Most advice on how to do keyword research starts in a tool. Someone types the service name into a keyword planner, sorts by volume, and the website ends up chasing phrases that are popular, vague and searched by people who will never buy.
Doing it well comes down to three judgements: which phrases your real customers use, what each searcher expects to find, and which single page should answer them. Get those right and the rest of an SEO-friendly website has something solid to build on.
The examples follow one business throughout: a contractor that installs industrial floors for factories and warehouses.
How to do keyword research: the short answer
For a service business, the process has six steps:
- Collect your customers’ own words from sales calls, enquiries and Google Search Console.
- Widen the list with autocomplete, People also ask and Google Keyword Planner.
- Label each phrase’s intent: informational, navigational, commercial investigation or transactional.
- Read the live results page to see which kind of page Google rewards.
- Judge on business value and intent first, volume last.
- Map one primary keyword to each page, then check for pages competing for the same search.
Repeat the process in every language your customers search in.
Step 1: start with the evidence you already have
Keyword tools show what people search for in general. Your own records show how your customers describe a problem, often before they know the industry term, which makes them the best starting point for keyword research for small business websites.
Sales calls and enquiry emails
Read your recent enquiries and ask whoever answers the phone what callers ask first. Write down the exact wording, not your tidied-up version. Listen for:
- The problem, in their words. “Our warehouse floor is cracking and dusty”, not “industrial floor remediation”.
- The questions before a decision. Cost, disruption to operations, lifespan, one material against another.
- Words you never use. If customers say “epoxy floor” and your website says “resin floor systems”, you have found a gap.
The Search Console Performance report
If your site is live, open Performance → Search results in Google Search Console, choose at least three months of data (it keeps up to 16), and look for three patterns in the Queries tab:
- Non-brand queries. Filter out your name with “Queries not containing” (or the built-in non-branded filter, where offered) to see what Google already associates with you.
- Many impressions, few clicks, average position beyond page one. Google sees you as relevant, but the page isn’t strong enough or isn’t the right type. These are often the quickest wins.
- Queries answered by the wrong page. Click a query, then the Pages tab. If your homepage is fielding a question about cost, you probably need a page that answers it.
Search Console leaves rare queries out of the table to protect searchers’ privacy, so the list is never complete.
Step 2: widen the list with free sources
Now find the variations and follow-up questions around each phrase.
Autocomplete, People also ask and related searches
Type a phrase into Google and note the suggestions, then add modifiers such as “cost”, “vs”, “for” and “near”. Google says its predictions reflect real searches. The People also ask box shows the questions searchers ask next, and related searches at the foot of the page show how they refine a search. Both are good material for FAQs and supporting guides.
Google Keyword Planner
Keyword Planner is free but sits inside Google Ads, so you need an account with its setup completed. Enter seed phrases or a competitor’s web address for related keywords with estimated monthly searches. Accounts with little or no ad spend usually see broad ranges, not exact figures, so use them to compare phrases rather than forecast visitors.
Long-tail keywords: small numbers, clear intent
Long-tail keywords are longer, more specific phrases: “anti-slip flooring for food factories” rather than “flooring”. Each is searched less often, but the searcher has told you far more, and is often closer to a decision.
Tools often show these as zero or “no data”. If customers use a phrase on the phone, others are probably typing it; judge it by the enquiry it could bring.
Step 3: label the search intent
Search intent is the reason behind a search: what the person wants to know, do or reach. Google aims to rank pages that satisfy that reason, so an excellent page of the wrong type rarely ranks well for it.
The four types of search intent
| Intent | What the searcher wants | Example | Page that usually fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Informational | To understand something | why does epoxy flooring peel | A guide or article |
| Navigational | To reach a particular site | [company name] contact | Homepage or contact page |
| Commercial investigation | To compare before choosing | epoxy vs polyurethane flooring | A comparison or cost guide |
| Transactional | To hire, book or get a quote | epoxy flooring contractor | A service or landing page |
Few searches are purely one type: “epoxy flooring cost” is part research, part buying signal. Google’s Search Quality Rater Guidelines use different labels (Know, Do, Website, Visit-in-Person) but ask the same question: what would a helpful result look like? The answer decides the page type; landing page vs homepage vs service page explains which page should take which traffic.
Step 4: read the results page before you commit
An intent label is a guess; the results page is evidence. Search each shortlisted keyword in a private window, in the market and language your customers use, and ask:
What kind of pages rank? Service pages, long guides, lists, directories, marketplaces or videos. That mix shows the format Google currently favours for the search.
What angle do they share? If most results lead with price, “for beginners” or the current year, searchers want that angle.
What else is on the page? A map of local listings signals local intent; People also ask boxes signal research. At the time of writing (August 2026), many question-style searches also show an AI-generated summary above the links, so a page aiming for them should answer plainly and early, then add the depth a summary can’t (more in Google AI Overviews and your website).
Who ranks? If page one is all large directories or major publishers, a single service page will struggle.
Turning what you see into a decision
- Results match the page you planned: target it.
- Results are all guides, but you wanted a service page: write the guide, link it to the service page, and aim the service page at a more transactional phrase.
- Results are mixed: serve the dominant intent, with a clear route to the other.
- Results are sites you can’t realistically outrank: choose a longer, more specific phrase.
Step 5: judge keywords on business value, not volume
Volume is the easiest number to sort by and the easiest to be misled by. A phrase searched thousands of times by hobbyists is worth less to our contractor than one searched a handful of times a month by factory managers. Judge each phrase in this order:
- Business value. Would you want this searcher as an enquiry?
- Intent fit. Does the results page reward a type of page you can create?
- Ability to compete. Can you offer something the current results don’t? Tools’ “difficulty” scores come from their own models; the results page is the better guide.
Volume is only a tie-breaker. For the example:
| Keyword | Likely intent | Business value | Decision |
|---|---|---|---|
| epoxy flooring contractor | Transactional | High | Primary keyword for the main service page |
| epoxy flooring cost | Commercial investigation | High | A cost guide if guides rank, otherwise a pricing section on the service page |
| epoxy vs polyurethane flooring | Commercial investigation | Medium | A comparison guide linking to both services |
| epoxy resin art | Informational, mostly hobbyists | None | Skip: likely higher volume, wrong audience |
Step 6: keyword mapping, one primary keyword per page
A keyword map assigns each target search to exactly one page. It stops pages competing, shows which are missing, and gives every page a clear job.
Group phrases that share a results page
Two keywords belong on one page when they share an intent and Google returns largely the same results for both. Search them side by side: if several top results overlap, one page can serve both; if not, they need separate pages. “Epoxy flooring contractor” and “industrial epoxy flooring company” will probably share results. “Epoxy flooring cost” probably won’t.
Build the map
| Page | Primary keyword | Secondary keywords | Intent |
|---|---|---|---|
/services/epoxy-flooring/ |
epoxy flooring contractor | industrial epoxy flooring | Transactional |
/services/anti-static-flooring/ |
anti-static flooring | ESD flooring | Transactional |
/guides/epoxy-flooring-cost/ |
epoxy flooring cost | epoxy floor price per square metre | Commercial investigation |
/guides/epoxy-vs-polyurethane/ |
epoxy vs polyurethane flooring | best industrial floor coating | Commercial investigation |
Add columns for status (live, rewrite, to create) and links. The map becomes your site structure, with guides linking up to the services they support, as internal linking and site structure explains. The on-page SEO guide covers where each keyword belongs on its page, and how to write a service page covers the content that turns a visit into an enquiry.
Check for keyword cannibalisation in Search Console
Keyword cannibalisation is when two or more of your pages compete for the same search and Google keeps switching between them. Often neither holds a steady position, and the one shown is not always the one you would choose. It creeps in as old posts, service pages and campaign pages drift into saying similar things.
The check
- In Search Console, open Performance → Search results and choose a long date range, such as six months.
- Add a Query filter set to Exact query, with your keyword.
- Open the Pages tab and note every URL with impressions.
- Keeping that filter, add a Page filter for one URL at a time and switch on Average position. If one page’s impressions rise as the other’s fall, and the position jumps when they swap, they are taking turns.
If both pages hold strong positions at once, or the query is your brand name, leave them alone.
The fixes
| Situation | Fix |
|---|---|
| Both pages serve the same searcher | Merge: combine the best of both on the stronger URL and permanently (301) redirect the other |
| One page is old, thin or redundant | Redirect: send it to the page you want to rank |
| Both pages deserve to exist | Re-angle: give one a different intent, such as turning the blog post into the comparison guide, and rewrite its title, heading and opening |
Then point your internal links for that phrase at the chosen page. The website migration SEO checklist shows how to handle redirects without losing rankings.
Research every language separately
If your customers search in more than one language, translating your keyword list is not keyword research. The phrase a translator picks is often not the one people type. Even one language shifts by market: a British searcher wants an “estate agent” or a “solicitor”, an American a “real estate agent” or an “attorney”. Between languages the gaps are wider, and different pages may rank.
So repeat the process in each language. Ask the people who talk to those customers, use autocomplete in that language, filter Search Console by country or by that language’s section of your site, and read that market’s results page. Each language gets its own keyword map, and multilingual SEO covers the structure that lets every version rank.
Put your keyword map to work
Start small: take your three most important services through the six steps and fix any cannibalisation you find, then extend the map one cluster at a time.
Keyword research pays off most before a site is built, because the map decides which pages exist and what each must say. It belongs at the start of a project, alongside structure, design and content, not sprinkled on at the end.
If you are planning a new site, our website design and development projects start from what your customers search for, with separate SEO for each language you publish in. Unsure about your current site? A free website audit shows how visible it is on Google today.