Research and save keywords

Keywords is where you find search terms worth writing for and keep a list of them. Select Insights > Research in the sidebar. Research has two tabs: Keywords and Buyer questions. Where your tracked keywords rank is on Performance > Search, under Tracked keywords. Keywords is the first tab. It shows Your keywords, your saved list. The Research keywords button at its top right opens keyword research. For Buyer questions, see Add buyer questions from People Also Ask.

Keyword research and audience checks fetch fresh data. Research runs only when you select Run keyword research. Saving a new keyword fetches its Google top 10, and so does Check Google top 10. Opening the tab, tagging, removing, and tracking start no lookup.

Research keyword ideas

1. Select Research keywords, at the top right of Your keywords. Research opens in a window over the list. If you close it and open it again during the same visit, your last search and its results are still there.
2. Enter one to five seed terms in Seed terms (1–5, one per line). The line under the box counts them. If you select Run keyword research with no seed terms, you'll see "Enter at least one seed term."
3. Choose a Location and a Language. They start on your first active market's location and language from Set up your strategy, or on United States and English when no market has them set.
4. Choose a Result count: 10, 25, 50, or 100 ideas. It's the most ideas the run returns in total, split evenly across your seed terms.
5. Optionally select Include SERP overview. It adds a snapshot of each keyword's Google results page: which kinds of results show up, how many results Google reports, and when the page was last checked. Hover the info icon next to it for the details.
6. Above Run keyword research, a line sums up the search as you change it, like "3 seed terms, up to 25 ideas, 3 requests". It's one request per seed term.
7. Select Run keyword research. The button reads Running keyword research… until the results arrive.

Every idea contains one of your seed terms, with words added before, after, or in between, sometimes in a different order. A seed term with no such ideas adds no rows. If you see "No keyword ideas were returned for these seed terms and settings.", try shorter seed terms or another location.

Read the results

Each idea has one row:

• Keyword is the search term.
• Seed is the seed term the idea came from. It shows when the ideas came from more than one seed term. If two seed terms find the same idea, it's listed once, under the first of them.
• Volume is how many people search for it each month.
• CPC is the average cost per click for ads on it.
• Competition is how crowded the ads are for it, as a percentage.
• Difficulty is how hard it is to rank for it. Higher is harder.
• Intent is what the searcher is likely after, like informational or commercial.
• SERP shows Available when the SERP overview came back for that keyword.

A dash means no figure came back for that keyword.

The table starts with the highest Volume first. Select a column heading to sort by it, and select it again to reverse the order. To narrow the ideas, type part of a keyword in Search keywords, or select the filter icon in the Intent heading and pick an intent. Below the table, a count shows how many ideas match, like "1–25 of 50." Filtering makes no new lookup. The table shows 25 ideas a page.

Save keywords

1. Select the box next to each keyword you want, or the box in the table's header row to select every idea that matches your search and filter, on every page.
2. Select Save to your keywords, at the bottom of the window.

The window closes. A line above Your keywords confirms how many were newly saved, and how many were already saved if any, and the saved keywords are highlighted in the list. Keywords save with the location and language of the run.

Each newly saved keyword is also tracked for rank checks on your site, and Mark fetches its Google top 10 for the audience check, one lookup per new keyword. Saving a keyword that's already saved changes neither.

Find saved keywords

Your keywords shows a count of saved keywords next to its title. The keywords with the most searches are at the top. Until you save one, it says "Start your keyword list" with a Research keywords button.

Search sits above the table. The other filters are in the column headers: select the funnel next to Tags, Source, or Market and pick values. Each applies as soon as you pick, and they combine:

• Search by keyword: type part of the keyword and press Enter.
• Tags: tick one or more of your tags to see keywords that have any of them. The column shows once you've tagged a keyword.
• Source: Research, Competitor lookup, AI agent, or Search Console, one at a time. Competitor lookup means you saved it from a competitor's page under Strategy > Competitors. See Research competitors. A keyword keeps the source it was first saved from.
• Market: tick one or more markets to see the keywords saved in any of them. Its filter shows once you've saved keywords in more than one market.

Each filter that's on shows as a chip above the rows, such as "Tags: evergreen". Select a chip to remove that filter, or Clear all to remove every one and keep your search. While a search is on, Clear filters next to it resets the search and every filter. On a phone, each keyword shows as a card, and one Filter button above the cards holds every filter. If nothing matches, you'll see "No saved keywords match these filters."

Each row shows:

• Keyword, Volume, CPC, and Intent, as in the research results. An excluded keyword has a red no-entry icon next to it; hover it for the reason. Select a keyword to open its details. See Open a keyword's details.
• Difficulty, colored as easy (under 30), medium (30 to 69), or hard (70 and up).
• Competition, how crowded the paid ads are, as a percentage. It's colored as low (under 34%), medium, or high (67% and up).
• Track, a switch that turns rank checks on or off for that keyword on the site you picked. It's off and can't be turned on for an excluded keyword. See Track keywords for rank checks.
• Position, where your site ranked on Google at the last rank check, with a green up or red down arrow and how many places it moved since the check before. 100+ means outside the top 100. n/a means no check has run yet, or the last one failed. A dash means the keyword isn't tracked on the site. See Track keywords for rank checks.
• Market, the flag of the country the numbers are for. Hover it to see the country's name.
• Tags, the keyword's tags, once you've tagged a keyword.
• Source, where you first saved it from.

Hover the info icon on any column heading for a short explanation of it.

Sort by Keyword or Volume by selecting the column heading. Select it again to reverse the order. Keywords without a volume sort last either way. On a phone, pick the order from the menu above the cards.

Under the table, a line shows which keywords you're seeing, such as "21–40 of 45". Select a page number, or Previous and Next, to move between pages, and use Rows per page to show 20, 50, or 100 at a time.

Open a keyword's details

Select a keyword's name to open its details on the side. They show:

• The audience check: your call on the keyword and Google's top 10 for it. See Check who a keyword's searchers are.
• Tags, with an × on each to remove it and a box to add one.
• Source, where the keyword came from, and Saved, when you saved it.
• The market by name, like "United States · English", under the keyword.

Check who a keyword's searchers are

A keyword can match your product word for word and still be searched by the wrong people. Search volume doesn't tell you who they are, and volume tools can disagree by about four times on the same query. In Mark, volume only orders your list. It never decides that a page should exist.

The audience check shows you who Google ranks for the keyword today, so you can judge whether that crowd is your buyer.

Mark fetches the top 10 when you save the keyword, in its own location and language.

1. Select the keyword's name to open its details. If the automatic lookup failed, select Check Google top 10.
2. Read the results. Each of the top 10 organic results shows its position, title, domain, and a rough page type: Article, Product or service, Directory or listing, Forum, Video, or Government or edu. SERP features lists which of People Also Ask, AI Overview, Local pack, Video, Shopping, and Discussions and forums appeared.
3. If the list has a shaded Discussions and forums row, read it. It's Google's block of forum threads, separate from any single Forum result, and it sits where Google placed it among the top 10, or at the end of the list if Google placed it lower. The line under the title reads "Google shows these threads here. Buyers are asking each other, not a business." Each thread shows its title, which opens the thread in a new tab, and its source, post count, and month when Google gives them, like "r/HomeImprovement · 12 posts · Mar 2026". Open a few threads to see who is asking and what they want. Threads full of people looking to hire someone fit a keyword worth keeping. Threads of people doing it themselves point to excluding it. Reddit threads titled as questions also show under Suggested on Research > Buyer questions. Only keywords you have checked and not excluded feed that list, and nothing becomes a buyer question until you select Add.
4. If the crowd isn't your buyer, select Exclude, say why in up to 200 characters, like "Ranking pages are DIY forums, not homeowners hiring," and select Exclude again.

Every keyword is included until you exclude it. An excluded keyword stops rank tracking, and its past positions stay. To undo it, open its details and select Include again. Tracking picks up where it stopped. An excluded keyword shows a red no-entry icon next to its name in the list. Mark never excludes a keyword for you. Volume, difficulty, and every other metric leave it alone.

Select Re-check to fetch the results again. The new results replace the old ones, and an exclusion stays. If the lookup fails, you'll see a message, nothing is saved, and you can try again.

Act on selected keywords

Select the box next to each keyword, or the box above the table to select all on the page. A bar shows how many are selected, with Track rank, Stop tracking, Add tag, Remove tag, and Remove. Select Clear selection to deselect them all.

Tag saved keywords

Tags are your own labels for grouping keywords, like "service pages".

1. Select the keywords.
2. Select Add tag, enter a tag name, and select Add tag again.

To take a tag off, select the keywords, select Remove tag, and pick the tag. The list shows only tags on the selected keywords. To remove one tag from one keyword, open its details and select the × on the tag.

Remove saved keywords

1. Select the keywords.
2. Select Remove.
3. Confirm with Remove, or select Cancel.

Removing deletes the keywords, their tags, and any rank history from your saved list. It does not undo.

Track keywords for rank checks

Tracked keywords get Mark's own Google rank checks for one of your sites. Keywords are tracked on your main site when you save them. Use this section to track them on another site, or to stop tracking. Excluded keywords aren't tracked. Including one again turns back on the tracking that excluding stopped, or tracks it on your main site if it was never tracked. Tracking you stopped before excluding stays off. The results show on Performance > Search, in Tracked keywords and in the Tracked rank column of Queries. See Check your keyword rankings and Read performance.

1. If you have more than one site, pick the site from Tracking ranks for next to Your keywords. It's the same site menu as on Presence > Websites.
2. Select the keywords.
3. Select Track rank or Stop tracking.

To track or untrack one keyword, use the Track switch on its row. The Position column shows a dash for keywords that aren't tracked on the site you picked.

Tracking alone starts no lookup. Beside Tracking ranks for, Rank checks sets how the site's checks run: Manual: only when you click Run now or Weekly: checks rankings once a week. It saves as soon as you pick. To run a check now, see Check your keyword rankings.

Add buyer questions from People Also Ask

Buyer questions is the list of questions your buyers ask AI tools. When AI answer checks are on, Mark asks each active question every week on ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Overview, AI Mode, Claude, and Perplexity. Select the Buyer questions tab to see the list. The ⋮ button in a question's Actions column opens its menu:

• Log idea, while no page answers it yet.
• Deactivate, to leave it out of the next check. Reactivate brings it back.
• Delete, to remove it from your list and from future checks. Past AI answer results for it stay. Adding the same question again brings it back with its history.

To act on several at once, select the box next to each question, or the box above the table to select all on the page. A bar shows how many are selected, with Deactivate and Delete. Delete asks you to confirm first. The list shows 25 questions a page; pick 50 or 100 in Rows per page.

To add your own question, type it in Question and select Add question.

Select Suggested above the list to see questions you might add. They come from three sources, shown in the Source column. To see only some, select the filter icon in the Source column header and pick one or more. On a phone, select Filter:

• People Also Ask: questions Google showed for your tracked keywords on the latest rank check for each site and locale. Mark saves them during the check, so viewing suggestions never starts a new lookup. See Check your keyword rankings.
• Search Console: searches phrased as questions that showed your site on Google in the last 28 days, with their impressions and clicks.
• Reddit: Reddit threads titled as questions, like "How much did your ADU cost?", from the Discussions and forums row of each keyword's audience check. Only keywords you have checked and not excluded count. Each title opens its thread in a new tab.

Until a source has something to suggest, or once you've added every suggestion, Suggested says there are no suggestions right now and links to Performance › Search › Tracked keywords.

A suggestion is not a buyer question. Mark never asks it in an AI answer check and never adds it for you.

1. Read the question. Why shows where it came from: the tracked keyword whose results showed it, plus a count like +2 if more keywords showed it too, a search's impressions and clicks, or a thread's subreddit.
2. Decide if a buyer would ask it in those words. Once added, a question can't be edited, only deactivated or deleted.
3. If the wording is close but not right, type your own version in Question and select Add question. Otherwise, select Add to put the suggestion on your list as written. It starts active.

Suggestions leave out any question already on your list, active or not, and any question another source already suggests. Mark shows up to 50 from each source. When a source has more, a line under the table gives its total, like "People Also Ask: showing 50 of 64."

Compare questions by AI search volume

AI Search Volume estimates how often people ask AI assistants like ChatGPT and Google AI Mode a question each month. It's the sum across your active markets that have both a location and a language. It's modeled, not a count of real prompts, so use it to compare questions with each other. Hover the info icon on the column heading for how many markets it sums and when it was last fetched.

To see each market, hover, focus, or tap a question's number. The breakdown lists each market with its flag and name, highest volume first, then a Total line.

A cell can also show:

• No data: Mark fetched it and no market had a figure.
• Not fetched: Mark hasn't fetched any market for it yet. Select Refresh AI volume to fetch it.
• —: no active market has a location and language. A line above the table says so and links to Markets.

Set a market's location and language in Strategy > Markets.

To fetch fresh figures:

1. Read the line next to Refresh AI volume on Your questions, like "12 questions × 2 markets". It's one estimate per active question in each market. With no active question, it reads "Nothing to check. Add or turn on a buyer question first." The button shows once you have a question and a market with a location and language.
2. Select Refresh AI volume. It reads Refreshing… until the figures arrive.

To vet a question before you add it:

1. Type it in Question and select Check AI volume. The button reads Checking… while it runs. It stays off until you type a question and a market has a location and language.
2. Read the popover, AI search volume a month. It shows each market and a total, the same way as the column. Nothing is saved yet.
3. Select Add question to add it to your list, or Close to leave it. If the check fails, the popover says why, like "AI volume check failed. Try again."