Keyword research with AI for a small business: a free workflow that avoids made-up search volumes

The short answer: use an AI assistant to brainstorm the questions and phrases your customers might type, then use Google's own tools to check them. Do not ask an assistant how many people search for a phrase and trust the number it gives. A chat model has no live search-volume data unless it is connected to a data source, and a confident-sounding figure with no source is a guess. The workflow below costs nothing beyond your time.

Facts about Google's tools come from Google's help pages, linked where used and read on 20 October 2026. The prompts are examples; adapt them to your business.

Step 1: brainstorm with AI (10 minutes)

Give the assistant real context, not just "keywords for plumbers". For example:

I run a two-person bathroom renovation business in Leeds. My customers are homeowners aged 35 to 65. List 40 things they might type into Google or ask an AI assistant when they are thinking about a renovation, grouped by how close they are to hiring someone: just researching, comparing options, ready to buy. Include price questions and questions that contain the town name.

Ask for questions, not only short phrases. People now ask assistants in full sentences, and full questions are the best starting point for a page that answers them.

Step 2: add what AI cannot know

Two sources tell you what your actual customers say:

• Your own inbox and phone calls. Copy the last 20 enquiry emails or call notes into the assistant and ask it to list the exact wording customers used. These are the phrases to put on the page.
• Google Search Console. If your site is verified, its Performance report shows the queries that already bring people to you, with clicks, impressions, click-through rate and average position (Google). Phrases with many impressions and few clicks are pages worth improving.

Step 3: check demand with Google, not the chat

Google's Keyword Planner is a Google Ads tool for researching keywords, and it shows monthly search estimates and typical ad costs for a keyword. Google's help page says you must finish account setup by entering billing information to use its basic features, and that very low-volume keywords may not be discoverable or forecastable (Google Ads help). The page does not say whether you must run ads to read the numbers, so check the current rules before you set it up.

Another quick check is Google's own autocomplete and "People also ask" boxes: type your phrase and see what Google suggests. They are a signal of what people search for, not a measured volume.

If you want volume figures without a Google Ads account, paid keyword tools exist. Treat any single number as an estimate, and prefer comparing two phrases to each other over reading one figure alone.

Step 4: sort the list

Put each phrase in one of four boxes:

1. Ready to buy ("bathroom fitter Leeds price"): write one page for each of your main services.
2. Comparing options ("walk-in shower vs wet room"): write a plain comparison with your honest view and prices.
3. Researching ("how long does a bathroom renovation take"): short answers that build trust and link to the buying pages.
4. Not for you: drop it.

A small business should aim for a handful of pages that each answer one question completely, not hundreds of thin ones.

Step 5: write each page for people and for AI

Answer the question in the first paragraph in plain text, then give detail, a price or range if you can, and what to do next. Google says it does not require special markup or files to appear in its AI features, and that important content should be in text (Google). The same page is also what an AI assistant can quote; see AI visibility for small business.

Step 6: measure monthly

In Search Console, note impressions, clicks and average position for each page once a month. Ask the assistant to compare this month's export with last month's and list the three changes worth making. Do not read much into the first four weeks; new pages take time to be crawled and ranked.

Where AI helps, and where it does not

If you want this done for you, a Dapols plan includes tool and next-step recommendations for your business type, and typing three buyer-style questions into ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini shows whether assistants already mention you. For picking which AI assistant to use for the brainstorming, see the best AI stack by budget.

Sources: Google Search Console: Performance report, Google Ads: Keyword Planner, Google Search Central: AI features