How to Pick Keywords That Make You Money (and Keep Getting Better at It)
The short answer: pick the keywords that bring in the most revenue, not the most traffic. Start with three proven campaigns: competitor alternatives, long tail and buyer intent. Then keep testing your own ideas every week. The best keyword strategy today won't be the best one in six months, so the companies that win are the ones that keep researching. OGTool runs the proven campaigns for you, lets you run your own research, and shows the revenue, visitors and sign ups each keyword brings in.
The goal: keywords that make money
Most keyword advice is about traffic. Traffic is not the goal. Revenue is.
Compare two searches:
- "What is the best coffee?"
- "How is coffee made?"
If I want to buy coffee, I ask ChatGPT "what is the best coffee?" and buy the first one it names. That search ends in a purchase. "How is coffee made?" might get 10x the searches, but nobody pulls out their card after reading it.
Intuitively this makes sense. The hard part is finding the "best coffee" keywords for your business, the ones that end in a sale.
Our approach: build a process that improves itself
The usual question is "what's the gold standard for picking keywords?"
We ask a different one: how do we build a process that tests, learns and gets better every week?
The gold standard keeps changing. AI search changes, competitors move in, and what worked last quarter stops working. So:
- Companies that keep researching find the alpha and win. They find the keywords nobody else is targeting yet.
- Companies that copy one approach and stop iterating lose. By the time everyone copies a playbook, its keywords are crowded.
We believe in science and testing. Every campaign is an experiment, and every experiment shows you its results.
Start with the proven campaigns
You don't have to start from a blank page. Every OGTool account comes with three default campaigns, set up during onboarding:
| Campaign | Example | What it optimizes for | Risk |
|---|---|---|---|
| Long tail | "best adhd coach for entrepreneurs" | Low competition, high conversion | Low |
| Competitor alternatives | "granola alternatives" | Medium-money keywords | Medium |
| Buyer intent | "best meeting notetaker" | Big-money keywords | High |
Long tail keywords are specific. Fewer people search them, but the ones who do know exactly what they want, so they convert.
Competitor alternatives catch buyers who are already shopping and want to compare options. It's the balance between money and difficulty.
Buyer intent keywords are the big ones, like "best CRM". They bring in the most money, but every company in your category wants them, so they're competitive and harder to win.
What happened when we ran them
- Competitor alternatives drove the biggest revenue boost. Buyers searching for alternatives are ready to switch, and they're comparing you directly against the brand they're leaving.
- Long tail brought in a steady stream of sign ups. Lots of small wins add up.
- Winning one buyer intent keyword brought in a flood of sign ups. One big keyword can outperform dozens of small ones.
Meanwhile, we raise your domain authority
You usually can't win the biggest buyer intent keywords on day one. The sites ranking for them have more domain authority than you do.
So while your campaigns run, OGTool builds your domain rating in the background with quality backlinks. As your domain rating climbs, harder keywords come within reach, and we move you up to the high buyer intent keywords over time. See how to raise your domain authority.
Run your own research
The default campaigns are our standard. But we also believe in agency: you know your customers, and you should be able to test your own ideas.
Get the full data. See difficulty, search volume, domain rating and who ranks today for every keyword, so you can make your own calls.
Bring your own data. Already have a keyword list or research from another tool? Push it into OGTool.
Turn customer support tickets into keywords. The questions your customers ask support are the questions your future customers are asking ChatGPT.
Custom research campaigns
What if you want to target use-case keywords or persona keywords? Write a prompt, and OGTool's AI researches the web and your company to find the best keywords for it.
For example:
Find me the best use-case keywords for my company, like "best adhd coach for entrepreneurs" or "most affordable adhd coach for women".
Here's what happens next:
- Every week, the AI researches the web and your company for keywords that match your prompt.
- It shows you the 7 best keywords it found.
- Once blogs are published for all 7, it researches again and finds the next batch.
- It skips duplicates, so it never suggests a keyword you're already targeting.
Going hard: research that runs every day
Custom campaigns can connect to your own data sources and run on their own schedule:
- Sales calls: "Find the best questions to answer for OGTool. Here's our Fireflies. Look for new keywords every day."
- Support: "Here's our support database API. Every day, find questions customers asked that we haven't answered yet."
- LinkedIn: "Find the trending topics on LinkedIn in our space. Every day, look for questions we haven't answered."
- Reddit: "Once a week, find the trending topics on Reddit in our sector, then write a question and answer on our blog that references the Reddit post."
These are part of our custom enterprise plan. DM me and we'll set it up.
See what's working
Because every campaign is an experiment, you need to see the results. OGTool shows you:
- The success rate of each campaign, so you know which strategy works for your business and where to double down.
- Revenue, visitors and sign ups for every keyword, so you can see exactly which keywords make you money.
- Your domain authority over time, so you can see when harder keywords come within reach.
You also get our own gold standards built in: the same playbook we use to win 72% of the keywords we target and help companies reach $119k a month from ChatGPT. More in how our AI wins 72% of keywords.
Find your buyer intent keywords
Enter your website and we'll generate 7 buyer intent keywords for your company, check whether you show up on Google and in AI answers for each one today, and email you the report. It's free once per company and email.
Want to target them, or run research on competitor alternatives, long tail keywords or your own ideas? Create an account.
FAQ
What makes a keyword valuable?
How close the searcher is to buying. "Best X for Y" and "X alternatives" searches end in purchases. "What is X" searches usually don't.
Should I start with buyer intent keywords?
Start with all three campaigns. Competitor alternatives and long tail keywords bring in revenue while your domain authority grows. Buyer intent keywords pay off the most, but they take longer to win.
Can I use my own keyword research?
Yes. You can import your own keywords, turn support tickets into keywords, or write a prompt and have AI research new ones every week.
How do I know which keywords are working?
OGTool shows the revenue, visitors and sign ups each keyword brings in, plus the success rate of each campaign.
Will OGTool target keywords I already have pages for?
No. Research campaigns skip keywords you're already targeting, so you never compete with yourself.
Start picking keywords that make money
Run the proven campaigns, test your own ideas, and see which keywords bring in revenue.
