1. Research widely
Use Keywords, which has four tools: Domain Keywords on your own domain — what you already rank for. The best starting point on an established site. Domain Keywords on competitors — works on any domain. The fastest read of what a competitor is targeting, and the fastest source of terms you’d never have thought of. Suggestions — up to 100 seeds in, 50 related keywords out. Good when you’re starting from a topic rather than a list. Research — up to 700 keywords in bulk, when you already have candidates from a brief or a brainstorm. Bookmark anything plausible. Saving is free and unlimited; it costs nothing to be generous here.2. Shortlist on the metrics
On Saved keywords, work through your list against three questions. Is the intent right? This decides more than anything else. Expand a row and check Intent — a transactional keyword needs a product page, not a blog post, and no amount of writing quality overcomes the mismatch. Cut anything where you can’t or won’t build the right page format. Is it winnable? Keyword difficulty is green under 40, amber to 69, red above. But KD is relative to the whole web, not to you — judge it against your own Domain Rank. A KD of 35 is easy for an established domain and out of reach for a new one. Is it worth anything? CPC is the best proxy for commercial value. High volume with a CPC near zero is informational traffic that rarely converts. Modest volume with a high CPC is a keyword people pay real money for. The sweet spot on most sites is low volume, low KD, high CPC — small, winnable, and commercially real. High-volume head terms feel like the goal and usually aren’t the place to start.3. Track the shortlist
There’s no promote-to-tracking button. Saved keywords are a shortlist; tracking is a separate step. Since the Tracking form accepts a comma-separated list, the practical move is to finish your shortlist, then paste the final set across in one go:4. Size it against your plan
Tracked keywords are capped per plan and counted across the whole organization, not per project:
Spreading Pro’s 500 across five projects is 100 each. Plan the split before you fill it up on one site.
5. Tune the frequency
Before adding more keywords, consider checking the ones you have less often. On Tracking → Overview, Settings offers Every day, Every 3 days, or Once a week. Moving from daily to weekly cuts that consumption by roughly 85%. Most sites don’t move enough day to day for daily checks to tell you anything a weekly check wouldn’t — and 500 keywords checked weekly beats 100 checked daily for almost every purpose. Daily is worth it when you’re actively working on a page and want fast feedback, or during a migration.6. Maintain it
A tracking set isn’t set-and-forget. Pause rather than delete. Pausing stops checks and keeps history; deleting destroys the history permanently. Note a paused keyword still counts against the tracked-keyword limit — pausing saves lookups, not slots. Review what’s stuck. A keyword pinned outside the top 100 for months is telling you the page isn’t competitive. Either commit to fixing it or stop paying to watch it. Watch the ranking URL. On keyword cards and in history, the URL column shows which page actually ranks. When it changes, Google reinterpreted which of your pages is most relevant — often the real story behind a position swing. Add from what you learn. Domain overview → Top Keywords refreshes your view of what you rank for. Terms at 11–20 with real volume are the cheapest wins available.Next
- Keyword metrics — what each number means
- Ranking alerts — the thresholds that trigger a notification
- Position changes — reading movement over time