Yesterday, Google finally launched a new keyword tool. This has been in beta for a while, and was previously accessible mostly by Google’s internal team - however, the functions have been leaked in several places (I’ve heard about it from no less than 5 sources over the past month).

The keyword tool brings back data in three ways:

1. Matching Keywords
One inputs a keyword, and Google brings back very similar keywords (similar to the keyword sandbox right now).

2. Category Keywords
If the keyword one inputted in #1 above matches categories, then related categories are brought back as well. Clicking on a category will then start the ‘matching keywords’ process above for that category.

3. Site spider
Input your website (or webpage) and Google will look at the keywords on the website or a webpage and bring back suggestions. The ability to limit to either an entire site or a single webpage is very useful.

The Good News

Lots of new features.
Allows one to ’save’ keywords while the research is being done.
One can use the traffic estimator to see Google’s projections from within this tool.
Allows an ‘add’ button to save these keywords. If the keyword is already in an adgroup, then the button doesn’t appear.
When you’re ready, with the click of a button, these keywords are added to the adgroup you’re working on.

The Bad News

Only accessible from within an adwords account.
Only accessible at the keyword level.
If one wants to use it for research, then you must use a dummy adgroup (preferably in a dummy account).
The spider can bring back some very irrelevant results (one test I did both back ‘quality’ ‘content’ and ‘engine’ - obviously not good keywords).

Overall, an excellent addition to the Google AdWords program. I’m sure this tool will get a bit of tweaking (especially on the spidering side) which will make it one of the most powerful keyword research tools freely available.

• MSN’s PPC Keyword Research
• AdWords Keyword Research by eWhisper
• AdWords Keyword Research Genie - TOC
• Finding Negative Keywords
• AdWords Keyword Research Genie - Full Version