Growth GuidesHow-To
How to Choose Low-Competition Commercial SEO Keywords
A practical process for finding commercial-intent keywords worth targeting — beyond just looking at a difficulty score.
Contents
A keyword-difficulty score from a third-party tool is a useful starting filter, not a final answer — it estimates competition based on backlink profiles and general ranking signals, but it doesn’t tell the whole story about whether a specific business can realistically compete for a specific term.
Start with commercial intent, not volume
A keyword with modest search volume but clear commercial intent (someone ready to hire or buy) is usually worth more than a high-volume, purely informational term. Filtering for genuine buying intent first, then evaluating volume and competition within that filtered set, produces a more useful target list than sorting by volume alone.
Treat a difficulty score as a screening tool, not a verdict
A reasonable practice: use a third-party difficulty metric (roughly 20 or under, as a rough screening threshold) to narrow a large keyword list down to a manageable shortlist — then manually verify each one by actually looking at what’s currently ranking.
Manually check the actual current results
A difficulty score can miss real-world weakness — outdated content currently ranking, a thin page that’s ranking mostly on domain authority rather than genuine relevance, or a local pack with few genuinely optimized competitors. Looking at the actual current top results reveals opportunities a score alone won’t show.
Consider the realistic content investment required
A keyword might be “winnable” in theory but require a genuinely substantial content investment to compete — factoring in realistic effort against expected value helps prioritize a shortlist rather than chasing every technically low-difficulty term regardless of what it would actually take.
Revisit the list periodically
Competition changes — a term that was low-competition a year ago may not be today, and vice versa. A keyword strategy built once and never revisited misses both new opportunities and existing targets that have gotten harder to win.
Where this fits
Keyword selection is foundational strategic work. A Free Strategy Audit includes a real review of realistic keyword opportunities for a specific business.