Adwords Estimator - "Not enough data..."

[OneOfEm]

I'm toying with an idea for an informational website with affiliate or PPC ads. With fair execution, there is real potential for Digg first page (it's current, a little geeky, and the timing is perfect) and a pretty high click-through on the ads. However, Google's Adwords Estimator doesn't know anything about my primary keyword combination.

When I search for the keywords within Google, the first couple of pages are nothing but messages from people looking for ideas on this subject or news articles on this subject.

I'm encouraged by this.

Without knowing details, am I missing anything?

Also, I've talked with my host, and they say they can handle the volume. Has anyone ever dealt with that kind of load spike?

[Marcie]

I *think* Google's 'data' in this case is based on other people clicking on ads related to those keywords. So, if you truly have little or no competition, there would be no data. Hm, have you tried my favorite tool http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ - you can see how many people are searching for your keywords on all the major engines together...run a test! :)

[ItsMe]

Hi,
the http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ tool does not give any result for any search topic. Not even speed reading or weight loss.


Is there any tool that works?

[Marcie]

Well :( that wasn't even the link I meant to post but nonetheless it does seem to be not working - which means a lot of other tools based on this one also are not working...I'll look around...

[Disarm]

Yeah, the overture search has been down since at least Thursday when I first tried to use it. Anyone know of any alternatives?

[Marcie]

Well, here is one: http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/ - I read that this is based on Dogpile.com and Metacrawler.com, which is .63% of all searches. Not exactly statistically significant...

More info on the Yahoo/Overature tool here:
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/007337.html

[OneOfEm]

OK... here's a hack that will give you pretty close estimation of Google hits - much closer than anything else:

-Go to Google Trends

-In the search box enter {male yeast infection, "your keywords"}
(I know that's strange, but trust me)

-On the graph that follows, you'll see a blue line (for male...) and hopefully a red line for your keywords

-If there's no red line on the graph, look at the bottom right by "English" under "Languages."

Here's the kicker: the recent average for male yeast infection has been between 500-550 hits per day. If a red line shows on the upper graph, you can get a good estimate from it. If not, compare the blue bar under "English" to the red bar under it. Again, the blue bar is around 500 hits, so if your red bar is half of that, you can expect 250.

If you have a keyword combo with a known number of hits per day (over 250), you could use it in place of the male yeast infection for even more accurate results.

This information came from the Thirty Day Challenge website. Although it's over for this year, the info is still available, and it's been very informative for me - especially the market research parts.

[dkingnu]

After doing what you had mentioned, I don't see any red lines anywhere for that search term even under the English languages section. What does it mean if there are no red lines?
Thanks

[dkingnu]

It looks like you have to seperate search terms with a comma to get the red lines. Once you get the lines, you can see them on the volume map, but I am still not sure how you get an actual # of searches...

[Marcie]

I'm confused, why wouldn't you just use Google's Estimator?

[OneOfEm]

Google's estimator is for adwords. This estimates clickthroughs on searches within Google if you're in the top 3-4 search results. They are two different tools for two different goals.

If there is no red line (not even under "English"), there are a negligible number of searches per day for that specific keyword combination.

If you see a red line or bar, you'll have to visually compare your line to the blue line, knowing it's a "baseline" of 500 hits per day.

[Marcie]

Oh, so searches vs. clickthroughs. Gotcha.