Keyword research for a small business: start with your customer's question
You do not need to chase the words with the most volume. Find the questions your customer asks right before buying, and write one good page for each of them.
New to this topic? Start with SEO for small businesses: ranking higher in Google without an agency
Why the biggest keywords are the wrong ones
Most business owners start keyword research with the word that describes their trade. An installer searches for "heat pump", an accountant for "bookkeeping". It feels logical and almost never pays off.
On a broad word like that you compete with national web shops, comparison sites and brands with a marketing department. And even if you did rank, the visitor is still exploring. They want to know what a heat pump is, not who can install one tomorrow.
A small business wins on the narrow questions. They have less search volume, but the people typing them are further along in their decision. Ten visitors who want a quote are worth more than a thousand who are browsing.
Start with what customers already ask you
The best keyword research does not start in a tool, it starts in your inbox. Which questions do you get every week? What does someone ask on the phone before they decide?
Write them down word for word. Not "heat pump costs", but "is a hybrid heat pump enough for a house from the 1930s". That sentence is exactly how people search, and more and more often how they ask an AI assistant too.
A few sources you already have today:
- Your inbox and your quote requests. The first sentence of a request is often a search query.
- Your Google Business Profile. Questions and reviews show, in your customer's words, what they were looking for.
- Google's own suggestions. Type the start of a question and see what gets completed. Related searches sit at the bottom of the results.
- Search Console. If your site is already in it, you see the queries you already appear for, even if you never wrote a page for them.
Sort by intent, not by volume
Every search reveals what someone wants. Roughly, there are three kinds:
| Intent | Example | What the page needs to do |
|---|---|---|
| Informational | "how does a hybrid heat pump work" | Explain, without a sales pitch |
| Comparative | "hybrid or fully electric heat pump" | Weigh the options honestly, with your advice |
| Transactional | "heat pump installer eindhoven" | Show who you are and how to get in touch |
A small business needs all three, but is best off starting with the last two. That is where the customer is closest to a decision and where competition is smallest.
Not sure which intent is behind a search? Look it up yourself. What Google puts at the top shows what Google thinks the searcher wants. If there are only explainer articles, a service page has little chance there.
One page per question, not one word per page
A classic mistake is creating a separate page for every variation. "Install heat pump", "fit heat pump" and "have a heat pump installed" are the same question. Three pages for them make them compete with each other.
So group the keywords that deserve the same answer, and write one page that gives that answer completely. The variations come back in the text on their own, because you cover the topic properly.
This is also how you build structure. One overview page for the whole topic, with pages underneath that each answer a single question. How to tie them together is covered in internal links for SEO.
Look at difficulty, but do not let it paralyse you
Keyword tools give a difficulty score. It says something about how many strong sites already rank. Useful to know, but read it as a direction.
A local or very specific question often has a low score, even if big players are somewhere in the background. And a word with a high score can still be within reach if the pages ranking now answer the question poorly.
What tells you more: open the top three results and read them. Do they answer the question completely? Are they recent? Could you, as the expert, write something better? If the answer is yes, it is worth the effort.
Do not forget the question asked to an AI assistant
More and more people no longer type their question into a search bar, they ask an AI assistant. Those questions are longer and more personal: "which installer in the Eindhoven area has experience with older houses".
The good news is that the same approach works. Pages that answer one concrete question clearly also get picked up by AI search engines. The difference is in the form: a direct answer at the top, numbers with a source, and your name and region clearly in the text. More on that in what GEO is.
How dGENIX does it for you
The SEO Engine finds keywords with room left for you, with search volume, difficulty and the chance that Google places an AI answer above them. Connect Search Console and it puts your real positions next to the estimates.
You can also simply ask:
"Find ten keywords around hybrid heat pumps where an installer in Eindhoven still has a chance, and group them by question."
The result is not a long list but a proposal: which questions become one page together, and which one you start with.
A routine you repeat every month
- Collect the questions customers asked in the past month
- Look them up and note the intent and what ranks at the top now
- Group questions that deserve the same answer
- Pick the one where you can give the best answer
- Write that page and link to it from your overview page
- After a month, check in Search Console what it appears for
That is not a big project. It is an hour a month, and after a year you have twelve pages that answer exactly what your customers are searching for. The bigger picture is in SEO for small businesses.
Frequently asked questions
How much search volume does a keyword need at minimum?
There is no lower limit. A question asked ten times a month by people who want a quote can bring in more than a word with thousands of searches from people who are browsing.
Do I need a paid keyword tool?
Not to get started. Your customer questions, Google's suggestions and Search Console give you enough direction. A tool only helps once you scale up and want to know which questions you are still missing.
How often should I do keyword research?
A small round every month works better than one big study a year. Customer questions change, and you see faster what a new page does.
