Popular user-generated content sites like Reddit provide a goldmine of low competition keywords. Reddit’s posts are often easy to outrank with a targeted article that covers the topic in-depth.
Mining Reddit Subreddits for keywords is one of my favorite tactics to generate low competition keyword ideas to quickly grow traffic on my sites.
In this guide we will cover:
- 6 step process to use AHREFs to find and filter the best keyword ideas from Subreddits
- 5 ways to find Subreddits that are related to your niche
Let’s get to it!
Reddit Keyword Template
Why is Reddit a Gold Mine for Keywords?
User generated content is typically easy to outrank in Google, especially if the content is short or if the comments are not very helpful or don’t adequately answer the searcher’s question.
Reddit is one of the largest user generated sites on the internet with an estimated 261 million traffic per month according to AHREFs (February 2022). It has over 100,000 active communities (Subreddits) and in 2020 Reddit claimed to have over 50 million daily active users.
Of the 26 million pages on Reddit.com according to AHREFs, many receive few or zero inbound links and the on-page SEO is not well optimized for the target keyword (e.g. poor title, no descriptive H2 headings).
Additionally, Reddit is filled with questions people ask about specific topics. This can help you develop a list of the most frequently asked questions in the niche and get a sense of what information people are looking for.
6 Step Process To Extract Low-Competition Keywords From Reddit
Case Study Setup: Reddit /r/JustStart
As an example, we used the JustStart Reddit community that focuses on building profitable niche sites.
Here is a 6 step process for gathering keywords from /r/JustStart and identifying article topics with a good opportunity to rank highly and increase traffic.
1. Enter Subreddit URL into AHREFs
Once you find a Subreddit that matches a specific niche, enter the URL into AHREFs Site Explorer.
AHREFs should automatically select “Prefix” from the drop down menu so you only get data for the specific Subreddit.
2. View Organic Keywords Report
Click on “Organic Keywords” on the left menu to see the list of all organic keywords for the Subreddit.
Next, export the CSV with all the keywords and add it to your Reddit Keyword Research Google Sheet (upload the CSV to Google Sheets and then copy the tab to your main Google Sheet).
3. Perform Filtering and Sorting
AHREFs will typically provide data on thousands of keyword phrases based on the subfolder of the Subreddit.
To filter the list to display only low competition keywords, select the filter for keyword difficulty and enter 0-10 (you can adjust this based on your preferences and authority of your website).
You can also click on any of the headings like “Volume”, “KD”, “Traffic” or “Position” to sort the list of keywords from high to low.
Export the filtered list of keywords as an CSV file and add it to your Reddit Keyword Research Google Sheet.
4: Expand Your Keyword Ideas List With Related Keywords
You can generate additional related keyword ideas using AHREFs’ Keywords Explorer by manually entering relevant and promising keyword ideas found from the Subreddit.
Enter a promising keyword phrase into the Keyword Explorer and click on “Related terms” on the left sidebar to see a list of similar keywords.
Export a CSV of the related terms to add to your Reddit Keyword Research Google Sheet.
Repeat this step with all the promising keyword phrases you can come up with and combine the CSVs into one tab called “Related Keywords”. That way you can then sort the list of related keywords from low difficulty to high difficulty.
5. Expand Your Keyword Ideas List With Search Suggestions
Additionally, you can click on the “search suggestions” report on the left menu to see a list of ‘autocomplete’ keywords.
Export the list as a CSV and upload it to your Reddit Keyword Research Google Sheet.
Like the Related Keywords tab you will want to repeat this step with all the promising keyword phrases you can come up with. Then combine the CSVs into a single tab called “Search Suggestions” that can be sorted from low to high difficulty.
6. Add the Best Keyword Ideas to a “Top Keywords to Target” Tab
Lastly, identify the best keyword phrases and add them to a “Top Keywords to Target” list.
Optionally, you can add a potential title, priority level, the writer who the article is assigned to, and when the article has been published.
How to Find Subreddits Related to Your Niche (5 Ways)
1. Reddit Search Bar
To find Subreddits that closely match your niche, you can search Reddit using the top navigation search box.
On the results page, click on “Communities” to only show Subreddits that are related to the keyword.
2. Related Subreddits
Many Subreddits link to other related Subreddits in their right sidebar navigation.
3. Reddit Leaderboard
View the Reddit Leaderboard for the fastest growing communities at https://www.reddit.com/subreddits/leaderboard/. Reddit provides the leaderboards for several categories such as Beauty, Food, Fashion, Outdoor, and Tech.
4. Community Directory
Check the Community Directory at https://www.reddit.com/subreddits/a-1/ which lists Subreddits that start with each letter in the alphabet.
5. Search Reddit with Google
Another way to find relevant Subreddits is to use the Google search operator site:Reddit.com followed by any highly relevant keywords you can think of.
Example: site:reddit.com website investing
Additional Reddit Keyword Research Tips
View Linked Domains from the Subreddit
You can view the “Linked Domains” report to see a list of sites that Reddit users have linked to from the Subreddit.
From this list of sites you may discover competitors in the niche and you can check their top keywords with AHREFs.
Note: AHREFs says some of these links are dofollow but if you inspect the HTML on Reddit they have a rel=”nofollow” tag.
Examples in Other Niches
Food
- /r/Baking/ (16,960 pages, 67,400 keywords, 19,900 traffic, 699 dofollow referring domains)
- /r/Cooking/ (48,565 pages, 464,000 keywords, 184,000 traffic, 3,083 dofollow referring domains)
Home/Garden
- /r/HomeDecorating/ (1,119 pages, 13,300 keywords, 5,000 traffic, 125 dofollow referring domains)
- /r/homestead/ (2,715 pages, 12,300 keywords, 3,700 traffic, 237 dofollow referring domains)
Pets
- /r/Rabbits/ (8,043 pages, 33,800 keywords, 26,600 traffic, 455 dofollow referring domains)
- /r/Aquariums/ (20,542 pages, 70,270 keywords, 37,900 traffic, 716 dofollow referring domains)
Outdoor
- /r/Camping/ (7,351 pages, 34,900 keywords, 11,300 traffic, 446 dofollow referring domains)
- /r/CampingGear/ (6,641 pages, 62,100 keywords, 24,100 traffic, 501 dofollow referring domains)
Technology
- /r/audiophile/ (9,732 pages, 58,000 keywords, 19,500 traffic, 831 dofollow referring domains)
- /r/hometheater/ (16,793 pages, 99,800 keywords, 45,400 traffic, 869 dofollow referring domains)
Final Thoughts
Conducting keyword research based on Reddit communities can help you find valuable low competition keywords that your competitors are not aware of. This can be a useful tactic to add to your keyword research toolbox.
