Tool to Find Keyword Search Volumes for a Small Town?

[Noelle Leahy]

Hi there, I've had no success in finding a tool to research keyword search volumes for a town i.e. with 5K population. I've tried the Adwords Keyword planner, Wordstream and SemRush but the town i'm researching is not in any of the dropdowns for 'target location'. Any other suggestions for tools? Thanks in advance.

 

[Eric Rohrback]

I would try the closest town that registers and go with that. You could also look at national averages, and use population data to get approximates.

Ultimately the search volume data from any tool you use will be inaccurate if you're trying to tie exact numbers to it. Use the search volume to influence the strategy, but don't rely 100% on it. Remember that all these tools are looking backwards as well, so the terms that are getting volume today may not be the same terms as yesterday.

When all else fails and you want to know if those terms are actually being searched in that particular city, then pay for the ads. Getting ad data from a few days will help prove or disprove your assumption.

 

[Noelle Leahy]

Thanks Eric. What about local terms like 'Dentist Roscrea', where Roscrea is the town of interest? Would you look at national search volumes?

 

[JoshuaMackens]

I would look at the closest big city and extrapolate from there. This won't give you exact search volume but you don't need to know exact search volume, correct? You just need to know which search term gets more searches than others.

This will get you pretty close.

Then, once you're ranking well, you'll have GSC data and as long as you're ranking on the 1st page for all terms you can use the impression data to see what people are really typing in.

One of the benefits of a small town is you should be able to rank fairly quickly and easily. Once that happens, the GSC data can help you adjust quickly.

Also, as Eric stated, you can run Adwords which will be exact. But you'll be paying for that and will have to set up campaigns for all keywords.

Good luck!

 

[Noelle Leahy]

Thanks Joshua, it's actually for market research to see what the demand is in the town as we aren't doing business there yet.

 

[JoshuaMackens]

Gotcha, then Eric is right. Ads is probably the only way to tell.

A very rough way to do that, if you're comparing towns to one another, is via population. The more people, the more they need a service. However, if you're not comparing locations (ie to see which ones you should tackle vs others) then that won't help either.

 

[Eric Rohrback]

Yeah, ads would be the best way to get real data on demand.

Do a little bit of keyword research for your primary targets, set up some quick campaigns and use exact match targeting, and either target the specific zip code(s) or the city.

Another idea for a really really rough calculation is to take the volume / national population, then use that percentage to apply to a local population to get an idea of demand. Not even sure if that would come up as an accurate enough figure for you to use.

Quick example to try...

"Dentist" volume as a searched term: 6600 (pulled from SEMrush using the Ireland database)
Ireland Population: 4.784m
Searches as a % of population = .14% (rounded)

Applied to your location: .14% * 5000 = ~689 people who may be looking for a dentist within that city.

Is that accurate in any way? Definitely not. Does it provide about as much accuracy as some of the tools out there? Probably... idk lol.

The best way to get data on new markets to expand into is to run ads for a short time to see what kind of feedback you get. If you get a positive response, then create pages on the website and optimize for those terms. It will take longer to get that feedback look from SEO, so that's why I suggest run ads to gauge demand first before you spend time on updating the website for the new market.