Recently I read a very interesting survey done on keywords, and in particular the most expensive keywords to pay for in Google. In this post I’ll be discussing what these are and how you can potentially use them in your organic campaigns, whether affiliate marketing sites, adsense etc…
The study done by Wordstream, showed that insurance keywords came out on top and made up nearly a quarter of the total, and the highest CPC in this niche being almost $55!!
This study was designed for paid traffic marketers, which I’m not, however you can still use this information when doing SEO sites, especially if you are running Adsense on your sites.
The top 20 categories are listed below:
- Insurance (example keywords in this category include “buy car insurance online” and “auto insurance price quotes”)
- Loans (example keywords include “consolidate graduate student loans” and “cheapest homeowner loans”)
- Mortgage (example keywords include “refinanced second mortgages” and “remortgage with bad credit”)
- Attorney (example keywords include “personal injury attorney” and “dui defense attorney”)
- Credit (example keywords include “home equity line of credit” and “bad credit home buyer”)
- Lawyer (“personal injury lawyer,” “criminal defense lawyer)
- Donate (“car donation centers,” “donating a used car”)
- Degree (“psychology bachelors degree”)
- Hosting (“hosting ms exchange,” “managed web hosting solution”)
- Claim (“personal injury claim,” “accident claims no win no fee”)
- Conference Call (“best conference call service,” “conference calls toll free”)
- Trading (“cheap online trading,” “stock trades online”)
- Software (“crm software programs,” “help desk software cheap”)
- Recovery (“raid server data recovery,” “hard drive recovery laptop”)
- Transfer (“zero apr balance transfer,” “credit card balance transfer zero interest”)
- Gas/Electricity (“business electricity price comparison,” “switch gas and electricity suppliers”)
- Classes (“criminal justice online classes,” “online classes business administration”)
- Rehab (“alcohol rehab centers,” “crack rehab centers”)
- Treatment (“mesothelioma treatment options,” “drug treatment centers”)
- Cord Blood (“cordblood bank,” “store umbilical cord blood”)
Planning Your Approach
Now that you know to find the top keyword niches, you need to plan your approach for ranking for variations of these root keywords for your websites. Obviously it goes without saying that trying to rank for something like “Insurance” would not be a good idea, because the competition would be way too high, however you could look for longer tail keywords in these high CPC niches, and try and rank for these instead.
Once you get traffic to your websites in niches where there is money being spent, you can monetize this traffic with Adsense, or even put your site for sale, or maybe even offer to sell it to companies who are well established to monetize the traffic in the niche.
Either way when trying to find top keywords it’s not a bad idea to look where the money is being spent!
When doing your SEO keyword research in these big money industries, you want to look for phrases that big authority sites are not purposely trying to rank for, as you’ll find it hard to outrank them. However there are opportunities on longer tail phrases if you spend time checking them out!
Related articles
Hey Matt,
Thanks for these, they will certainly help me out the next time I’m looking to build a new site!
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:09 am
Hi Breitling Super Avenger
No problem, glad you found the share helpful
Matt
This is amazing. Especially it reminds me of that webminar you did recently on adsense. Longtail kw’s are way to go here I guess.
Cheers
Alex
Thanks Matt! I was very surprised at cord blood…very interesting to know that.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:10 am
You’re welcome Laura!!
Matt
thanks for this.. I’ve been trying to find a good niche and keyword for my next site.. thanks again.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:12 am
Hey Mark
Glad you found this KW lsit helpful, I certainly did myself!!
Matt
Hi Matt,
After studying rapid profit formula your product it’s the first time i understand the whole internet marketing system.
Now try to get my first sale.
Robin
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:13 am
That’s great news Robin
Keep going with it as it gets easier and easier the more you do it!!
Regards
Matt
Hi Matt
if i rank for a long tail keyword on an INsurance category wouldnt be the CPC a lot lower. what the exsact approach?
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:15 am
The CPC will still be good, because if you are doing Google Adsense your pages content will trigger these high CPC keywords to show ads. Also if you get traffic that is relevan to a big insurance company, you can always contact them directly and ask if they want to place an ad on your site for a monthly fee
regards
Matt
ArtH Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 12:51 pm
Matt,
Useful post as always, however, I don’t want to burst anyone’s bubble, but most people have no real idea what criteria Google uses to pay Adsense webmasters. Maybe I can shed a little light on the subject for those of you who may be a bit confused.
I’d just like to caution your readers about those seemingly high paying cpc keywords before they get the mistaken notion that they are going to make big bucks from using them in Adsense. Because they aren’t going to!
Take the keyword “buy car insurance online” for instance.
Yes Adwords advertisers are paying $55.25 to get listed in the SERPS (Google Search). However, Google isn’t going to pay a webmaster on that amount, because that same advertiser only pays $2.69 to be listed in the Display Network. Your webpage is part of the Display Network, not Google Search.
An advertisers ad will only show up on your Adsense webpage if he/she has elected to show up on the Display Network, and they won’t be paying anywhere near $55.25 to show up in Display. They will only pay $2.69 for that keyword.
Consequently, what Google will pay for someone clicking an ad on your webpage is 68% of $2.69 for that exact keyword…not 68% of $55.25.
So, knowing that, you have to ask yourself if it’s really worth all the effort to go after those high competition keywords when they really aren’t going to pay any more than less competitive keywords going for under $3.00 a click cpc???
This is just one of many myths that have been passed around by gurus who don’t know what they are talking about for years. It’s also why newbies who attempt to go after so called high paying cpc keywords never make anywhere near what they imagined they would, (if they make anything at all) because they can’t rank high enough in Google to ever get a click in the first place.
If anyone wants to know what any keyword will pay in Adsense income they have to use the Google Contextual tool, which they will have to have an Adwords account to use. And Google let it out that they are paying on average 68% to the Adsense webmaster.
Hope that helps.
Regards.
Art
Thanks Matt for sharing the information on these top keywords. I think it illustrates the types of variations of other keywords that marketers might not have thought about. I appreciate how your postings are relevant and get our brains thinking.
Best wishes for a successful week in relationships and business!
Derek
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:15 am
Thanks Derek!
I wanted to say thanks for this entire list, since many of them are new to me. A few of these I was already aware of and some of them can be REALLY high paying, but the competition is also really stiff. Long tails are definitely the way to go, and I’ve actually found some with a good number of monthly searches.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:16 am
Hi Jon
Great to hear from you, and yeah I think longtails is the only way to go with these niches, otherwise you won’t be able to compete!
Good luck
Matt
Hi Matt!
Very nice research – thanks a lot. I copied this top 20 list as I’m planning to build more adsense sites soon. All the niches are very competitve but there’s plenty of long-tails that can also bring good traffic.
I guess Wordtracker and GKT will be the best kw research tools here.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:17 am
Great stuff Anton!
Hope your sites work out well for you
Regards
Matt
That’s a great list Matt, and a helpful post. I started using some of your recommended resources from Rapid Profit Formula…like Article Marketing Robot, and I just love it.
I love your theme to. It’s so easy to work with and looks great!
Thanx
Becky Newman
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:18 am
Hey Becky
Thanks for the great feedback, I’m glad you like my course and are making progress!
Kind regards
Matt
Great list for ideas matt. I came accross this post a few days ago, used some of the main keyword ideas here, and managed to come up with some great niche site ideas. The best part was that I not only found unique keyword phrases with decent traffic, but a .com domain name to match.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:18 am
Good work Dan, great to see you taking action so quickly on this!!
Regards
Matt
Thanks for the tips Matt, some are quite surprising to me. I thought “software” would be better ranked, maybe in the top 5 even. Nice post as always….Grant
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:19 am
Hi Grant
Yeah some of them are surpirzing, the “donate” one I was surprized by!
Matt
G’day Matt:
Thanks for the advice.
I’m just a beginner, but have been advised many times that Adsense was the way to go for us Newbies.
However, I had the feeling that some niches would be a lot better to build Adsense sites on than others.
Your list of 20 top categories certainly is a pointer in the right direction.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:20 am
Hi Leon
Hope you are well, and great to see you are getting into online marketing. There is a lot to learn at the beginning but it does get easier the more knowledge you gain!
Good luck
Matt
Matt this is great lesson for which I thank you very much.
Cheers!
Michael
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:20 am
No problem Michael!!
Cheers
Matt
Hello Matt,
Thank you for this list. What do you think: are these categories with the highest CPC in non-English countries as well? I am located in Hungary, Europe.
Kindest,
Csaba
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:22 am
Hi Csaba
The problem with non english sites is there is not much Adsense, but I think you could monetize in other ways and do well. I would say the top 20 are probably similar in most countries, especialyl stuff like Insurance etc…
Regards
matt
Csaba Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 5:38 pm
Hi Matt,
There are AdSense advertisers in Hungary, the CPCs are not as high as in English but for example in case of a plastic surgery it can be in a range of a dollar.
What other ways of monetization would you suggest for me?
Hi there Matt,
Thanks heaps for the tips n tricks on your blog, also for this valuable insight as to what people are spending big money on. It’s amazing the money people are prepared to spend per click.
regards Jeff
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:22 am
You’re welcome Jeff,
Thank for commenting!
Matt
This is a very helpful list. By picking one of the general keywords in the list and drilling down I bet we could find a ton of variations.
To find keywords related to these niches but without the massive competition would be hugely beneficial.
Andy
Hey Matt,
what an excellent idea! There are so many canny tricks out there to learn, and this is the place to find them. The things people are looking for online are going to surprise you, to be honest that is just part of the fun.
Like this website that I have just built. You gave us all the ideas, but there is little point in watching them if you don’t actually do anything about it. If you are going to excel online, you need guys like you to learn it all from.
Excellent Matt
Thanks for expanding my thinking into niches I wouldn’t have considered.
Best
dray
Matt,
Thanks for a great post and the research time that you have spent here. Most of these are niches I have generally stayed away from, but maybe I should reconsider.
Keep up the good work… Noline
I found this post interesting Matt… I didn’t know wordstream, their free goes on the keyword finding tool was Interesting; for comparing results!
Hi Matt,
Thanks heaps for your informative post on the highest cost per click. This will definitely help me out on my next adsense site I will build.
This can supplement what I am learnt from the Adsense webinar you had a while ago. Keep up the great work on your posts!
Regards,
Alton
Hi Matt
Thanks for a great post on the highest CPC words. This is quite useful information which can be used on an adsense site.
I’ll be sure to use the info from this post and the adsense webinar to make a site.
Keep up the good work and don’t stop providing the good content!
Alton
Matt,
That’s a great list of material. I would never have thought of some of those in a million years. maybe I will have a go at some of them, but it’s finding the right long tail that really matters.
Hi Matt,
This is a great follow on from the adsense webinar that you recently held. Ranking longtail keywords with adsense equals good passive income.
Thanks again Matt
Rich
Im truly grateful and really impressed. Appreciate making the effort to share with you this, Im strongly about this and love reading more on this topic.
Very informative blog here
Thanks you Matt
I wouldn’t be so sure that these keywords are all really high earners.
For example I rank top 3 for one of those keywords for which the payout should be over $35/click according to Google keywords tool…I rarely get over 50-60 cents!
Not to mention the traffic is quite low…but I though that the high click value would compensate for that…not!
Cheers
Radu
ArtH Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 11:37 pm
Radu,
There’s a very good reason for that, which I explained in my reply to a post by Guillermo above. You have to understand the difference between Google Search and the Google Display Network.
When you display Adsense ads on your site you are part of the Display Network. You will not get paid for ads that show up in the standard search engine results. You only get paid if someone clicks on an ad on your webpage.
The ads that show up in Search results may also show up in the Display Network if the advertiser elects to show them there, but they wont cost the advertiser as much to show up on your webpage as they do to show up in the search results. So the cost of the click on your page is going to be much, much lower, and your share (avg. 68%) is based on that lower cost, not the high cpc that everyone gets so excited about.
To make matters worse, since the high paying keyword is for an extremely competitive keyword phrase, you have next to no chance to get your page ranked high enough to get any traffic. So, as you pointed out, since you didn’t get anywhere near what you were expecting per click it didn’t balance out the low number of clicks you were getting.
Here’s what everyone needs to know about how much keywords cost to show up on the Display Network…they rarely go above $3.00 per click so you’ll never earn much more than around $2.00 a click on the top end. When you read any Adsense course or listen to anyone telling you they are making $5 – $10 a click in Adsense revenue, just know they are not telling you the truth.
If you are going for less competitive long tail keywords, they usually cost far less than $1.00 for the advertiser so you’ll earn even less on them. BUT, since you have a better chance to rank your long tail keywords, more traffic (even at a lower payout) will probably result in higher earnings than the competitive phrases will ever bring you.
My advise is, unless you have lot’s of time and resources on your hands, don’t bother trying to rank for those super high CPC terms, because it’s going to take you years to knock off the top sites, if you ever manage to do so. It takes far less effort to rank for low competition keywords with lower Adsense payouts, but it will be more profitable for you a lot faster.
Hi Matt, keyword research is the most important part of internet marketing, and I am constantly looking for new and obscure keywords that get high searches with low competition.
Thanks for the post.
Many thanks for this Matt. These areas are outside of my current niche but they are good to know about for the future.
Regards
Michael
Again a great post-I have to say after reading so many of your posts-I took a hobby to a blog-rc indoor helis-the result has been mind bending-only spent $10 on stubleupon advertising-not a bad thing to start with-then just cranked unique content you always recommend-now at 12,000 hits a month and 60 emails plus a day to reply to-bloody daunting but makes me a few bucks and helps heaps-guess gone off the point of your post-but just to say thank you for getting me out of giving up on internet marketing-am in Sydney-time for a beer-cya Matt and thank you
Thanks Matt
As always excellent information!
Matt,
As always you are one of the rare gems in the internet marketing industry. Always willing to share new ways of making money on the internet and a very good teacher. Thanks a Million.
Thanks! Matt its a very useful keyword list of hot keyword Categories. Your posts are always very informative. I always read your new posts and learn a lot from them. and your course Rapid profit formula is one of the best investment i have made so far. Keep this good work going on really appreciated!!! Thanks again.
Matt, Thanks, good information to know, especially if you can get a client in one of these niches. Even the biggest niches it seems to me, that if you Geo-target them depending on the size of the city or town that they would be possible to rank for, thanks again.
Quality, useful information like this is the reason I ALWAYS read your emails compared to a lot of the other low value crap I get sent everyday, yours is always usable in some way.
Thanks for the information as I certainly never thought of making longtail keywords out of these phrases. I just thought they would be impossible for me to rank with. You come across loud and clear, just like in Rapid Profit Formula.
Thanks for the list Matt! I have a site on saving money which is pretty broad in scope so I can use some of the categories to diversify.
All the best!
Great post Matt,
I also find spyfu very helpful in determining which keywords are worth targeting.
This will be useful to me because I am focusing on online education. Now off to find the longtail keywords.
Matt,
I always appreciate your stuff. I was wondering if you noticed Google playing more games than usual. Lately when I have linked a key word to my site Google has been lowering it in the rankings. It could be that I’m not varying my linking structure enough but is strange. One key word went from 4 to 679, back to 4 and then to 72.
Matt Carter Reply:
August 9th, 2011 at 9:03 am
Hey Ron
This is nothing new with Google, they have been doing this for years with webpages, its the Google dance, and sometimes it last for days, other times months, but usually on for new sites.
Regards
Matt
I could never have imagined that “donate” could be one of the top keywords…
Hi Matt,
I found this post interesting. I will try to use some of the words in my Adsense campaign.
Good work as usual.
Regards,
Sergiy.
Thanks Matt! I was very surprised and impressed at CPC is up to $55. I rarely get over $2 from Adsense.
That’s the first time I heard someone talking about keyword selection by value (like the CPC) instead of just volume. That makes a lot of sense from a marketing perspective. You want to be where the money is, not where all the tire-kickers are.
Nice post thanks matt, very informative.
These keywords are like gold dust. It is amazing that some companies will pay $55 for PPC!!! What a wonderful opportunity for internet marketing – for those who know how to do it.
Hi Matt,
Interesting that I found that nine categories of the twenty on your list was content that I have content on my website or blog considering my website is devoted to financial planning.
I will share this post with some of my customers who think the only keyword that matters is the one that is most popular and of course almost impossible to rank for….
I guess it’s my responsibility to educate them.
Thanks for the great post Matt.
Viola
Thanks for this info, Matt…this is great info to use to build websites and monetize with Adsense.
I’m doing some SEO work right now for a mortgage company and this is some interesting info that I can use to justify to them why they need my help.
Jhoe
yeah, read this on wf..but thanks for the share..
Thanks Matt, this post is stimulating food for thought, ideas to research and hopefully a few gold nuggets will be discovered. Its just in time for my foray into Adsense site building.
You are always on the money.
Thanks for sharing.
Pnina
Thanks for the list Matt!
Unfortunately, I don’t see myself in any of the listed niches 🙁
Still, there is plenty of money to be made in other niches.
Thanks Matt the list is great. Most of these keywords I would not think of going after as there not in a niche that I would try for. I may have to change my way of thinking and branch out.
Neil
Thanks Matt, I still doing backlinks for my two affiliate sites, but I already thought about adsence web and these keywords help me a lot to start one very soon 🙂
Hi Matt,
Thanks for the whole list. I also notice that we can combine some of the keywords when building a website to get more traffics.
Very motivating for my next project, thanks again.
Regards,
Dev
Hi Matt
Now I know why I’m not making millions!
These are the top categories with millions of searches that all the ‘big boys’ are fighting over……..(not much chance of competing really for the ‘little guy’ is there?).
I do know that visitors to my site seem to like my content and newsletters and I get a lot of feedback which is encouraging.
German Shepherd Dogs- Don’t You Just Love Them!
Matt,
You give stuff that really help!
Thanx
Thank you Matt. So is it better to use key phrases instead of just one word?
Thanks,
Ryan
When people ask me ‘who do you follow’? I say Matt’s Marketing Blog – especially for a newbie because you tell it so simply. Well done Matt.
Janice
It is always amazing what those keywords can do. Thanks for the great information.
Hi Matt,
Thanks so much for the above examples and the reminder that higher paying CPC’s do exist.
I also got the adsense course you recommended last month and it’s helped me to rethink using adsense as a good way to make income each month.
The Best,
Joel
Hey Matt
Some great ideas there. Keyword research is definitely my weakest point, whether to search with quotes or without and whether to do exact or broad, there is so much conflicting advice so any help with keywords is a definite bonus to me. Thanks.
Thanks Matt
As always a great post with great information on keywords.
i have use Cpcs in the past and in just one year alone the price per click has increased 25% on high ranking keywords.
Regards
Scott
I like this information! Made me realize that instead of picking a product to promote and finding the best keywords, why not turn this on it’s head? Find the best kw’s, then find an appropriate product to promote. It’s so obvious, I wonder why I didn’t think of it before!
Good overview, but I’d like to see something more specific on keyword research. Here’s a free report from Gavin Hartwell at http://gjbmarketing.com/the-cyber-criteria/professional-keyword-research-manuscript/ . Just click on Download Manuscript. I think his approach is fascinating and full of common sense. Maybe you could do a keyword research article about this, Matt.
Interesting list, Matt, and with some surprising top categories. Even more astonishing to see that “make money online” isn’t one of them!
Well worth a shot at one or two. Thanks for the information.
Matt,
I do all my sites in the health niche and very little in your list had to do with health conditions in specifics. The word “treatment” is really the only relevant word to the health niche. Thanks for this post.
On another note, I was unable to search your website. I wanted to know if you had written something about the Google Sandbox? I recently had 2 of my sites go into the sandbox and I thought you would have some great advice about it.
Thanks
All these keywords must be very competitive so I agree with you that these are for those who want to pay for traffic.
Thanks for the great info once again, Matt! I’ve just started flipping websites and this info is very helpful!
Hi Matt,
Great post! Thanks for the whole list I’ll be using this. By the way have you heard about the new “Social Media platform that shares it’s revenue with users?”
Click my name to go to the Facebook Page and find out more.
Personally I avoid those top-paying keywords… Reason is simple. All those keywords are so oversatured. I think it’s pointless to start competing in above niches, becouse it’s very tough to rank for those keywords.
Hi Matt,thank you for the keywords and niches that I never thought to use Thank you .
thanks for the valuable information Matt. keyword is one part, another part is the content creation of that niche. I wonder how a super affiliates like you, create articles and content of your niche? since I’m sure we all don’t have a same level of knowledge of some specific niche. can we just re-use other people articles, let say spin it to make a new articles?? can Google banned us if we do this kind of method?
Matt Carter Reply:
August 21st, 2011 at 7:50 am
Just get a writer to research the niche and write frsh content that way.
Cheers
MAtt
Thanks Matt,
as always your stuff is tops in my book.
I spent ages a few weeks ago trying to find this out and actually didn’t manage to get most of what you have given.
THANKS mate.
Have a fantastic week.
Mark
Matt Carter Reply:
August 23rd, 2011 at 8:05 am
You’re welcome
Matt
Good Article, I guess Its always better to choose high CPC keywords if you are planning to monetize your website using adsense…
Hi Matt,
That’s a job! Well done! Thank you ever so much!
Thanks for this post! You mentioned above and I quote: “Either way when trying to find top keywords it’s not a bad idea to look where the money is being spent!”
Could you explain what you mean when you said …to look where the money is being spent” … like how?etc. Thanks again!
Matt Carter Reply:
September 6th, 2011 at 7:19 am
Hi Simon
looks where the CPC of the keywords is high, this is a sign that there is a lot of companies competiting for the keywords
One thing that would be helpful, Matt, is if you could show us how to do the research for high-paying websites.
I have heard of some companies paying $80 per click (long before your recent webinar guest – I don’t remember his name – mentioned something along these lines).
What percentage of that sort of money do Google pay you?
Anthony