Keyword Clustering: How We Organize Keywords in 4 Easy Steps

Let’s be honest—SEO can sometimes feel confusing and hard to piece together. You’ve got a long list of keywords, but where do you even start? 

This is exactly where keyword clustering makes things easier. It’s a powerful way to organize your keywords into groups based on how closely they’re related. 

So, in this article, we’ll walk you through exactly how we approach keyword clustering to take your content from chaotic to totally organized. Plus, we’ve got a free keyword clustering template you can download to get started right away.

What Is Keyword Clustering?

Keyword clustering is the practice of organizing and grouping related keywords together.

Without clustering keywords, you’d have to create one page for each keyword—but when you group them smartly, you can target several related keywords on the same page.

And the best part? It’s a simple strategy that actually works.

But how do keyword clusters work? Let’s find out!

How Do Keyword Clusters Work?

Before any writing begins, we take a look at the keywords. At this point, it’s usually a long bunch. Our SEO specialist goes through that list and starts grouping the keywords that talk about the same thing. 

For example, if we see “best SEO tools,” “SEO tools for beginners,” and “free SEO software,” we put them all together. These all belong in one keyword cluster.

So, by clustering keywords this way, we can write one strong blog post that covers everything a reader might want to know about SEO tools. 

Instead of writing five different posts, we write one complete one. It’s clearer for Google, easier for readers, and helps the page show up higher in search results.

It may sound difficult, but once you get the idea, it only takes a few minutes!

So, now, let’s explore the benefits.

The Benefits Of Keyword Clustering

Here’s how keyword grouping is actually helpful for SEO:

• Improved rankings and traffic: Grouping similar keywords signals to search engines that your content covers a topic in a detailed way, increasing its relevance and authority. This leads to higher rankings and more organic traffic.
• Increased content quality: When combining different subtopics in one single article, you have the opportunity to cover a broader range of relevant information, making the content more comprehensive and valuable to readers. This enhances the overall quality and relevance of your content. Google loves such content.

So, using keyword clustering in SEO gives your content a clear structure and direction.

4 Simple Steps for Effective Keyword Clustering

Now that you’ve got a clear idea of what keyword clustering is and why it matters, let’s talk about how to group keywords the right way.

Understand Your Target Audience

Before we even touch a keyword cluster, we take a step back and ask ourselves: who are we writing for? Knowing your audience is key!

We try to understand what they care about, what problems they’re trying to solve, and what kind of questions they’re typing into Google. 

To figure this out, we use a mix of tools like Ahrefs, Google, and Peopleasked to learn what search terms people are typing, allowing us to optimize content during different parts of a customer journey. 

For instance, people searching for how to write content might type keywords like “content writing tips/strategies.” By researching these keywords, you’ll better understand what people are looking for and write content that not only effectively groups related keywords but also answers the common questions of your target audience.

Start Building Keyword Lists

When we start building our keyword clusters, we follow a simple process to make sure everything is organized and effective. Here’s how we do it:

We put everything in a Google sheet, with columns for:

• Keywords (e.g., “email marketing”)
• Global Search Volume (GSV) (aim for keywords with a GSV over 200)
• Keyword Difficulty (KD) (try to pick keywords with a medium or low difficulty)

Ideally, you want to target medium to easy difficulty (KD) and high global volume (GV) to have the best chance at ranking.

As you can see, the keyword “email marketing” has 93 KD and 195K global search volume. While it’s quite a competitive keyword, you still have a chance to rank high on Google if you manage to write good content and build some valuable backlinks. 

Once the list is ready, we look for seed keywords—these are broad terms that cover the main cluster topic. For example, “email marketing” might be a primary keyword for a blog about creating digital content.

After we have the seed or primary keywords, we dig deeper and look for related subtopics or variations. These could be phrases like “email marketing tools” or “benefits of email marketing.”

So, we can build a well-organized keyword cluster that will help us create more focused, valuable content.

Organize Keywords in Groups 

The next step is to organize keywords into relevant groups. Here’s how you can do it:

You can organize keywords by topics, intent, or any shared characteristics. This helps target related keywords on the same page of your website. For example, if you want to categorize keywords by intent, then you would have these four categories:

• Informational: E.g., “How to start email marketing”
• Commercial: E.g., “email marketing services.”
• Transactional: E.g., “email marketing software discounts”
• Navigational: E.g., “Mailchimp login”

Further reading:
11 Types of Keywords You Should Know

You can also group your keywords based on the type of content you plan to create. For instance, keywords that fit well into blog posts, product pages, landing pages, or even case studies. This way, you know exactly where each keyword belongs and how it will help support your content strategy.

In short, proper keyword organization makes it easier to plan content, stay focused, and reach the right audience at the right time.

Regularly Update & Refresh Content

Keeping the content fresh and up-to-date is another important step, so we regularly check and update our keyword clusters and content.

We start by reviewing our old content to see what needs updating. Then, we look at how our SEO keyword clustering is performing to make sure it matches the latest trends. We stay informed about changes in the industry and update our content with the most relevant keywords. 

To make the content easier to read and more engaging, we add visuals like infographics.  If needed, we turn to AI for graphics like infographics, charts, and images to make the content more engaging and visually appealing. We also check that all links are working and fix them if needed.

After updating, we promote the content through our marketing channels to get it in front of more people. This includes sharing on social media and using social media monitoring to track how well it’s doing, adjusting our approach as needed. 

Regular checkups and small tweaks can help keep your content performing well over time and make sure your content stays relevant, ranks better, and continues to bring value to your audience.

To Sum Up

Keyword clustering isn’t just another task you do and forget about it. It’s an ongoing process that ensures your content stays organized, focused, and aligned with your goals.

Need help sorting your keywords or just want to discuss your content strategy? Contact us to make this SEO thing a little easier (and a lot more fun)!

FAQ about keyword clustering