Does anyone else have issues with Moz's keyword search volume tool for Google's search engine?

[ShokIdeaGroup]

It will show the search volume for Bing even when Google is selected. Then, if you select Bing, you'll get the same data as it shows for when you selected "google". So basically, this tool does not work for Google's search engine. Or it is most likely not a reliable way to perform keyword research. Anyone else notice this? Does Moz even offer a way to submit a support ticket to get this fixed?

[GPainter]

Hi Patrick,

Googles a tricky beast and it doesn't give up details easy now days so Roger uses Bing to help you with search volume, this isn't given to you via Bing to mislead you it is so you can get a rough idea of what the volume is to help you.  You can still use Google's ad sense to get some volumes but there is no reason to believe even that is completely correct.

You can find more info here- http://moz.com/blog/keyword-research-and-targeting-without-exact-match-whiteboard-friday

You can even see in the comments I asked-

"Quick question you mention Moz's (great) keyword checker which also has search numbers including exact.  How is this extrapolated? when I mean is, is this going to be incorrect with the new update too?"

"Our data comes via Bing, who still provide exact match data (and keyword referral data, thankfully!)." - Rand Fishkin

Hope that helps.

[ShokIdeaGroup]

You are right, that is a tricky beast! I've seen all of our tools effected over the past year and it seems no one can really tell you exact numbers for search volume on keywords via Google.

Our concern is that Bing does not provide near the amount of search traffic as Google, so it's data is not reflective of the population as a whole. This makes research difficult and even more difficult when you are focusing on a small region for local SEO clients, some of which only see 10% of organic search traffic from Bing.

I'm pretty sure Google's AdWords research tool is not ideal for local  or regional campaigns, it seems to be based on large estimates and it would be better to see a timeline of search traffic, as most businesses have seasonal traffic that fluctuates throughout the year. I have AdWords for research, implemented keywords, and found results much different than what the initial research had told me. It seems like the days of presenting hard evidence to a client on why they should focus on specific keywords will be gone....

Overall, I think Moz should remove the option to select "google" as the search engine on it's keyword checker tool as that is misleading.

[GPainter]

Don't forget Google trends it can be another handy tool in your belt.

Some other handy tools are -

www.semrush.com

http://www.keywordspy.com/ - no experience personally with this one i'm afraid.

http://www.alexa.com/

so you can put together an educated guess at volumes but there is no definitive list.

Good luck!

[ShokIdeaGroup]

Thank you very much!

I will look at those tools.

We used to use KeywordSpy but found the data was getting worse and worse, only to hear from the company that they are no longer able to grab accurate data from Google and did not have an immediate fix for that. This was a few months ago so we have cancelled our subscription. It used to be a great tool though!

Thanks again.