The Best Key Phrase Research Tool You Don't Use

Do you want to know which gender or age group searches for a key phrase more? This free tool can assist.

Pop quiz:

Organize these categories from most searched to least searched on Bing:

  • Animals / Pets & Pet Supplies
  • Beauty_&_Personal_Care / Cosmetics
  • Travel & Lodging / Cruises & Charters
  • Vehicles / Boats & Watercraft

Next, which gender searches for each key phrase more?

  • flights
  • business
  • auto
  • apartments
  • cancer
  • obituaries
  • massage

Which age group searches each of these phrases the most? (Your choices are: 18-24, 25-34, 35-49, 50-64, 65 and over)

  • shoes
  • health
  • love
  • disney world
  • obituaries

Would you like to know the answers to these questions for your industry and targeted key phrases?

Well, you can!

You can find all that and more with Microsoft Ad Intelligence add-in for Excel, a free tool.

I rarely hear people discuss this tool. Yet it has the most interesting data of any key phrase research tool.

There are some barriers to using this tool.

First, you must have Excel 2007. No other version of Excel will work.

Second, you must have a Microsoft adCenter account. The setup is free. But you will need a credit card to put into the system.

These two criteria probably are more trouble than most people want to go to. All other key phrase research tools are online and instantly accessible. Microsoft, I think, has a bit of a hard time letting go of the desktop application.

There really isn’t anything in this tool that couldn’t be run online and then offer the option of downloading the data into Excel.

But just the same, the data is so interesting and unique, it’s worth the effort to access it.

The information you get is based on actual Bing and MSN query data.

You get information like:

  • relevance
  • volume
  • cost history
  • search-user age group
  • gender
  • geographical location

The “Vertical KPIs” tool is particularly fascinating. It allows you to learn more about how keywords in your specific search business category and content vertical perform. This information can help you forecast the expected cost and performance of your search and content campaigns.

It was initially called “adCenter Add-in for Excel.” This tool was a bit buggy. So, I too, avoided it for a while.

I’ll never forget my first experience with this tool. I was at an SES conference talking to someone at the MSN booth. This tool was just coming out. I don’t believe it was available for general consumption.

I spoke with an engineer of the tool. He was beaming with excitement. He was sitting on a stool and showed me this new tool on his personal laptop, literally on his lap. He said he really wanted to give me access to it so I could check it out. But he just wasn’t allowed. He said he’d e-mail me access to it when it went live. Sure enough, he did.

That experience left a big impression with me. At that point, I started to believe that Microsoft was going to continue to be a major player in search marketing.

The process for migrating your Yahoo Search Marketing listings to Microsoft AdCenter is happening right now. Yahoo posted transition steps on its blog on August 31.

Microsoft will close the massive gap between it and Google. And that’s because of innovations such as the Ad Intelligence tool.

We all need to get more comfortable with the Microsoft search world. It will likely be a major part of all our search marketing futures.

Oh! Here are the answers to the questions above:

Most searched to least searched:

  • Travel & Lodging / Cruises & Charters: 6,334,389 impressions
  • Animals / Pets & Pet Supplies: 2,470,943 impressions
  • Beauty_&_Personal_Care / Cosmetics: 1,091,385 impressions
  • Vehicles / Boats & Watercraft: 10,388 impressions

Male or female:

  • flights: female, 56.8 percent
  • business: male, 61.2 percent
  • auto: male, 61.8 percent
  • apartments: female, 61 percent
  • cancer: female, 60.2 percent
  • obituaries: female, 57.4 percent
  • massage: male, 64.5 percent

Age groups:

  • love: 18-24
  • shoes: 25-34
  • disney world: 35-49
  • obituaries: 50-64
  • health: 65 and older

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