Keyword Suggestions

In this guide you’ll learn more about the Keyword Suggestions section in Keyword Explorer, including how to filter and group keyword suggestions. If you need help understanding any of the metrics used throughout Keyword Explorer please see our keyword metrics guide.

Quick Links

• Getting Started with Keyword Suggestions
• Keyword Relevancy
• Filter and group top suggestions
• Suggestions list
• Suggestions list – grouped keywords
• Export Keyword Suggestions
• Understanding Keyword Suggestions Terminology

To get started with Keyword Suggestions:

1. Enter a keyword in the box provided

2. Select a market via the drop-down

3. Click Analyze

From here, the tool will provide a list of top keyword suggestions based on your seed keyword, sorted by Relevancy. You can then filter, sort, and group these suggestions as you explore them.

By default, the suggestions listed are sorted by Relevancy. A higher Relevancy score indicates that the keyword meets the following criteria:

• It shows up in a higher number of sources
• It is lexically similar to the original seed keyword you entered

Maximum Relevancy is indicated by five blue dots.

Above the suggestions table are various filter options that can be applied to the results. These filters can help you further narrow down and group your keywords during your research.

Filter by type of result

The first set of filters is based on the source, or type, of result. Selecting a source will update the results below, along with the title of the results table.

The filter options include:

• Top suggestions — This filter shows you keyword suggestions from all other filter suggestion types, sorted by Relevancy.
• Questions – This filter shows you keyword suggestions that contain your keyword query and are in the form of a question. For example, “how to make cupcakes” or “what temperature to bake cupcakes.”
• Closely related topics – This filter uses Moz’s topic modeling algorithm to extract terms and phrases we found on many web pages that also contained the query terms. For example, keywords like “chocolate cake” and “desserts” were found on many of the pages that had the words “cupcakes” and thus will appear in these suggestions.
• Broadly related topic – This filter expands upon the topic modeling system above to include synonyms and more broadly related keywords for a more iterative extraction process and a wider set of Keyword Suggestions. If Closely related topics suggestions are not what you’re looking for, this filter often provides better results.
• Similar SERPs – This filter analyzes the top-ranking pages for your entered query and identifies other search terms or phrases commonly associated with those pages. For example, if you search for "cupcakes," this filter might discover that many top-ranking pages for "cupcakes" also rank well for related searches like "easy cupcake recipes" or "cupcake decorating ideas." It works by:
  • Examining the search results for your initial query
  • Identifying the top-ranking pages for that query
  • Analyzing those pages to find other search terms they rank well for

The Questions filter is great for finding popular queries that you could address with an informative blog post. Play around with these results to familiarize yourself with the different options and results.

The Similar SERPS filter helps you uncover related search terms and potential content opportunities based on high-performing pages in your niche.

Group by lexical similarity

Lexical similarity is a measure of how similar a set of words are to each other. Within Keyword Suggestions, you can group keywords by Low, Medium, and High lexical similarity. Grouping by Low lexical similarity will give you fewer groups with more keywords in each group while grouping by High lexical similarity will give you more groups with fewer keywords in each group.

Filter by search term

The Filter by search term box allows you to select whether you’d like to see all search terms, only ones that include your seed keyword or only ones that don’t include your seed keyword.

• None selected – Keywords including and excluding the seed keyword will be listed.
• Includes the keyword – This filter will show only suggestions that include your seed keyword. For example, if you entered “ice cream recipes,” this filter would only show suggestions that contain the words “ice,” “cream,” and “recipes.”
• Excludes the keyword – This filter will show only suggestions that do not include your seed keyword. For example, if you entered “ice cream recipes,” suggestions might include “frozen custard” or “gelato recipes” but nothing with “ice cream recipes.”

The search term filter is very handy for brainstorming other terms people are searching for that you may not have thought of.

The list of suggestions will update to reflect the filters selected above and will include the following data:

A. Keyword – The suggested keyword based on your seed keyword.

B. Relevancy – By default, the suggestions are sorted by Relevancy. This means keywords that show up in the most sources and are lexically the closest to the original search term you entered. Maximum Relevancy is indicated by five blue dots.

C. Search Intent — Search intent indicates a user's primary goal when searching for a given keyword. Search engines use intent to inform the type of content served in the SERP. In Keyword Suggestions, Search Intent, which is powered by Moz Data and generated by Moz AI, identifies the most likely intent for the listed keyword. Below are the four primary types of search intent you may see noted in this column:

• Informational – The user is searching for specific information on a topic.

• Navigational – The user is searching for an online location or page of a website.

• Commercial – The user is searching with the goal of investigating or comparing brands, products, or services. Commercial intent occurs before transactional intent.

• Transactional – The user is searching for a product or service to purchase.

D. Monthly Volume – An indication of the demand for a keyword. This is the number of searches for a keyword in any given month.

E. Difficulty – A score from 0 (easy) to 100 (difficult) that estimates how difficult it would be for you to rank higher than the current competitors on the first page of search results. Click the refresh icon if a Difficulty score is not shown in the table.

F. SERP Analysis – Click Analyze SERP to be taken to SERP Analysis, where you can further investigate the search engine results page for this keyword.

G. Last Updated – The date of the last refresh of the Monthly Volume and Difficulty for this keyword.

Add to Campaign

To add keywords to an existing Moz Pro Campaign within your account, follow these steps:

1. Select the keywords you want to track using the checkboxes on the left
2. Click Add to Campaign at the top of the table
3. Select the Campaign you’d like to add these keywords to using the drop-down
4. Click Add to Campaign

If a keyword is already being tracked in a Campaign, it will be marked with a Tracked label in the suggestions list.

Click the Tracked label to see which Campaigns are tracking this keyword. You can then click the Campaign name to be taken to that Campaign.

Add to Keyword List

To add keywords to a Keyword List, follow these steps:

1. Select the keywords you want to track using the checkboxes on the left
2. Click Add to keyword list at the top of the table
3. Open the drop-down provided and select the keyword list you’d like to add these keywords to, or select Create a new keyword list
4. Click Add to List

Columns

Customize your view of the suggestions list by selecting the Columns button at the top of the table. This will open a window in which you can select which columns you’d like displayed in the table. Toggle the buttons to the left to remove or add columns to your view.

Filters

The Filters option at the top of the table allows you to add advanced filtering to the results in the table. There are three filter options available, and the second box will update based on the filter type selected.

Keyword — Use this filter to indicate whether the results should include particular terms from the keyword suggestions provided. This will allow you to keep your suggestions laser-focused on the terms you care most about. The Keyword filter offers the following options.

• Contains — Specifies that only keywords, including the term entered in the filter, should be displayed.
• Equals —Specifies that keywords that exactly match the term entered in the filter should be displayed .
• Is tracked – Specifies to only show keywords that are currently being tracked in a Moz Pro Campaign.
• Is not tracked – Specifies to only show keywords that are not currently being tracked in a Moz Pro Campaign.

Relevancy – Use this filter only to see keywords with a specific Relevancy score. The Relevancy filter offers the following options.

• Equals – Specifies that only keywords with the selected Relevancy score will be displayed.
• Is any of – Specifies that only keywords with the selected Relevancy scores will be displayed. This option allows you to select multiple Relevancy scores at once.
• Monthly Volume – Use this filter to specify a monthly volume range for the results displayed. The Monthly Volume filter offers the following options.
• Is greater than – Specifies that only keywords with a search volume higher than the value entered should be displayed.
• Is less than – Specifies that only keywords with a search volume less than the value entered should be displayed.

Search Intent – Use this filter to indicate whether the results should include keywords with a specific Search Intent associated with them. The Search Intent filter offers the following options.

• Contains – Specifies that keywords with the selected search intent(s) should be displayed.
• Does not contain – Specifies that only keywords without the selected search intent(s) should be displayed.
• Is exactly – Specifies that only keywords with the selected search intent(s) should be displayed. If multiple search intents are selected with this filter, only keywords that have all selected search intents associated with them will be displayed.

Monthly Volume Range – Use this filter to specify a monthly volume range for the results displayed. The Monthly Volume filter offers the following options.

• Is – Specifies that only keywords with the selected volume range should be displayed.
• Is not – Specifies that only keywords that don’t have the selected volume range should be displayed.
• Is any of – Specifies that only keywords with the selected volume ranges should be displayed. This filter options allows you to select multiple volume ranges at once.

Difficulty – Use this filter to specify a Difficulty range for the results displayed. The Difficulty filter offers the following options.

• Is greater than – Specifies that only keywords with a Difficulty score higher than the value entered should be displayed.
• Is less than – Specifies that only keywords with a Difficulty score less than the value entered should be displayed.
• Is empty – Specifies that only keywords without a Difficulty score should be displayed. You may request a Difficulty score by clicking the refresh icon.
• Is not empty – Specifies that only keywords with a Difficulty score should be displayed.
• Is low – Specifies that only keywords with a low Difficulty score (1-39) should be displayed. A low Difficulty score will be indicated with a green ring.
• Is moderate – Specifies that only keywords with a moderate Difficulty score (40-60) should be displayed. A moderate Difficulty score will be indicated with a yellow/orange ring.
• Is high – Specifies that only keywords with a high Difficulty score (61-100) should be displayed. A high Difficulty score will be indicated with a red ring.

Last Updated — Use this filter to identify keywords with a Difficulty and Monthly Volume refreshed within a specific date range. The Last Updated filter offers the following options.

• Is — Specifies that only keywords with the chosen refresh date will be displayed.
• Is not — Specifies that only keywords not refreshed on the chosen date will be displayed.
• Is after — Specifies that only keywords refreshed after the chosen date will be displayed.
• Is on or after — Specifies that only keywords refreshed on or after the chosen date will be displayed.
• Is before — Specifies that only keywords refreshed before the chosen date will be displayed.
• Is on or before — Specifies that only keywords refreshed on or before the chosen date will be displayed.
• Is empty — Specifies that only keywords that have not been refreshed will be displayed.
• Is not empty — Specifies that only keywords that have been refreshed will be displayed.

You can add multiple filters to your results using this feature and can specify how the filters should be applied. For example, in the screenshot below, the following filters have been applied to the results:

• Only show keywords that contain the word “vanilla”
• And only show keywords with a relevancy score of 4 or 5
• And only show keywords with a search volume between 900 and 10,000 searches per month

If the group by lexical similarity filter is selected, the list of suggestions will update to show groups of keywords. These groups will be created based on whether low, medium, or high similarity is selected.

When grouping is selected, keyword groups will be collapsed by default with the number of keywords in the group indicated in parentheses. Click the arrow to the left to expand the group and see the keywords nested within the group itself.

While all other filter options will be available, the list of suggestions will have different column headers when grouping is implemented:

A. Keyword group – The primary keyword used to create the keyword group. This is the keyword that lexical similarity is based on for this particular group. Expand the keyword group to see the keywords in the group.

B. Relevancy (Average) – The average Relevancy score of the keywords in this keyword group. By default, the suggestions are sorted by Relevancy. This means keywords that show up in the most sources and are lexically the closest to the original search term you entered. Maximum Relevancy is indicated by five blue dots. Expand the keyword group to see the Relevancy Volume for each keyword in the group.

C. Search Intent – Search intent indicates a user's primary goal when searching for a given keyword. Search engines use intent to inform the type of content served in the SERP. In Keyword Suggestions, Search Intent identifies the most likely intent for the listed keyword.

D. Monthly Volume (Total) – The total monthly volume for all the keywords in this group. This metric is an indication of the demand for a keyword. This is the number of searches for a keyword in any given month. Expand the keyword group to see the Monthly Volume for each keyword in the group.

E. Difficulty (Average) – The average Difficulty score for the keywords in this group. A score from 0 (easy) to 100 (difficult) that estimates how difficult it would be for you to rank higher than the current competitors on the first page of search results. Click the refresh icon if a Difficulty score is not shown in the table. Expand the keyword group to see the Difficulty score for each keyword in the group.

F. SERP Analysis – Click Analyze SERP to be taken to SERP Analysis, where you can further investigate the search engine results page for this keyword. When a keyword group is collapsed, there will not be an option to Analyze SERP. Expand the group to see this option.

G. Last Updated – The date of the last refresh of the Monthly Volume and Difficulty for this keyword.

You can export Keyword Suggestions to CSV or Excel using the Export button on the top right.

Within each export of Keyword Suggestions, the following data will be included.

A. Keyword – The keyword suggestion based on the original query

B. Tracked – Indicates whether this keyword is currently being tracked in a Moz Pro Campaign within your account. TRUE means it is being tracked, and FALSE means it is not currently tracked.

C. Campaigns – The Campaigns in which this keyword is currently being tracked.

D. Min Monthly Volume – The lower end of the monthly volume range for this keyword.

E. Max Monthly Volume – The higher end of the monthly volume range for this keyword.

F. Relevancy — Keywords that show up in the most sources and are lexically the closest to the original search term entered have a higher Relevancy score. In the CSV export, a score of 1 is considered 100% relevant. The smaller the Relevancy score, the less relevant the keyword is to your original query.

G. Monthly Volume — The search volume for this keyword suggestion

H. Difficulty – The difficulty score for this keyword

I. Last updated – The date the stats for this keyword were last refreshed.

For definitions of each filter option, please see above. More information about Keyword Metrics is available in the Keyword Metrics section. More definitions for Moz Pro terminology can be found in our glossary.

Monthly Volume - The number of searches for that keyword for any given month - this is an indication of demand for that keyword

Min Monthly Volume - (As seen in CSV exports) The lower end of the search volume range for a keyword

Max Monthly Volume - (As seen in CSV exports) The higher end of the search volume range for a keyword

Single number monthly volume - (Specific Monthly Volume in CSV exports) The unranged search volume for a keyword

Relevancy - Keywords that show up in the most sources and are lexically the closest to the original search term entered have a higher relevancy score