Editor’s Note: This post was originally published in March 2016. This time around, the post really aims to meet the needs of those new to blogging or in dire need of blog ideas. The Übersuggest tool maintains the same utility today as it did then, but with one update for Firefox users.
You’ve just opened a new business, or maybe you’ve been in business for a while now. Your friends, family, and closest neighbors were your first customers. Great! We’re thrilled your neighbor Ned and Aunt Ellie gave their support, but what happens when the initial spike of business starts to dwindle?
Somewhere along the way you learned about content marketing, and that a blog is a solid, market-tested way to bring in more business. It’s true. So, you sat down and cranked out a first blog that took you hours to curate. That should drive traffic back up at your location or on your site, right?
Not quite. I’m just going to be blunt here. Don’t have a blog just to have a blog. Blogs are not one-and-done ventures. So while writing a single mind-blowing post and walking away might score you some serious social kudos and more visits for a few days, those positive effects will wear off, and more quickly than you might expect.
You have to keep adding more blogs for sustained benefits. This means more writing, which means you have to keep coming up with fresh ideas for content.
What, you say? I already run a business. How can I possibly run a blog too?
Like almost everything in life, doing something and doing something well are not one in the same. A blog is like a baby, which is to say, it needs to be fed—often. Don’t starve your blog. One of the main reasons people give up on blogging is because they run out of things to write about—or at least, they think they’ve run out of new ideas.
That is until tools like this one enter the scene to come to the rescue.
What is Übersuggest?
Take your keyword research to the next level with tons of keyword ideas
for SEO, PPC, and your next content marketing campaign.
-Übersuggest website
First of all, you will be pleased to learn that it’s FREE and easy to use for beginners. You’re probably wondering now how something can be both free and effective, right? It’s the web—anything is possible. Übersuggest is a research tool that quickly generates a plethora of keywords in response to any words you type in the field.
Aside from being an exceptionally simple site—no distraction—it also touts its ability to yield keywords that are not available in the Google Keyword Planner, another keyword research tool that you can check out later.
But first, let’s check out Übersuggest more closely.
How does Übersuggest Work?
Tools are useless if you either use the wrong ones or don’t know how to use those that are the right ones.
Fortunately for you, this short video below—like, under 60 seconds kind of short—does a pretty good job of showing you what to do for basic keyword research. In the time it takes to pop a bag of kettle corn, you will have learned what this tool is and how to use it for your own keyword search.
Let’s pretend you just opened a coffeehouse in town. You’re stoked about making sure the locals, as well as worldly visitors, come to your shop for their java fixes. But, you’re so busy running your new shop that you barely sleep, let alone have time to constantly whip up ideas you need for your blog. You know you needed them yesterday, and you might even understand the value of SEO and keywords for small businesses like yours. Excellent, you’ve done the hard work already in learning this. Ahead are the easy steps.
In almost the same amount of time that it takes you to type in keywords, you can view a long list of available blog ideas by following these steps:
- Visit their site.
- Type in your desired keyword(s) in the search bar.
- Press ‘Enter’ and bam! Your keyword search results appear. Pick a few and get to writing. Or, if you still can’t allot time to make this happen, hire a content writer or find a service that can help with this.
- Optional: Select your preferred source from the drop-down menu. The default setting is Web, which is most common. The other selections are Images, Shopping, YouTube, and News. Play around with these to best find what you want.
- If you’re not viewing it in your native language, you can use the other drop-down menu to select your language. There are many.
The more basic your word search, the longer the results will be. While this sounds inviting, it might be helpful to limit your results from 1,000 broad topics to maybe 200 useful ones for you.
Why Use ÜberSuggest Keyword Suggestion Tool?
The question here is, why not give it a shot? Now that you know what it is and how it works, you might still be wondering what the big deal is with keywords. More specifically, you might be curious as to how they can help you generate more ideas for your own blog.
Unless you have a knack for spouting out a dozen ideas for your business keywords like a machine—week after week—this Übersuggest keyword tool is worth trying and the price is right, especially as you grow your business and need to be mindful of expenses.
How to Get the Most out of Übersuggest
Like an exercise machine or a kitchen gadget, the best way to get the most out of Übersuggest—or any tool for that matter—is to use it.
Hopefully, by now you’ve tried out the basic keyword search function. Ready for the next level? That’s right. You’ve nailed the basics, so the time has arrived to step it up and put a little more thought into your keyword research.
Pretend you’re a human on the other side of the Übersuggest portal. Someone who teaches woodworking has sat down to try the tool for the first time. He wants more people to sign up for his woodworking classes. He types in “woodworking” and so you think of a thousand results because, in your mind, woodworking is a broad topic. While it could be useful, doing this is going to offer everything under the sun, moon, and stars.
What Mr. Woodworker could do to improve his search is recognize additional words that will help to hone in on more specific keyword results, thus producing ideas he will want to use for his next dozen blogs or more.
Look what appears for keyword ideas when he says to you, or rather, types in: “how to make a table and chairs.”
Now, you don’t have to think of everything because he’s now told you he wants “how to make…” keywords. Okay, roleplay is over. You’re you again—the one needing ideas.
Do you see how being more specific with your own search can help Übersuggest find better keywords for you and those searching for your services?
Want to learn what the search volume is for your keywords or the cost-per-click? Install the KeywordEverywhere extension, which is also free. When we last wrote about Übersuggest in March 2016, this extension was only available for Chrome, but now you can use it with Firefox (update since March 2016 post). This is great news for those of you who just aren’t one with Chrome.
Final Thoughts
I hope you’re pumped up now and full of blog ideas after using Übersuggest.
This blog post had a two-fold purpose. The first was to introduce you to, or remind you of, an-easy-to-use free resource for keyword research. In less than 30 seconds you might have already discovered your next 30 blog topic ideas. That’s a pretty good return-on-time investment, if you ask me.
The second purpose is broader, because there’s a lot more to blogging than meets the eye. Experiment with this tool, but don’t stop with this one alone. There are many more ways to come up with topic ideas, to include social media platforms, such as Pinterest. Or you could just read a blog about how to think of blog topics. Discover for yourself which ones work best for your blog and strategy.
Also, know that it’s not ideal to rely on tools alone to do all the heavy lifting. Are you rolling your eyes now, after everything I just wrote above? Stay with me here. While they can be powerful game changers and timesavers, you still need to be proactive with your blogging strategy if any of this is to matter in the end. These tools are here to help, but they won’t do all of the work for you.
If after all this you’re still not sure exactly what keywords do and how they help you get better content, I might have to fire myself.
On a serious and final note, learning how to make your content work for you takes time. Relax. The idea is to continue soaking up knowledge and resources, especially when made available at no cost and provided by industry experts. While there are more advanced keyword search tools out there, giving you more information about the free Übersuggest keyword suggestion tool is just our way of taking down a blogging barrier, which is oftentimes finding new ideas to write about.
With the right tools and a little work, you can unleash the potential your blog has to keep your business running strong (digitally, and otherwise, too) for years.
