Branded vs Non Branded Keywords: Which Are Better to Increase Your Website Sales in 2024

Keyword research is probably the #1 way to increase your search traffic and overall website sales.

Just like any other aspect of SEO, keyword research is also a huge ocean. There are a ton of keyword types including;

  • Informative keywords (how to articles, case studies and so on)
  • Buyer keywords (buy now, discount, coupon posts etc)

There are also keyword types which include;

  • Branded keywords
  • Non branded keywords

In this article, we’ll talk about the major difference between branded vs non branded keywords along with their benefits so you’ll know when to use which type of keywords to increase your website traffic and sales in 2024.

Are you ready? Let’s get started without further ado.

Branded vs Non Branded Keywords: Which One Should You Use for More Sales

branded vs non branded keywords

What are branded keywords?

Branded keywords are “navigational keywords” that include the brand name.

They are navigational simply because the searchers are exclusively looking for your brand name. It simply means that they already know that your brand exists and they are typing various keywords that are relevant to your brand to find your website or products in search results.

Branded keywords can contain a variety of keyword terms including;

  • Your company name
  • Your startup name
  • Your products
  • Your website name
  • Your agency name and so on

Branded keywords examples along with their benefits

As we already discussed above a brand keyword is the keyword that is used primarily to search for a brand or company name. For instance, a recognisable branded keyword example is “Nike”.

Now, Nike doesn’t have to only bid for “Nike” keyword as it can also add qualifier keywords which are also known as “branded plus” keyword terms such as;

  • Nike running shoe
  • Nike coupon
  • Nike shoe discount
  • Nike men running shoe size 12
  • And the list goes on

More examples of branded keywords include;

  • Apple iPhone (a smartphone from Apple brand)
  • Samsung galaxy (a smartphone from Samsung brand)
  • Ford Ecosport (a compact SUV from Ford brand)
  • And so on

Are you getting it?

Branded keywords are those keywords that people use in search engines to find a particular product or service of a particular brand (in the above example, it is “Nike” and it’s a HUGE brand).

Read: Google Search Ranking SEO Case Study: How Long Does It Take to Rank for A Keyword

What are the benefits of branded keywords?

If you’re wondering about the benefits of using branded keywords, here are few of them.

Targeted people and hot leads: People who are looking for your branded keywords clearly show some interest in your brand or company. In most of the cases, they already are familiar with your products, services or brand.

That means, targeted people (who already know your brand or company name) are looking for you in search results. So there’s a huge advantage of converting them as they can be considered as hot leads as converting them into sales will be much easier (when compared to those who don’t know your brand).

Branded keywords generate more clicks: Did you know that branded keywords generate more clicks? Yes, that’s true. A study conducted by Bing revealed that running ads on branded terms results in 31% more clicks for retail advertisers and 27% more clicks for travel advertisers. So clearly, if you’re targeting branded keywords either organically or by bidding PPC ads, you will get better ROI.

Increased conversion rates: The #1 reason huge brands like Amazon spend literally billions of dollars on paid search is this: they know that by targeting branded keywords, they will get higher conversion rates.

Thousands of studies have shown that branded keywords are 5 times more likely to convert visitors into leads, and paid conversion rates can be upwards of 4 times higher than organic conversion rates. That’s insane, right?

That’s why you should target branded keywords. They get you better conversions, hot leads, more clicks and what not?

How to easily find branded keywords?

There are multiple ways to find branded keywords. So let’s discuss some of the best and easiest ways to find branded keywords to increase your website sales and conversions.

Using Google Autosuggest

Google Autosuggest is a saviour. It’s free, easy to use and fast. Just start typing on Google about a brand or company. Search for a brand by typing the business or product name without hitting enter and you’ll see a ton of suggestions from Google.

Here’s how it looks like;

semrush brand keywords

As you can see above, when entered an example branded keyword “Semrush” (which is also the #1 SEO tool), Google autosuggest is giving us a ton of keyword terms and suggestions that include the branded term “Semrush”.

You can again start performing keyword research for the suggestions given by Google autosuggest to take your keyword research to the next level.

Using Semrush

Google Autosuggest is great but it doesn’t give you full keyword metrics. Here’s where a comprehensive SEO tool like Semrush comes into play.

Semrush is an all in one SEO toolkit that helps you with almost every SEO related task including keyword research, competitor analysis, backlink audit, site audits, domain vs domain comparison and the list goes on.

Click this link to get a 14 day free Semrush Pro account (worth $129.95)

If you’re wondering about how to use Semrush to find branded keywords, here’s a simple tutorial for you.

Step 1: Go to Semrush dashboard, click on “Organic Research” section which you can find under Competitive Research tool from Semrush.

Now, simply enter any of your competitors URL in the organic research section. Here’s how it looks like;

Organic Research Semrush

As you can see above, immediately after entering a domain name, Semrush organic research tool gives us a ton of data including;

  • Keywords (a list of all the keywords the domain is ranking for)
  • Estimated organic traffic
  • Traffic cost
  • Position changes
  • Competitors
  • Top pages and so on

Step 2: To find “branded keywords”, you need to use filters in Semrush organic research tool.

Here’s how it looks like:

branded semrush

Here’s how you can do it.

  • Go to “Positions” tab in organic research
  • Click on “Advanced Filters”
  • Choose the filter “Include” and select “Keyword type”
  • And pick Branded column

That’s it, you’re done.

Step 3: Now, once you’ve applied the above filters, Semrush organic research tool shows you a list of all the branded keywords your entered domain or website is ranking for.

Here’s the data.

branded keywords example

As you can see above, you can see that our example domain “Neil Patel” currently is ranking for 13 branded keywords. Along with those keywords, Semrush also shows you the data including;

  • Keyword positions
  • Traffic percentage
  • Search volume
  • Keyword difficulty
  • CPC
  • URL
  • SERP result for the keyword

The above keyword data is enough for you to easily determine the value and competition of any keyword. That’s how you can easily find highly potential branded keywords using Semrush.

Read: Serpstat Review: Is it the Best SEO Tool?

What are non-branded keywords?

Non branded keywords are those keywords which are highly relevant to your brand, company or products but don’t include your brand’s name.

For example, let’s say you’re running an SEO related blog with the website name “Bloggers Passion”.

Bloggers Passion is your brand name whereas keywords like “SEO”, “digital marketing”, “keyword research services” etc are non-branded keywords which DO NOT include your brand name directly but are highly relevant to your website.

Non-branded keywords examples along with their benefits

Non branded keywords don’t include a branded term and mostly include highly relevant terms. It simply means, these keywords do not include a brand or company name or any part of it.

Let’s take an example of a non branded keyword.

photo editing software Google Search

As you can see above, when you enter a keyword term like “photo editing software” on Google, Google instantly shows you featured snippets including top editing software tools like;

  • Adobe Photoshop
  • GIMP
  • Polarr
  • CorelDRAW
  • And so on

You can see that, we’ve NOT included any branded keyword in that example. That’s the beauty of targeting non branded keywords as you’ll be getting more exposure for other highly relevant terms (even though your brand or company is not included in them).

What are the benefits of non branded keywords?

You can still get benefits by ranking for non branded keywords although these keywords don’t directly include your brand or company’s name.

More opportunities: The #1 benefit of using non branded keywords in your SEO or PPC strategy is that you can expand your reach because you’ve literally unlimited options to rank for relevant keywords (without actually including a brand or company’s name).

Non branded keywords give you more options when compared to branded keywords because the keywords your target audience uses to discover your website or products are almost unlimited.

They help you build awareness: Honestly, non branded keywords help you build awareness about your products, website, services, company and so on. Since people are not searching for your brand related terms, they’ll be mostly typing that’s similar to your brand. It allows you to focus on finding highly relevant terms to increase the awareness of your products or services.

Enough said about non branded keywords. Let’s now talk about how you can find them.

How to easily find non branded keywords?

Curious to know how to find non branded keywords? Let’s now talk about how you can quickly find non branded keywords to increase your traffic and sales.

Using Semrush

As we already discussed above the importance of using Semrush. It can be also used to find non branded keywords and the keyword research is almost similar to that of finding branded keywords (which we covered above).

Here’s how to use Semrush to find non branded keywords easily.

Step 1: Go to Semrush dashboard, click on “Organic Research” section which you can find under Competitive Research tool from Semrush.

Enter any of your competitors URL in the organic research section.

Semrush organic research tool gives you all the data you need including;

  • A list of all the keywords the domain is ranking for
  • Estimated organic traffic
  • Traffic cost
  • Position changes
  • Competitors
  • Top pages

Step 2: To find “non branded keywords”, you need to use filters in Semrush organic research tool.

Here’s how it looks like;

non branded semrush

Here’s how to apply filters to find non branded keywords.

  • Go to “Positions” tab in organic research
  • Click on “Advanced Filters”
  • Choose the filter “Include” and select “Keyword type
  • And pick Not branded column

That’s it!

Step 3: Once you’ve applied the above filters, you can find a list of all the not branded keywords for the specific domain you entered.

Here’s the data on it.

non branded keywords example

As you can see above, you can see that our example domain “Neil Patel” is ranking for nearly 290K non branded keywords.

You can again apply more filters with low search volume (less than 1000 searches) to easily find low search volume non branded keywords.

Read: Keyword Cannibalization: What Is It And How to Fix It to Improve Your Website’s SEO 

Few More Things About Branded vs Non Branded Keywords

Here are few important things to keep in mind while using branded or non branded keywords to increase your overall website sales and conversions in 2024 and beyond.

Smartly use branded keywords

Did you know that you can bid for your competitors branded keywords? Yes, you can do that.

For example, let’s have a look at “air zoom womens nike” in Google search.

air zoom example

As you can see above, resellers are bidding on PPC results for the branded term (air zoom is one of the best sellers from Nike).

You can also see that there are no particular ads from the brand Nike. By smartly bidding such kind of branded keywords on Google PPC, you get more clicks from search engines with higher conversion rates.

Get more keyword data

While choosing both branded vs non branded keywords, it’s essential for you to gather as much keyword data as possible.

Keyword data including;

  • Competition
  • SERP
  • Keyword search volume
  • CPC
  • Keyword difficulty

The above metrics are extremely important to determine great keywords to increase your sales and conversions. So how can you find that keyword data?

Start using the RIGHT tools. Yes, if you’ve access to the right SEO tools like Semrush (Semrush is the only tool we’ve been using for more than 3 years to find highly potential keywords) is the key.

The good thing about using Semrush is that, you can easily find a list of branded vs non branded keywords with filters.

Whether you know it or not, you can filter by 3 types of keywords in Semrush.

  • Branded keywords: It will display you all branded keywords for the queried domain
  • Non branded keywords: It will show keywords that are not branded for your queried domain
  • Branded for other domains: It will show keywords that include another domain’s brand name that the queried domain is ranking for in Google’s top 100

All in all, Semrush is the PERFECT tool for finding branded and non branded keywords easily. So what are you still waiting for? Use the below link to get started with Semrush today.

Click here to try Semrush Pro free for 14 days

FAQs

Here are few interesting questions you should know about branded and non branded keywords in 2024 and beyond.

What is branded paid search?

Bidding for branded keywords (such as “Adidas running shoe) in paid search results (PPC ads) in search engines like Google, Bing etc is known as branded paid search.

Are there any keyword research tools for finding both branded vs non branded keywords?

Yes, there’s a tool called Semrush. You can use the organic research tool from Semrush to easily find both branded and non branded keywords

Can I target my competitors branded keywords?

Yes and no. No, you can’t if your competitors’ website or brand name is watermarked and yes if they haven’t.

Should I bid on brand terms in 2024?

Yes, you should, especially if you have competitors appearing for various keyword terms which are directly related to your brand (or include your brand name). It allows you to protect your traffic coming from paid or organic search along with Google rankings.

What type of keywords should I consider while bidding for PPC ads?

There are basically several types of keywords including;

Generic terms: As the name suggests, these are general keywords that describe your product or service (i.e. fitness apps)
Related terms: These are the keywords that don’t directly relate to your website or business that your audience may be searching for (i.e. fitness)
Brand terms: As we discussed above, these are the keywords that contain your brand, website or company name (i.e. Nike running shoe)
Non-brand terms: These are the keywords which don’t include your brand name but are highly relevant to your products or brand (i.e “best writing apps” for the brand Grammarly)
Competitor terms: These are the keywords that including PPC and organic keywords of your competitors


Final Thoughts

It doesn’t matter whether you’re bidding PPC terms or trying to rank organically, you need to target both branded and non branded keywords. They both help you with increase conversions, expanded reach, bringing more leads organically and so on.

It depends on your brand, website or company when to go for these keywords for higher conversions and website sales. So what are your thoughts?

Do you’ve any more questions around branded vs non branded keywords? Let us know in the comments.

About Author
Anil Agarwal is the Founder of Bloggerspassion. He is a full-time blogger and SEO expert who has been helping people build profitable blogs for over a decade Now. He has been featured in Over 100 Publications including Forbes, The HuffPost, HubSpot, Shopify, Semrush, Kinsta, Bluehost, Hostinger and G2.com etc. Know more about Anil Agarwal from here.

Reader Comments (15)

  1. Hi,
    A lot information you have given in the blog about branding and non branding keywords. We have to target for not branded keyword to get best results. I think please reply me

    Reply
    • Hi, that’s true, we’ve talked mostly about branding and non branding keywords and yes, we always have to target for not branded keyword to get best results (if you’re starting new or don’t have much budget). Also make sure to focus on using informative keywords as they tend to have higher monthly searches, so they can send you more traffic.

      Reply
  2. Hello Anil sir,

    I have seen your Interview on youtube, I am really feeling motivated, after seeing such a passion. You are an inspiration for youth.

    Reply
    • Hi Sneha, glad you saw my interview on YouTube (may I know which exact interview you saw, is it with Amit?). Glad you found it motivational. Make sure to start a blog and be consistent so that you can also make money and inspire others.

      Reply
  3. Honestly saying if an article is extremely informative, helpful and provides right approach then it must be from Anil Agarwal Sir. I am die hard fan. Such a great informative articles always he provides. THanks.

    Reply
  4. Hey Anil sir,

    This is a very interesting article as many times people will only focus only on using branded keywords, this article will help them understand that they should be targeting both for better performance. I will agree with you sir brands won’t take an objection if we try to rank it organically, i’m sure many would have had this question on their minds, glad you answered it for all.

    Reply
  5. Thanks Sir !
    As you told in your article that Non branded keywords are not much profitable but if we will rank on some Keywords like (Best Running shoes, Top 10 seo tool etc) then we can generate more sales.
    Am I right or not ? (Because I am new in Blogging)

    Reply
  6. Very interesting post Anil. The way you have mentioned about harnessing both branded and non branded keywords for SEO is awesome.
    Thanks.

    Reply
  7. Hey Anil sir,

    Yesterday I watched your interview on YouTube, I really impressed. You have been blogging for 10 years. I would liked to follow your knowledge.

    Reply
  8. Hi Anil,

    First off, I’d like to commend you for this amazing and informative post. I couldn’t agree more with what you shared here, particularly, with the combination of branded and non-branded keywords. For the most part, branded and non-branded keywords are truly helpful in PPC and in pursuit of better results in terms of conversion and sales, it is time that businesses focus on these two. Plus, we must not forget to target the right audience and provide relevance to user intent. I’m definitely looking forward to reading more of your blog posts soon. Thanks for sharing this post! The insights are amazing.

    Reply
  9. Hello Anil,

    Great Post. Branded keywords are highly competitive as you have to compete with industry leaders. I agree with you that we have to use the combination of both Branded and Non branded keywords. However, I have one question for you. Do you think that using Branded keywords sometimes creating trademark issues? Because many brands are not like to use their keywords. Please reply.

    Regards,
    Vishwajeet

    Reply
    • Vishwajeet, there could be issues with few brands mostly in case of paid methods where we try to run paid ads (PPC ads etc.). But most of brands will not have much problem when we target their brand related terms organically at least. Let me share you few examples of brands keywords examples that lots of bloggers and SEO’s target: Google, Amazon, Flipkart, Pinterest etc.

      Reply

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