How to Find Low Competition Keywords That Actually Rank: A 10-Step Technical Process

Most SEO guides tell you to “find low competition keywords” like it’s as simple as plugging a seed term into Ahrefs and sorting by KD. If you’ve tried that approach, you already know it doesn’t work that cleanly. The keyword difficulty scores across tools disagree with each other, the “low competition” terms often have zero commercial value, and the ones worth ranking for still have page-one results you can’t beat.

I’ve spent years doing keyword research for Singapore businesses across dozens of industries. From dental clinics in Novena to B2B SaaS companies targeting Southeast Asia, the process of finding low competition keywords that drive actual revenue follows a specific, repeatable method. Not a vague framework. A technical process.

This guide walks you through the exact 10 steps I use. You’ll learn how to find keywords where you have a realistic shot at page one, where the traffic is worth having, and where the intent matches what your business actually sells.

What Makes a Keyword Genuinely “Low Competition”

Before we get into the steps, let’s be precise about what low competition actually means. It’s not just a number in a tool.

A keyword is low competition when the current page-one results are beatable by your specific website, given your current domain authority, content resources, and backlink profile. That’s it. A keyword with a KD of 15 in Ahrefs might be impossible for you if the top results are all government sites. A keyword with a KD of 35 might be easy if the SERPs are full of thin forum posts.

The Four Signals That Actually Matter

Keyword difficulty score is just one signal, and honestly, it’s the least reliable one. Here’s what I look at instead:

• SERP composition: Who currently ranks on page one? If it’s Reddit threads, Quora answers, and low-DA blogs, that’s a genuine opportunity. If it’s HubSpot, government portals, and Wikipedia, move on.
• Backlink requirements: How many referring domains do the top 3 results have? If they have fewer than 10, you can compete. If they have 200+, you probably can’t, at least not quickly.
• Content quality gap: Are the current results actually good? Sometimes a KD-40 keyword has terrible content ranking because nobody’s written anything better. That’s your opening.
• Commercial relevance: A keyword with 50 monthly searches that brings in qualified leads is worth more than one with 5,000 searches from people who’ll never buy. Especially in Singapore, where your total addressable market is already smaller.

Think of it like choosing a hawker stall location. You don’t just want low rent. You want low rent in a spot where hungry people actually walk past.

Step 1: Map Your Business Topics Before Touching Any Tool

This is where most people go wrong. They open a keyword tool first. Don’t.

Start with a simple exercise. Write down every service you offer, every problem your customers mention during sales calls, every question your support team answers repeatedly, and every objection prospects raise before buying. This gives you your topic map.

For a Singapore accounting firm, that might look like this: GST registration thresholds, IRAS filing deadlines, corporate tax exemptions for startups, XBRL filing requirements, difference between sole proprietorship and Pte Ltd tax obligations. Each of these is a topic cluster, not a keyword. The keywords come next.

The goal here is specificity. “Accounting services” is a topic. “How to calculate GST for partially exempt supplies in Singapore” is a topic that leads to low competition keywords. The more specific your topic map, the more low competition opportunities you’ll uncover.

Practical Action

Create a spreadsheet with three columns: Service/Product, Customer Problem, and Common Question. Fill in at least 20 rows. This becomes your keyword research foundation. Every keyword you find later should connect back to one of these rows. If it doesn’t, it’s not worth pursuing no matter how low the competition.

Step 2: Mine Google’s Own Suggestions Systematically

Google Autocomplete and “People Also Ask” are underrated because people use them casually. Used systematically, they’re a goldmine for finding low competition keywords with proven search demand.

Here’s the method I use. Take each topic from Step 1 and type it into Google followed by every letter of the alphabet. “GST registration a”, “GST registration b”, “GST registration c”, and so on. Screenshot or record every suggestion. Then do the same with question modifiers: “how to”, “what is”, “when to”, “why does”, “can I”.

Next, click into the top results and expand every “People Also Ask” box. Each time you click one, Google generates more questions. You can easily pull 30 to 50 question-based keyword ideas from a single seed topic.

The reason this works so well for finding low competition terms is that Google only suggests phrases people actually search for. Unlike tool-generated keywords that might have inflated or estimated volumes, these are real queries from real users.

Singapore-Specific Tip

Make sure your Google search is set to Singapore (google.com.sg) and your location is set to Singapore in your browser settings. Autocomplete suggestions vary by country. A suggestion that appears for US users might not appear for Singapore users, and vice versa. You want the local data.

Step 3: Extract Data From Keyword Tools With the Right Filters

Now you bring in the tools. But instead of browsing aimlessly, you’re validating and expanding the topics you’ve already identified.

Here’s my exact workflow in Ahrefs (you can adapt this for SEMrush or even the free version of Ubersuggest):

1. Enter your seed topics from Steps 1 and 2 into Keywords Explorer.
2. Set the country to Singapore.
3. Filter by KD 0 to 25 as a starting point.
4. Filter by minimum search volume of 30 per month. Yes, 30. In Singapore’s small market, 30 searches per month for a high-intent commercial keyword can be worth thousands in revenue.
5. Export the results.

Then repeat with “Matching terms” and “Related terms” reports. These surface keyword variations your seed terms wouldn’t catch.

One critical thing most guides skip: Google Keyword Planner’s “competition” column measures PPC competition, not organic competition. A keyword marked “High” in Keyword Planner can be low competition organically, and vice versa. Don’t confuse the two. For organic SEO, use Ahrefs KD, SEMrush KD%, or Moz’s difficulty score. Never Keyword Planner’s competition column alone.

Free Alternative for Smaller Budgets

If you don’t have access to paid tools, use Google Keyword Planner (free with a Google Ads account) for volume estimates, then manually check SERPs for competition. It takes longer but works. Combine it with the free tier of Ubersuggest, which gives you a few searches per day, and you can build a solid keyword list over a week or two.

Step 4: Reverse-Engineer Your Competitors’ Easy Wins

This step alone has uncovered more opportunities for my clients than any other. The idea is simple: find keywords where your competitors rank with minimal effort, then do it better.

In Ahrefs, go to Site Explorer, enter a competitor’s domain, click “Organic Keywords”, and filter by KD 0 to 20 and positions 1 to 20. You’ll see every low competition keyword they currently rank for. Now look for keywords where their ranking page is thin, outdated, or poorly optimised. Those are your targets.

Don’t just look at your direct business competitors. Look at informational competitors too. If you’re a renovation company in Singapore, your competitors for keyword research purposes include blogs like Qanvast, HDB’s own info pages, and forums like HardwareZone. Plug all of them into the tool and extract their low-difficulty keywords.

The Content Gap Method

Ahrefs and SEMrush both have a “Content Gap” feature. Enter your domain and 3 to 5 competitor domains. The tool shows keywords your competitors rank for that you don’t. Filter by low KD, and you have a ready-made list of low competition keywords with proven ranking potential. Someone in your space is already ranking for these. That’s your proof of concept.

Step 5: Prioritise Question-Based and Problem-Aware Keywords

Question-based keywords tend to have lower competition for a structural reason: they’re longer, more specific, and big brands rarely optimise individual pages for them.

Use AnswerThePublic (free for a limited number of searches) or AlsoAsked.com to generate question clusters around your topics. For a Singapore context, you’ll find questions like “how much does it cost to renovate a 4-room HDB flat” or “do I need to pay GST if my revenue is below 1 million”. These are real questions with real search volume that most businesses never create content for.

The key insight is that question keywords reveal where someone is in their buying journey. “What is SEO” is early-stage awareness. “How much does SEO cost in Singapore” is mid-stage consideration. “Best SEO agency for ecommerce Singapore” is late-stage decision. Match your content to the right stage, and you’ll convert the traffic you get.

Structuring Content for Question Keywords

When you target a question keyword, answer it directly in the first 100 words of your content. Then go deep. Google rewards comprehensive answers, not just quick ones. A 1,500-word guide that thoroughly answers “how to register for GST in Singapore” will outrank a 200-word FAQ snippet every time, especially if you include step-by-step instructions, screenshots, and real examples.

Step 6: Validate Competition by Manually Checking SERPs

This is the step that separates amateurs from practitioners. Tool-based KD scores are estimates. The SERP is the truth.

For every keyword on your shortlist, search it in Google (from Singapore, in an incognito window) and evaluate the first page. Here’s exactly what to look for:

• Domain Authority of ranking sites: Install the MozBar or Ahrefs SEO Toolbar browser extension. If the top 5 results all have DR 70+, it’s competitive regardless of what the KD score says. If you see results with DR below 30, that’s your signal.
• Page-level backlinks: Click through to check how many referring domains point to each ranking page. If the top results have fewer than 5 to 10 referring domains, you can compete with strong content alone.
• Content quality and freshness: Are the ranking pages well-written, comprehensive, and recently updated? Or are they thin, outdated, and poorly formatted? Weak content on page one is your biggest opportunity signal.
• SERP features: Does the keyword trigger featured snippets, knowledge panels, or “People Also Ask” boxes? Featured snippets can be captured even with a lower-authority domain if your content is better structured.

If you see Reddit threads, Quora answers, or old forum posts ranking on page one, that keyword is genuinely low competition. Google is showing those results because nothing better exists. Be the something better.

Step 7: Analyse Search Intent Before Creating Content

Mismatched search intent is the number one reason technically well-optimised pages fail to rank. Google has gotten extremely good at understanding what users want when they type a query. If your content doesn’t match that intent, it won’t rank. Period.

There are four intent types, and you need to identify which one applies to each keyword:

• Informational: The searcher wants to learn something. SERPs show blog posts, guides, and how-to articles. Example: “what is domain authority”.
• Commercial investigation: The searcher is comparing options. SERPs show comparison articles, reviews, and “best of” lists. Example: “best CRM software for small business Singapore”.
• Transactional: The searcher wants to buy or take action. SERPs show product pages, pricing pages, and service pages. Example: “buy standing desk Singapore”.
• Navigational: The searcher wants a specific website. Example: “IRAS myTax Portal login”. Skip these unless you’re the brand.

How to Check Intent in 30 Seconds

Search the keyword. Look at the top 5 results. If they’re all blog posts, create a blog post. If they’re all product pages, don’t write a blog post for that keyword. Match the format, then make yours better. This sounds obvious, but I see businesses create service pages for informational keywords and blog posts for transactional keywords all the time. It never works.

Step 8: Use Forums and Communities to Find Untapped Topics

Some of the best low competition keywords don’t show up in any tool because they’re too new, too niche, or phrased in ways the tools don’t capture.

For Singapore-specific topics, HardwareZone forums, Reddit’s r/singapore, and Facebook groups for specific industries are treasure troves. People ask questions in natural language that often maps directly to search queries.

Here’s my process: search Reddit or HardwareZone for your topic. Read through the threads. Note the exact phrases people use when asking questions. Then check those phrases in a keyword tool. You’ll often find they have search volume that nobody is targeting.

A real example from a client project: We found the phrase “BTO renovation package what’s included” being discussed repeatedly on HardwareZone. When we checked, it had 210 monthly searches in Singapore, a KD of 8, and zero well-optimised content targeting it. The blog post we created ranked on page one within 3 weeks and now drives 15 to 20 qualified leads per month to a renovation company.

YouTube Comments Are Underused

Go to YouTube videos in your niche and read the comments. People ask very specific questions there that they also search for on Google. These questions often have no dedicated content answering them, which means low competition and high relevance.

Step 9: Target Long-Tail Keywords With Commercial Value

Long-tail keywords are phrases with three or more words that are more specific than head terms. They typically have lower search volume, lower competition, and higher conversion rates. This is where smaller businesses win.

But here’s the nuance most guides miss: not all long-tail keywords are worth your time. “How to tie shoelaces in a double knot” is long-tail and low competition, but it has zero commercial value for a shoe retailer. You want long-tail keywords that signal buying intent or problem-solving intent related to your business.

Good long-tail keywords for a Singapore web design agency:

• “How much does a WordPress website cost in Singapore” (commercial investigation, directly relevant)
• “Best website builder for Singapore SME” (commercial investigation, comparison intent)
• “Do I need a website for my home-based business in Singapore” (informational, early-stage but highly relevant)

Bad long-tail keywords for the same agency:

• “History of web design” (informational, no commercial value)
• “Free website templates download” (transactional, but attracts people who won’t pay for your services)

The Revenue Filter

For every keyword on your list, ask: “If someone searching this found my page, is there a reasonable path from that page to a sale?” If the answer is no, deprioritise it. Low competition keywords only matter if they connect to your bottom line.

Step 10: Score, Rank, and Build Your Keyword Roadmap

By now you should have a list of 50 to 200 potential keywords. You can’t target them all at once, so you need a scoring system to prioritise.

Here’s the scoring matrix I use with clients:

• Search volume (1-3 points): Under 50/month = 1 point. 50 to 200/month = 2 points. Over 200/month = 3 points. (Adjust these thresholds for Singapore’s smaller market.)
• Keyword difficulty (1-3 points): KD over 30 = 1 point. KD 15 to 30 = 2 points. KD under 15 = 3 points.
• Commercial relevance (1-3 points): No clear path to revenue = 1 point. Indirect relevance = 2 points. Directly related to a service or product you sell = 3 points.
• SERP weakness (1-3 points): Strong competitors on page one = 1 point. Mixed results = 2 points. Weak results (forums, thin content, low-DA sites) = 3 points.

Maximum score is 12. Prioritise keywords scoring 9 or above first. These are your quick wins, the keywords where you have the best chance of ranking with the highest potential return.

Building the Content Calendar

Group your prioritised keywords into content clusters. Multiple related keywords can often be targeted by a single comprehensive page. For example, “how to find low competition keywords”, “low difficulty keywords for new websites”, and “easy to rank keywords Singapore” could all be addressed in one thorough guide rather than three thin posts.

Map out one piece of content per week or per fortnight, depending on your resources. Consistency matters more than volume. One well-researched, well-optimised post per month will outperform four rushed ones.

Common Mistakes That Waste Your Keyword Research Effort

Even with a solid process, I see businesses make the same errors repeatedly. Here are the ones that cost the most time and money.

Trusting KD Scores Blindly

Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Moz all calculate keyword difficulty differently. Ahrefs focuses primarily on backlinks to ranking pages. SEMrush factors in domain authority and content relevance. A keyword with KD 10 in Ahrefs might show as KD 35 in SEMrush. Always validate with manual SERP analysis. The tool score is a filter, not a verdict.

Ignoring Search Volume Minimums

I mentioned earlier that 30 monthly searches can be valuable in Singapore. But there’s a floor. Keywords with 0 to 10 monthly searches are usually not worth creating dedicated content for unless they’re extremely high-value transactional terms. Your time is better spent on keywords that bring at least some consistent traffic.

Targeting Keywords Without Creating Better Content

Finding low competition keywords is only half the battle. If your content isn’t substantially better than what currently ranks, you won’t displace the existing results. “Better” means more comprehensive, better structured, more current, and more useful. Not just longer. A 3,000-word article full of fluff will lose to a focused 1,200-word article that answers the query perfectly.

Forgetting to Track and Iterate

Keyword research isn’t a one-time activity. Search trends shift, competitors publish new content, and Google updates its algorithm. Set up rank tracking for every keyword you target (Google Search Console is free and sufficient for this). Review your rankings monthly. If a page isn’t ranking within 3 to 6 months, revisit the keyword choice, the content quality, or both.

Putting It All Together: A Singapore-Specific Example

Let me walk through a quick real-world scenario. Say you run a pet grooming business in Singapore and want to attract more organic traffic.

Your topic map might include: dog grooming prices, cat grooming tips, pet grooming for anxious dogs, mobile pet grooming, grooming for specific breeds popular in Singapore (Shih Tzu, Poodle, Singapore Special).

After running through Steps 2 to 9, you might end up with keywords like:

• “How much does dog grooming cost in Singapore” (volume: 320, KD: 12, commercial relevance: high)
• “How to groom a Shih Tzu at home” (volume: 170, KD: 8, commercial relevance: medium, builds trust)
• “Mobile pet grooming Singapore HDB” (volume: 90, KD: 6, commercial relevance: very high)
• “Dog grooming for aggressive dogs Singapore” (volume: 40, KD: 4, commercial relevance: high, niche service)

Each of these has low competition, genuine search demand in Singapore, and a clear connection to your business. You create one comprehensive guide for each, optimise properly, and within 2 to 4 months you’re pulling in targeted organic traffic that converts into bookings.

That’s the power of finding low competition keywords methodically rather than guessing.

What to Do Next

If you’ve read this far, you have everything you need to start finding and targeting low competition keywords for your business. The process takes time, especially the manual SERP analysis in Step 6, but it’s the difference between publishing content that ranks and publishing content that sits on page 7 forever.

Start with Step 1 today. Map your topics. Then work through the remaining steps over the next week or two. You don’t need expensive tools to begin. Google Autocomplete, People Also Ask, and manual SERP checks will get you surprisingly far.

If you’d rather have someone handle the keyword research and content strategy for you, that’s what we do at Best SEO. We run this exact process for Singapore businesses every week. Reach out for a conversation about your site, and we’ll show you the specific low competition keywords your business should be targeting right now. No obligation, no sales pitch. Just data.