Using Keyword Gap Semrush for SEO Research and Planning

Keyword Gap Semrush is a powerful tool that helps you identify gaps in your competitors' keyword strategies. This allows you to target new keywords and expand your online presence.

By analyzing your competitors' backlinks, you can uncover hidden opportunities for link building and content creation. This is especially useful for identifying gaps in your competitors' link profiles.

With Keyword Gap Semrush, you can also identify gaps in your competitors' keyword strategies and create a more comprehensive keyword list.

Keyword gap analysis and content gap analysis are often used interchangeably, but the latter may extend far beyond keywords.

The truth is, a keyword gap is specifically focused on identifying gaps in your website's keyword strategy, which is a crucial aspect of search engine optimization (SEO).

In contrast, a content gap analysis can take into account a broader range of content forms, such as broadcast and print media, ebooks, and other types of content.

A keyword gap is essentially the difference between the keywords your competitors are targeting and the ones you're not. This gap can be a major obstacle to your online success.

The Keyword Gap tool in Semrush helps identify these gaps by comparing your website's keywords with those of your competitors. It's a powerful analysis that can reveal opportunities for improvement.

By analyzing the keyword gaps, you can discover new keywords to target and improve your website's visibility in search engine results. This can lead to increased traffic and better online performance.

Keyword gap analysis and content gap analysis are often used interchangeably, but the latter may extend far beyond keywords.

A keyword gap is a specific analysis that looks at the keywords your competitors are ranking for that you're not. This is a crucial insight, as it can help you identify new opportunities to rank and gain more visibility.

Content gap analysis, on the other hand, takes into account a broader range of content forms, including broadcast and print media, as well as ebooks and other content types.

This means that content gap analysis can reveal gaps in your content strategy that go beyond just keywords.

Understanding the difference between keyword gap and content gap analysis is essential to get the most out of Semrush's keyword gap tool.

To conduct a competitive analysis, you'll need to select an SEO research tool, such as SEMRush, to help you identify gaps in your keyword strategy.

SEMRush has a dedicated competitive keyword analysis tool that allows you to compare your site with up to four competitors. Simply enter your URL and the URLs of your competitors, choose the type of keywords you want to compare, and click "Compare."

The tool will then show you the differences between your site and your competitors, including a list of top opportunities and a Venn diagram that illustrates where you overlap with your competitors in terms of keywords.

To analyze the results, look for shared, missing, weak, strong, untapped, and unique keywords. This will give you an idea of where you can improve your keyword strategy.

Here's a breakdown of what these terms mean in SEMRush:

By analyzing these keywords, you can identify areas where you can improve your content and optimize your website for better search engine rankings.

For example, if you're analyzing keywords related to "basketball shoes", you might see that "basketball shoes" has a search volume of 1,000, while "basketball sneakers" only gets about 140 searches. However, "basketball shoes" are more challenging to rank for at 35%, while "basketball sneakers" are easier at 17%.

You can also check the cost per click, competitive density, and search volume for each keyword to get a better understanding of its potential.

Here's a comparison of the search volume, keyword difficulty, and cost per click for "basketball shoes" and "basketball sneakers":

This information can help you decide which keywords to target and how to optimize your content for better search engine rankings.

To find missing keywords, click the Missing tab at the top of your spreadsheet. This is one of the most useful tools for successful competitive keyword analysis.

You'll see a long list of keywords not currently used on the domain. If you want to export your missing keywords, click the Export button at the top right of the spreadsheet.

Take a look at the search volume on the keywords you've chosen to analyze. For example, "color schemes" has a search volume of 40,500, while "color scheme" has a volume of 33,100.

The intent for both keywords is normally searched for informational purposes. You can also check the difficulty of ranking for these keywords, which can be a red flag if it's high.

Here are some key statistics to look for when analyzing missing keywords:

By analyzing missing keywords, you can discover new keyword opportunities that you may not have considered before, giving you a competitive edge.

To perform a self-search using SEMRush, you'll need to login or create an account on the platform.

First, navigate to the home page of your SEMRush account. You'll find a keyword gap link in the navigation menu on the left.

When you conduct a keyword gap analysis using Semrush, you'll get a wealth of valuable information to inform your SEO strategy.

You can identify keywords that your competitors are ranking for, but your website is not, which can help you fill the keyword gaps in your content and optimize your website for those keywords.

The Semrush tool can help you discover new keyword opportunities that you may not have considered before, giving you a competitive edge.

To make sense of the results, you can filter them by keyword, position, volume, keyword difficulty, and intent.

Here are some specific filters you can use:

By filtering the results, you can narrow down the list to keywords that are more relevant to your business and easier to rank for.

For example, if you have a brand new site with very little domain authority, you may want to start with keywords that are very easy to rank for, even if they don't get very much traffic.

Here's a table showing some of the key metrics you can use to evaluate keywords:

By analyzing these metrics, you can get a better understanding of the opportunities and challenges presented by each keyword.

Analyzing organic and paid keywords can give you a better understanding of your competition.

By comparing Asics' organic keywords with those of its competitors, you can uncover valuable insights.

You can save time by focusing on what works for your nearest competitors.

A closer look at both organic and paid keywords can help you make your Google ads work even better.

It's a smart move to analyze paid keywords, as it can help you uncover transactional keywords for better conversions.

Peeking into what words the competition is actually spending money on can be a game-changer.

Keyword gap analysis is an ongoing task that requires regular monitoring to ensure your SEO strategy remains effective. This means you can't just perform a one-time analysis and expect to be done with it.

It's crucial to adapt to market changes, competitor strategies, and evolving user behaviors. This is why regular keyword gap analyses are necessary to stay ahead of the game.

Continuous analysis will help you maintain a competitive edge and keep your website performing well in search engine rankings. Remember, SEO is an ongoing task that requires consistent effort.

Keyword gap analysis is not a static process, but rather a dynamic one that requires regular updates to reflect changes in the market and user behavior.

To use the Keyword Gap tool in Semrush, start by entering your domain and up to four competitors' domains into the tool. You can select the path according to your need, but the default option is to compare organic keyword profiles.

You'll get a results page with an in-depth comparison of the keyword profiles for all the pages you entered. The top opportunities will be displayed along with a visualization of the keyword overlap.

To get started, click on Keyword Gap in Semrush and follow the steps to enter your domain and competitors' domains. You'll get a list of keywords for what you and your competitors are running for.

By default, the "Shared" option will display a list of keywords that both you and your competitor are ranking for. You can filter the keywords by intent, such as commercial or transactional intent.

Here are the columns you'll see in the Keyword List:

To optimize results, you can incorporate new keywords into existing content, regularly perform SEO audits and competitor keyword analyses for ongoing optimization, and boost your organic website traffic.

To filter your results in SEMrush, you can start by using the Keyword Difficulty Score (KD) filter. This lets you select keywords that are "Easy" or "Very easy" to rank for.

You can also filter by keyword, position, volume, keyword difficulty, and intent. This helps you narrow down your results and focus on keywords that are most relevant to your site.

For example, you can filter by keyword difficulty and search volume to get a list of keywords that are both easy to rank for and have a decent amount of traffic.

Here are some common filters you can use:

By using these filters, you can quickly and easily narrow down your results and focus on the keywords that matter most to your site.

Once you've filtered your results, you can browse the different list tabs to get a better understanding of where your site stands in relation to the competition. These tabs include Shared, Missing, Weak, Strong, Untapped, Unique, and All.

For example, if you see a lot of keywords in the Weak tab, it means you're ranking worse than your competitors for those keywords. On the other hand, if you see a lot of keywords in the Strong tab, it means you're ranking better than your competitors for those keywords.