You launched the product. Maybe it is a custom SaaS development project, a new online store, or a publishing site with a sharp niche. Then the quiet problem shows up. Nobody knows you exist, and you are not sure which search terms are worth chasing.
Most founders start in the wrong place. They open a keyword tool, sort by volume, and assume the biggest phrases are the best phrases. That is how you burn months writing for traffic you will never win, or traffic that will not buy anyway.
When people talk about popular SEO keywords, they usually mean terms that look big in a spreadsheet. That is not the right definition for a new product. A useful keyword brings the right person, with the right problem, to the right page.
How Customers Find a New Product
A founder I talk to every few weeks says some version of this: “We built something solid. A few customers love it. But I have no idea how people are supposed to find us.” That is the real SEO question.
The instinct is to go after broad terms like “project management software” or “online course platform.” Those look important. They also put a new product in the ring with giant companies that have years of authority, deep content libraries, and full SEO teams.
A better question is simpler. What would a real customer type into Google right before they consider your product?
Start with the buying moment
If you run a niche store, a search like “sustainable baby gifts in Austin” is often worth more than a broad product keyword. If you run a hospitality or service business, local intent matters even more. Specific phrasing changes what people click and what they expect to see next.
Search terms are not branding exercises. They are clues about timing, urgency, and fit.
What founders usually miss
Most early teams describe the product using insider language. Customers do not. They search by pain, category, or desired outcome.
Try this quick test:
- Write what you call it: your internal product label
- Write what users call it: the plain-English version from sales calls or emails
- Write what they want done: the task they are trying to finish
- Write what they are switching from: spreadsheets, old software, manual workflows, agencies
That list is the start of your keyword strategy. Not because it is polished, but because it is real.
What Popular Keywords Really Mean
“Popular” is a dangerous word in SEO. It makes founders think the goal is to rank for the biggest phrase in the category. For a new product, that is usually fantasy.
The data tells a different story. Over 94% of all keywords receive fewer than 10 searches per month, and 34.71% of all Google searches are long-tail queries containing four or more words, according to Keywords Everywhere’s SEO stats. Search demand is spread across a huge number of specific phrases, not packed into a handful of giant terms.
The three checks that matter
You do not need a technical background to judge a keyword. You need three filters.
- Search volume tells you whether people search for the phrase at all.
- Difficulty tells you how hard it may be to rank.
- Intent tells you what the searcher is trying to do.
Intent matters most. A low-volume keyword with strong purchase intent can beat a high-volume keyword that attracts window shoppers.
A better definition of popular
For a founder, a “popular” keyword should mean one of two things:
| Keyword type | What it signals | Where it belongs |
|---|---|---|
| Broad category phrase | General awareness | Top-level service or category page |
| Specific need phrase | High fit and stronger intent | Blog post, landing page, or feature page |
If someone searches “membership portal software,” they are still exploring. If they search “membership portal for nonprofit training library,” they are telling you a lot more.
Practical rule: If the phrase sounds like something a buyer would say in a meeting, keep it. If it sounds like something only marketers say, question it.
If you want outside help sorting signal from noise, a good SEO audit usually pays for itself by stopping you from publishing the wrong pages.
A Simple Keyword Discovery Workflow
You do not need a fancy setup to find the right keywords. You need a repeatable process you can run in a couple of focused sessions.
Step one, brainstorm from the problem
Start with the product problem, not the product name.
If you built an AI tool for support teams, do not begin with “AI support automation platform.” Start with the jobs people need done. Reduce ticket load. Draft replies faster. Route support requests. Build a help desk bot.
Write down phrases under four buckets:
- Problem phrases: what hurts right now
- Solution phrases: the category they think they need
- Alternative phrases: what they use today instead
- Question phrases: what they ask before buying
This step is supposed to be messy. Good.
Step two, expand with Google itself
Search your rough phrases in Google. Open the results and study what shows up.
Look at:
- People Also Ask, because it shows how real users phrase related questions
- Autocomplete suggestions, because they reveal common query patterns
- Related searches, because they expose adjacent intent
The useful habit is the same across channels. Listen for the words people use, then mirror that language on the page.
Step three, screen for fit
Now use Google Trends and an SEO tool like Ahrefs or Semrush to narrow the list.
A strong benchmark for a SaaS MVP is to screen for keywords with search volume over 1,000 per month and a difficulty score under 30, then check the search results to make sure over 70% of results match your intent, according to CRO Benchmark’s SEO strategy data. The same source notes that long-tail variants are known to convert 3x better.
That does not mean every target must clear those exact thresholds. It means you need a filtering habit.
What to keep and what to cut
Keep a phrase if:
- It matches a real customer problem.
- The search results look beatable.
- You can build a page that answers the query better than what is ranking.
Cut it if:
- The results are full of giant brands and mixed intent
- The phrase is too broad for a new site
- You cannot tell what page should rank for it
If you cannot picture the exact page you would create for a keyword, it is probably not ready for your list.
How to Validate and Prioritize Your Keywords
A long list feels productive. It is not. The win comes from choosing the few keywords that fit your business right now.
Rank by business value first
Put each keyword into one of these groups:
| Priority group | What it usually means | Best page type |
|---|---|---|
| High intent | Buyer is evaluating options | Service, product, or category page |
| Mid intent | Buyer is comparing approaches | Use case page or detailed guide |
| Low intent | Buyer is still learning | Blog post or glossary-style content |
Founders often get stuck here. They publish educational content for every topic, then wonder why traffic does not convert. Some searches need a product page, not a blog post. If your goal is sales, the page type matters just as much as the phrase itself.
A keyword is only valuable if it lands on the right page. Good SEO starts with page intent, not content quantity.
Use competitor gaps the smart way
Do not obsess over what the biggest players rank for. Look at sites that are closer to your current authority.
Keyword gap analysis can uncover winnable terms by filtering for keywords where your low-authority competitors rank. This is ideal for new sites wanting to avoid battling established giants. For platform migrations, this technique can help recover traffic 2x faster, based on Senuto’s guide to low-competition keywords.
That is a practical founder move. You are not asking, “What does the market leader rank for?” You are asking, “What are the reachable wins for a site like mine?” If you are making similar judgment calls in product experiments, this kind of thinking lines up well with how A/B testing for founders works. You test the next smart move, not the fantasy move.
Build small clusters, not giant spreadsheets
Once you prioritize, group related terms around one page idea.
For example:
- One core page for “headless CMS migration”
- Supporting pages for specific industries or use cases
- One or two articles answering adjacent questions
That creates a site structure people can understand and search engines can crawl cleanly. It also keeps you from publishing five weak pages that all target nearly the same phrase.
Keyword Examples for SaaS, Ecommerce, and Media
This gets easier once you see the pattern. You are matching keyword intent to business model, then matching that intent to the right page type.
Here is a simple working table.
Example Keyword Mapping by Business Model
| Business Model | Informational Keyword | Transactional Keyword |
|---|---|---|
| SaaS project management tool | how to manage client work across small teams | project management tool for client services |
| Ecommerce store for sustainable home goods | how to choose reusable kitchen products | sustainable kitchen products online |
| Niche media site for real estate investors | how to evaluate rental market trends | real estate investor membership platform |
These are not magic phrases. They are examples of the pattern you want. The informational keyword teaches. The transactional keyword sells. For commerce brands, this usually works best when the keyword plan lines up with your product structure, category pages, and conversion flow. That is why SEO and ecommerce development often need to be planned together.
Two angles founders often ignore
The first is the so-called zero-volume keyword. Do not ignore keywords that tools report as having “zero search volume.” Google’s own data shows 15% of all searches are brand new, as explained in Suso Digital’s piece on zero search volume keywords. For a new product, ultra-specific phrases can be a fast way to get in front of the right people.
A phrase can look invisible in a tool and still be valuable if it matches a real buying problem.
The second is local intent. If your business serves a city, region, or physical market, location words belong in your keyword list from day one. Founders skip this all the time, especially in ecommerce, hospitality, and real estate.
A simple way to think about examples
- SaaS: target role plus job to be done
- Ecommerce: target product plus use case or location
- Media: target topic plus audience need
- Services: target outcome plus industry context
That is enough to build your first content and page plan without drowning in SEO jargon.
From Keywords to Customers, Your Next Steps
The useful shift is this. Stop asking, “What are the most popular SEO keywords?” Start asking, “What does my best future customer search when they are close to action?”
That changes everything. It changes what pages you build, what content you publish, and what terms you ignore.
The next three moves
- Make a short list: pick ten keywords, not a hundred
- Match each keyword to one page: product page, use case page, or article
- Add local terms if they matter: about 46% of all Google searches have local intent, and “near me” keywords generate around 800 million searches per month in the U.S. alone, according to SEO Sherpa’s SEO statistics roundup
If you are building a mobile product, the same discipline applies to acquisition planning more broadly. This guide on marketing mobile apps is a good reminder that channels work best when the message matches intent.
You do not need a giant SEO machine to get started. You need a clean workflow, plain-English thinking, and the discipline to build pages around buyer intent instead of vanity terms. If you need deeper support beyond this article, explore Refact’s services for founders.
If you have a rough keyword list and want a second set of eyes, talk to Refact. We have helped 100+ founders turn fuzzy product ideas into real websites, SaaS apps, ecommerce platforms, and content systems. Our average client relationship lasts 2+ years because we stay involved after launch, and our strategy phase comes with a money-back guarantee. Clarity before code.
