You’ve hired an SEO specialist or consultant, they’ve analyzed your niche and competitors, prepared keyword research, and in the column next to the search volume, you see a parameter called keyword difficulty. What does this score mean? Does a score of 0 indicate that the competition for the keyword is very low or even nonexistent? Does a high score mean that the competition is so fierce that you have no chance of ranking well for that keyword?
During my time working with SEO, I’ve heard very different opinions from various experts regarding this parameter. Some rely solely on it to select low-hanging fruit keywords, while others don’t consider it a determining factor for competition on a particular keyword. In this article, I’ll share my assessment of the keyword difficulty metric and provide examples to demonstrate when this score is useful and what it truly reflects.
What Does Keyword Difficulty Score Mean and Where Does It Come From?
Let’s start from the beginning so that even a completely unfamiliar reader can understand what it’s about.
Keyword difficulty is a score that was created to reflect the competitiveness of a keyword. In simple terms, it shows how hard it will be to rank for a selected keyword. The higher the score, the more difficult it will be to rank in the top 10 of organic Search Engine Results Page (SERP), and the lower the score, the easier it will be to rank.
How to Check Keyword Difficulty and How This Score is Determined
This topic is more complex because there are many SEO tools that calculate this score. For example, there’s a metric from a tool called Moz. They were among the first to calculate keyword difficulty, though they don’t fully disclose their exact methodology. However, it’s known that they factor in metrics like Page Authority (PA) and Domain Authority (DA). Another well-known SEO tool, Semrush, uses a very similar approach. They evaluate the number of links built to the page ranking for the keyword in SERP, the total number of backlinks to the domain that the page belongs to, and the ratio of dofollow/nofollow links.
Perhaps the most popular tool among my circle of SEO specialists is Ahrefs. They also calculate keyword difficulty in a similar way but with a few differences. They consider the backlink profile (i.e., all the links built to the site and the page ranking for the selected keyword), content relevance, and other factors they don’t specify.
Each of these tools claims their metric is the most accurate — naturally, could it be otherwise? But is that really the case?
What Keyword Difficulty Really Shows and My Personal View on the Usefulness of This Score
I’ll start with a statement that I will later support with arguments. Keyword difficulty, no matter who calculates it or how it’s measured, will always be an inaccurate and insufficient metric for determining the keywords that will be easiest for you to rank for. Identifying low-competition search queries is a complex task, and complex problems rarely have simple solutions. Here are my arguments for why this metric is inadequate.
Ranking Rules Change Frequently, and We Don’t Fully Know Their Impact
A large number of factors influence how Google and other search engines evaluate content, websites, and generally build search results. Nowadays, creating keyword-rich content is much faster thanks to AI, and not only are things changing frequently, but search engines keep ranking rules secret, including how much links or, for example, content, affect the ranking of a page. I’m not sure if the keyword difficulty formula, which most specialists rely on, changes at the same pace.
Too Many Variables
Each year, search engines use more resources and metrics to determine who is the best candidate for ranking in organic SERP. SEO has long been about more than just links, technical site condition, and content. Recently, a new component was added to Google’s Search Quality Evaluator Guidelines (SQEG) called E-A-A-T. As I mentioned before, keyword difficulty is often calculated using a very limited set of metrics.
Any Metrics Can Be Manipulated
There are many ways to artificially inflate certain metrics in tools that calculate keyword difficulty. Why would someone do this? Well, for one, to confuse competitors and hide their SEO strategy. For example, I could build 100 high-quality links to improve my rankings and then build 10,000 cheap links that I later disavow. You’d then be left trying to analyze which links worked and contributed to my success. There are many reasons for this, and to explain them all would require a separate article.
If Everyone Knows About It, It’s No Longer a Viable SEO Strategy
The more accurate an SEO tool is, the more popular it becomes. This, in turn, leads to you not being the only one targeting the “easiest-to-succeed” queries for generating traffic. The best strategy to outsmart your competitors is the one they’re unaware of, because what stops them from doing the same?
So, Does Keyword Difficulty Make Any Sense?
In my opinion, keyword difficulty does have its place, as I mentioned earlier, but it’s not enough on its own to determine a promotion strategy or the queries that will get you traffic faster. This score is based on factors that undoubtedly have a significant impact on ranking. It was created for a surface-level analysis, allowing you to quickly identify queries that are relatively low competition based on key SEO parameters. It’s one of the indicators that reflects query specificity, helping us analyze niches and saving specialists time.
Additionally, if you lack other data and don’t have a specialist who can identify low-competition queries that match ranking trends and the specifics of your niche and site, then keyword difficulty is at least something—an estimate that, while not entirely accurate, is closer to the truth.
Can You Identify Low-Competitive Keywords in Another Way?
Yes, of course. As I mentioned earlier, you can find queries that don’t require a lot of links and for which you can get traffic without a highly authoritative domain. There are methods like the golden keyword ratio strategy, but you must understand that there’s no universal strategy for everyone at all times. Ranking rules change, and ranking rules vary greatly by niche. A good SEO specialist with a track record of successful cases is probably the only person who can build a strategy for you, considering your niche and the goals you set.
What’s My Conclusion About Keyword Difficulty?
Is keyword difficulty enough to assess a query’s competitiveness? At a surface level, yes, but it’s a very inaccurate metric. You could write 100 articles targeting queries with a keyword difficulty of 0 and still see no results. To identify low-competition keywords that will be easy for you to rank for, keyword difficulty alone won’t be enough.
Who Can Evaluate Low-Competition Queries for You?
No tool or AI can do this accurately. Only an experienced SEO specialist, preferably someone with experience in your niche or a similar one, can help.
Does the Keyword Difficulty Score Make Any Sense at All?
Yes, on a basic level, it can be useful. You can interpret the data that this score provides from different angles. For example, queries with a high score are clearly important because people are investing resources to rank better for them. These could be good competitors to analyze and learn from their success. Also, I believe that in the absence of other data, it’s better to rely on this score than to write articles blindly.
