There are two kinds of query, and they should not share a budget line. A branded query contains your name: “Northline pricing”, “Fieldnote login”. A category query names the job: “brand studio”, “habit tracker”, “crm for agencies”.
Branded suggestions are usually easier. The name is already the query. They help people who are close to you, and they do little for people who have never heard of you. Category suggestions do the introduction. The list offers your name as one way to finish a sentence the buyer started without you.
Pick a phrase you can serve
The right category query has three properties. People type it. It describes something you sell. Your site can prove that in a single page, without a detour through a homepage slogan.
Volume tells you the first property. A keyword under a few hundred searches a month can still be right if the buyers are expensive, but it should not be priced or promised like a head term. That is why the plans on this site step from 500 to 1,000 to 2,000 monthly searches. Above that, the work is custom because the list is more crowded.
A bad keyword is specific
- It names a competitor, and the ask is to wear their clothes.
- It names a category you do not offer, because the volume looked good in a spreadsheet.
- It is so broad (“software”, “agency”, “app”) that a single brand suggestion is not a realistic reading of the list.
When a brief arrives, the first reply is often a narrower phrase. “CRM” becomes “crm for agencies”. “Studio” becomes “brand studio”. The narrower phrase is the one a buyer actually finishes, and the one a single company can honestly occupy.
Country belongs in the sentence
The same English words produce different lists in the UK, the US, and Australia. Choose the country where the pipeline is, not the country where the founder is sitting this month. A second country is a second placement, not a checkbox.
If you are choosing a first query, start with the phrase your best customers used before they knew your name. That sentence is the brief.