In the world of SEO, it’s easy to get fixated on a single, perfect keyword. But focusing on just one “golden” term is like fishing with a single line. To truly succeed, you need to cast a wider net. This is where secondary keywords come in. They are the supporting terms, related questions, and synonyms that give search engines the full picture of your content.
Understanding how to find and use these keywords is a game changer. It helps Google connect your content with a much broader range of search queries, boosting relevance and driving more traffic. This guide breaks down everything you need to know about secondary keywords, from what they are to how you can use them to climb the search rankings.
What Are Secondary Keywords?
Secondary keywords are search terms that support and add context to your primary keyword. Think of them as subtopics or different ways of phrasing the main idea. For example, if your main topic is “improve SEO,” your secondary keywords might include “how to improve SEO” or “SEO improvement tips”. They aren’t just random additions; they are strategically chosen phrases that enrich your content and signal to search engines that your page offers a comprehensive answer to a user’s query.
While you might hear terms like “LSI keywords” or “semantic keywords,” these are essentially just describing related terms that provide context. In fact, Google’s John Mueller has clarified that there’s no such thing as LSI keywords in their algorithm. The main goal is simply to use related concepts that make your content more thorough and helpful.
Why Are Secondary Keywords So Important?
Leveraging secondary keywords isn’t just a “nice to have” SEO tactic; it’s a fundamental part of a modern content strategy. Here’s why they matter so much.
- You’ll Reach a Wider Audience: A single page can rank for hundreds or even thousands of different keywords, not just one. By including secondary keywords, you open the door for your content to appear in a much wider variety of search results.
- They Clarify Your Intent for Search Engines: Modern search engines use semantic search to understand the meaning behind a query, not just the exact words. Secondary keywords help clarify ambiguous terms. For instance, if your primary keyword is “apple,” adding terms like “iPhone” and “Cupertino” signals you’re talking about the tech company, not the fruit. To go deeper, see our guide to understanding keyword intent.
- They Help You Create Comprehensive Content: Using secondary keywords naturally encourages you to cover a topic in greater depth. Addressing related subtopics and questions makes your content more valuable to readers and demonstrates your expertise and authority to Google, which is great for EEAT (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trust).
- They Drive More Traffic and Conversions: By targeting a wider range of queries, you naturally attract more visitors. Many secondary keywords are long tail phrases (3+ words), which are used in the majority of Google searches. These specific queries often have higher conversion rates because they are used by people who are further along in their decision making process.
- You Gain a Competitive Edge: Many competitors still focus narrowly on one or two major keywords. By creating comprehensive content rich with secondary keywords, your page can become the go to resource that outranks thinner, less detailed articles.
How to Find Secondary Keywords
Finding the right secondary keywords is a mix of using smart tools and understanding what your audience is looking for. Here are a few proven methods to build your list.
1. Use Google Search Itself
Google is your best free tool for discovering what people are actually searching for.
- Google Autocomplete: Start typing your primary keyword into the search bar. The suggestions that appear are popular, real user queries and perfect candidates for secondary keywords.
- People Also Ask (PAA): This box shows questions related to your search. Each question is a secondary keyword that you can answer in your content, often as a subheading or FAQ.
- Related Searches: Scroll to the bottom of the search results page to find a list of related queries. This section can reveal different angles or niche terms you hadn’t considered. Understanding these Google SERP features helps you spot secondary keywords systematically.
2. Mine Your Google Search Console Data
Google Search Console (GSC) is a goldmine for finding secondary keywords that your site is already getting impressions for. Go to the “Performance” report and look at the “Queries” tab. Here you will find terms that are bringing users to your page, many of which you may not be actively targeting. Look for keywords with high impressions but a low average position (e.g., position 11 to 30). These are your “striking distance” keywords, and optimizing your content to better include them can provide a quick ranking boost.
3. Check Top Ranking Pages
Your competitors who are already ranking on page one are a goldmine of information. Analyze their content to see what secondary keywords they are targeting. You can use SEO tools like Ahrefs or Semrush (and if you’re exploring tool options, see our guide to Ahrefs alternatives) to enter a competitor’s URL and see all the keywords that page ranks for. Look for common themes or subheadings they use. If multiple top pages cover a specific subtopic, that’s a strong signal you should include it too.
This process can be time consuming, but it provides a proven roadmap. For businesses looking to scale this effort, AI powered SEO services like Rankai can automate this competitive analysis, ensuring your content covers all the critical angles your competitors do, and then some.
4. Use a Keywords Explorer Tool
Dedicated keyword research tools can supercharge your efforts. Tools like Ahrefs, Semrush, and Moz allow you to enter a primary keyword and receive hundreds of related ideas, complete with data on search volume and difficulty. These “Keywords Explorer” features often group ideas into categories like “matching terms” and “related terms,” which helps you find both direct variations and semantic concepts. If you want to speed this up with automation, compare the best AI keyword research tools.
For those on a budget, free tools like AnswerThePublic can generate a visual map of questions and phrases related to your topic. Google’s own Keyword Planner is another solid free option that provides lists of related terms.
How to Use Secondary Keywords in Your Content
Once you’ve found your keywords, the next step is to weave them into your content naturally. Here are the key rules to follow.
Rule 1: Include Keywords Naturally
Your primary goal should always be to write for your human audience, not for search engine bots. Secondary keywords should fit seamlessly into your sentences. If a phrase feels forced or awkward, it will hurt the reader’s experience, which can lead to higher bounce rates and signal poor quality to Google.
Often, if you focus on thoroughly explaining a topic, you will naturally include many relevant secondary keywords without even trying. You can then review your draft and see where you can add any missed terms. They work great in subheadings (H2s and H3s), image alt text, internal links, and meta descriptions, as long as they make sense in that context. If you’re unsure about internal link density, use this practical guide on how many internal links per page.
Rule 2: Prioritize the Primary Keyword
While secondary keywords are important, your primary keyword is still the star of the show. It should be featured in the most critical on page SEO elements to make the page’s main topic crystal clear to both users and search engines.
Make sure your primary keyword appears in the:
- Title Tag: The main title that appears in search results.
- URL Slug: The part of the URL that identifies the page.
- Main Heading (H1): The primary headline on the page itself.
- Introduction: Mention it within the first paragraph or so.
- Meta Description: This can improve click through rates from search results.
Secondary keywords should be used to support the main topic in the body of the content, but they shouldn’t clutter these core elements. If the basics aren’t set up correctly, run a technical SEO audit to uncover issues fast.
Rule 3: Target Multiple Phrases on One Page
A single, comprehensive page should be optimized for a primary keyword and a cluster of related secondary keywords. This is much more effective than creating dozens of thin pages targeting minor variations. The overlap in words between your primary and secondary keywords helps search engines understand the page’s context. For example, a page about “best running shoes” can and should also target “lightweight running shoes” and “running shoes for flat feet.” This shared vocabulary signals to Google that your page is a thorough resource on the topic.
Rule 4: Avoid Keyword Stuffing
Keyword stuffing is the outdated and harmful practice of cramming a page full of keywords in an attempt to manipulate rankings. This is a direct violation of Google’s spam policies and can get your site penalized. It creates a terrible user experience and signals to search engines that your content is low quality spam.
Instead of repeating the same phrases over and over, focus on variety. It’s better to use ten different secondary keywords once than to use one secondary keyword ten times. A good rule of thumb is to keep your writing natural. If you ever find yourself wondering if you’ve used a keyword too many times, you probably have.
Monitoring and Iterating on Your Keyword Strategy
SEO is not a “set it and forget it” activity. After you publish your content, it’s crucial to monitor its performance to see which primary and secondary keywords are gaining traction.
Using Google Search Console, you can track the average position for the queries your page ranks for. Pay attention to which secondary keywords are driving impressions and clicks. If a page isn’t performing as well as you’d like after a few weeks or months, it’s a signal that the content may need to be refreshed or rewritten. This iterative process of publishing, monitoring, and optimizing is key to long term SEO success.
Creating high quality content at scale that avoids these pitfalls can be a challenge. It’s one reason many businesses partner with a service like Rankai, which uses a sophisticated content engine to generate comprehensive articles that are naturally optimized and continuously improved.
Secondary Keywords vs. Related Keywords (LSI)
You’ll often hear “related keywords” or “LSI keywords” used interchangeably with secondary keywords, and while they overlap, there’s a slight difference.
- Related Keywords (or LSI) are terms that are semantically connected to your main topic. For the keyword “fitness,” related terms would be “exercise,” “workout,” and “nutrition”. They help clarify the context of your page.
- Secondary Keywords are defined more by their strategic role. They are any keywords you target on a page that aren’t the primary one. This can include related keywords, but also subtopics that expand the page’s scope. For “vegan recipes,” a secondary keyword could be the related term “plant based meals” or a broader subtopic like “vegan meal prep tips”.
In practice, a good SEO strategy uses both. You don’t need to get hung up on the terminology. The goal is to create content that is both contextually clear and comprehensive.
Secondary Keywords vs. Long Tail Keywords
It’s also easy to mix up secondary keywords and long tail keywords. Here’s the distinction:
- Long Tail Keyword describes the length and specificity of a query. These are typically phrases of three or more words, like “best running shoes for flat feet.”
- Secondary Keyword describes its role and priority on your page. It’s any keyword that supports your primary focus.
Often, your best secondary keywords will be long tail keywords. For a page targeting the broad primary keyword “digital camera,” you would use long tail secondary keywords like “best digital camera for beginners” or “affordable mirrorless camera for travel” to capture more specific searches. Since long tail keywords make up the vast majority of all searches, targeting them is essential for attracting highly motivated visitors. Then group them into keyword clusters to structure your content and internal linking.
Secondary Keyword Examples
Let’s look at how this works in a few different industries.
Healthcare Example
- Primary Keyword: “Diabetes Management”
- Secondary Keywords: “blood sugar control tips,” “type 2 diabetes diet plan,” “signs of high blood sugar,” “managing diabetes complications.”
- Why it Works: A comprehensive article on diabetes management must cover these subtopics to be truly useful. This strategy allows the page to rank for a wide array of queries from people at different stages of their health journey, from those looking up symptoms to those seeking specific diet advice. This approach helps capture a massive audience of users searching for health information.
Finance Example
- Primary Keyword: “Credit Score Improvement”
- Secondary Keywords: “how to improve credit score fast,” “what factors affect credit score,” “how to remove errors from credit report,” “building credit from scratch.”
- Why it Works: People searching for financial advice have very specific questions. By including these secondary keywords, a single article can serve as a complete resource. In finance, where many keywords have low monthly search volumes, success depends on capturing hundreds of these niche, long tail queries.
E-commerce Example
- Primary Keyword: “Running Shoes”
- Secondary Keyword: “best running shoes for flat feet,” “long distance running shoes,” “trail running vs road running shoes,” “women’s lightweight running shoes.”
- Why it Works: An e-commerce category page or buying guide needs to target the specific phrases shoppers use. Someone searching for “best running shoes for flat feet” is a highly qualified buyer. Optimizing for these terms drives targeted traffic that is more likely to convert. Over half of online buyers use search queries with three or more words, making these long tail secondary keywords crucial for online stores.
Conclusion: Put Secondary Keywords to Work for You
Mastering secondary keywords is what separates basic SEO from a truly effective content strategy. By moving beyond a single primary keyword and embracing a wider range of related terms, you create content that is more valuable for your audience and more visible to search engines. This leads to higher rankings, more organic traffic, and better business results.
While this process requires dedicated research, careful writing, and ongoing monitoring, the payoff is enormous. If you’re looking to implement this strategy at scale without the heavy lifting, an AI first SEO service could be the answer. Platforms like Rankai are built to do exactly this, combining AI efficiency with human expertise to produce over 20 pages of highly optimized content per month. Their unique “rewrite until it ranks” model ensures your content is always working to capture the full spectrum of relevant keywords.
Whether you tackle it yourself or with a partner, the message is clear: stop fishing with a single line. Cast a wider net with secondary keywords and watch your organic traffic grow.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
1. What is the difference between primary and secondary keywords?
A primary keyword is the main topic of your page and should be featured in key places like the title and H1 tag. Secondary keywords are related terms and subtopics that you weave into the body content to add depth and context.
2. How many secondary keywords should I use on a page?
There’s no magic number. Instead of focusing on quantity, focus on covering the topic comprehensively and naturally. A long, in depth article might naturally include dozens of secondary terms, while a shorter post may only have a few.
3. How do I know if my secondary keywords are working?
You can use Google Search Console to monitor performance. Check the “Queries” report for your page to see which secondary keywords are getting impressions and clicks. An increase in rankings or traffic for these terms is a positive sign.
4. Does using secondary keywords guarantee higher rankings?
No single SEO tactic guarantees rankings. However, using secondary keywords effectively is a core part of creating high quality, comprehensive content, which is a major factor that search engines like Google reward. It significantly increases your chances of ranking for a wider range of queries.
5. Are secondary keywords still important with Google’s AI updates?
Yes, more than ever. Google’s AI and semantic search capabilities are designed to understand topics holistically. Using secondary keywords helps you create the kind of in depth, contextually rich content that these advanced algorithms are built to reward. If you’re tracking how AI is changing results pages, see our complete guide to Google AI Overview.
6. Where can I find secondary keywords for free?
You can find excellent secondary keyword ideas for free by using Google’s Autocomplete, the “People Also Ask” boxes, and the “Related Searches” section at the bottom of the search results page. Google Search Console is another powerful free tool for finding keywords you already have some visibility for.