1.1. Identify Keywords

One minute on why the keyword list governs everything else. Details begin below.

Seeds come from your cash register, not your imagination

Go to your Google Business Profile and open Performance, then the Searches section. That's where you'll find the terms people typed before landing on your listing: “pizza delivery Juriquilla”, “pizza place open now near me”, “gluten-free pizza Roma Norte”. These aren't estimates: they are actual queries with the searcher's real location, and they're worth more than any tool below.

Two limits: the report saves six months of data and updates at the start of the month with up to a five-day delay. Export on day 6 to a spreadsheet, or the seventh month disappears. If your listing isn't verified yet, sort it out in the lesson 3.1 before moving forward.

The second source is your order ticket: the twelve dishes you sell the most, written using the exact terms customers use when ordering by phone rather than the menu names—“stuffed crust,” “half and half,” “boneless.” That vocabulary is typed into search bars too.

The third is autocomplete. Google documents that its predictions depend on the language, location, and search history of the logged-in user: if you research with your account open, you are just seeing yourself. Do it in an incognito window with the location set to your target neighborhood; type “pizzeria” and “pizza delivery” followed by each neighborhood you deliver to, and write down the top ten suggestions.

Validating search volume: what's free and what's misleading

Keyword Planner remains free, but it requires a Google Ads account, and that's where the catch is: without an active campaign with real spend, you only see broad buckets like 1K–10K or 10K–100K, and “pizza Querétaro” falls into the same range as “pizzería Centro Histórico Querétaro”. With a campaign running, the exact average appears: if you are going to set up one anyway paid campaigns, a few days of minimum budget unlock the data.

Google Trends is free, and ever since its January 14, 2026 redesign, it compares eight term sets in one graph instead of five. It delivers a relative index from 0 to 100, not raw volume, and that is plenty: it shows you the exact week "takeout pizza" spikes and when holiday party season kicks off.

Keyword Surfer—a free Chrome extension that requires no account—overlays search volumes directly on the results screen while you perform the searches above. AnswerThePublic provides three free searches a day and is great for uncovering questions that can become sections on your website: parking, vegan options, whether pets are allowed.

Paid options, and only if you manage multiple businesses: Ahrefs Starter at 29 USD per month, Ubersuggest Individual at 29 USD with 150 daily searches, or DinoRANK Pro at 54 euros, which includes a local SEO module. Semrush is out of the question: it discontinued its Pro, Guru, and Business plans after the Adobe acquisition and now starts at 139 USD per month, more expensive than a SEO service end-to-end with us.

Read the intent before prioritizing

Tag each query with one of two labels. Local transactional: “pizza near me”, “pizzeria in Polanco”. Informational: “how long sourdough lasts”, “how many slices in a large pizza”.

Whitespark analyzed 540 searches across three cities and six industries: for purely local intent, the three map listings appear in 93% of cases and the AI overview in 15%; for informational intent, the pattern reverses: 92% for AI versus 6% for the map. Restaurants were not included in the sample: treat this as guidance, not a rule. What holds true: transactional searches are won on the map and come first; informational searches are won through writing, and that is 2.1 Quality content.

And before getting excited about search volumes: SparkToro measured that 68.01% of Google searches end without a single click (United States, January to April 2026). Your list isn't chasing pageviews: it's chasing phone calls and directions.

The final list fits into five columns

A spreadsheet with query, intent, volume or index, destination, and priority. Sort it and keep 15 to 25 rows; anything beyond that, nobody works on.

• Priority 1: transactional searches with your neighborhood or “near me”. Destination: your map listing.
• Priority 2: transactional searches for a dish or craving, like “gluten-free pizza” or “stuffed crust”. Destination: a custom website for each one.
• Priority 3: informational searches. Destination: blog articles, after the previous ones.

Keep that sheet close at hand. It's the core input for the rest of the course: it's used to benchmark competitors, write titles and descriptions, name photos, and measure whether anything worked. Without it, the next seven steps are pure guesswork.