illustration only.

Query	Role	Demand	Search results match page type	Another page on the site	Decision and reason
carpet cleaning service	primary	yes	yes	no	take it: precise phrasing of the page’s task
carpet cleaning service with pickup	supporting	yes	yes	no	take it: a clarification of the same service
carpet cleaning at home	skip	yes	yes	no	skip: the service doesn’t include on-site visits, the query is off-target
how long does a carpet take to dry after cleaning	question	not shown	no, articles rank at the top	no	answer briefly in the page’s FAQ block
how to clean a carpet at home	skip	yes	no, articles rank at the top	blog article	skip: that’s a different page’s task
buy a carpet	skip	not checked	no, catalog pages rank at the top	no	skip: irrelevant, different task

Skipped queries with a reason are also part of the list. Next time you do keyword research, you won’t have to check them again, and anyone who opens the table later will understand the decision. The list is the basis for the page’s headings and copy; for more on how to use a query list in headings and copy, see a separate article.

Common mistakes in keyword research

• Taking the query with the highest search volume as the primary one. The primary query is the one that most precisely describes this page’s task.
• Not checking the search results. If a different type of page dominates the top, the query won’t work as the primary one for yours.
• Putting queries for different tasks on one page. «Order it» and «do it yourself» are two pages, not one.
• Taking a query that another page on the site already answers. Check first whether it’s free.
• Dropping precise phrasings because of low search volume. A narrow query often describes the page’s task better than others.
• Expecting the page to get as many visitors as the search volume shows. The query count is a demand estimate, not a traffic forecast.
• Checking demand in the wrong region. Nationwide demand and demand in your city can differ significantly.

When there are many pages: from a list to a keyword map

Keyword research for a single page works as long as there aren’t many pages and it’s clear which page handles what. When you need to decide which pages the site needs, which are missing, and which overlap on queries, lists for individual pages are no longer enough. That’s the job of the keyword map — all the site’s queries, distributed across pages — and of site structure. For details on how to build a keyword map for the whole site and how groups of queries turn into sections and URLs, see the separate articles.

If it’s more convenient to solve this with an outside team, see how we help sort out keyword research and structure when there are many pages.

Frequently asked questions

How many keywords does a single page need?

There’s no universal number. A page answers one task, so its list includes the phrasings of that task that were found and passed the checks. A narrow page might end up with a primary query and a couple of clarifications; a broader one, more.

What to do if Wordstat doesn’t show search volume for a query?

That doesn’t mean the query is useless. Check a broader phrasing and a different region, and look at your own site’s data in Search Console and Yandex Webmaster. If the query precisely describes the page’s task, you can keep it among the supporting queries with the note «demand not shown.»

Can the same query be used for two pages?

No: one task, one page. If a query seems to fit two pages, that means they have different tasks and each has its own primary query. A disputed query stays with whichever page’s task it describes more precisely.

How often should a page’s keywords be reviewed?

There’s no universal schedule. Reasons to review: new queries the page ranks for show up in Search Console or Webmaster; the search results for the primary query have changed; the page’s task or the offer itself has changed.

Is the keywords meta tag necessary?

For Google, no: Google Search Central’s documentation states that the keywords meta tag isn’t used by Google Search and doesn’t affect indexing or ranking. Yandex Webmaster’s documentation on the keywords meta tag says it can affect how well a page matches search queries. If you do fill it in, use the phrasings from the page’s query list and don’t turn the tag into a list of every query. It doesn’t replace keyword research and verification.