A Closer Look at Keyword Scout: More Than Just a Keyword Tool

Although there are a lot of factors at the start that influence how successful an Amazon seller will be, the single biggest focus for most sellers is keyword research.

Keyword research helps you decide which products are going to be worth your time and effort, and return a healthy profit.

Gone are the days when you could just rank any old product and make a living. Competition is fierce now so you need to find a good product that is also not in a highly competitive niche.

Although there are a lot of popular research tools out there such as MerchantWords, Sonar and Keyword Inspector, the results are very similar and fairly average in terms of what they can tell you.

There is clearly a need for real, in depth keyword research and that is why Jungle Scout launched the ‘Keyword Scout‘ feature as part of their web app.

We’ve spoken in-depth about Jungle Scout on this site and their progress at becoming a one stop shop for all Amazon seller needs, but does the new Keyword Scout feature deliver?

Let’s take a closer look and find out.

What is Keyword Scout?

Keyword Scout is found within the main Jungle Scout Web App and aims to provide you with up to date and accurate keyword research for Amazon products.

There are a lot of other keyword research tools out there, but Keyword Scout is different because it does more than just find you a product.

Keyword Scout’s main differentiating feature is the way in which it helps you develop strategies based on the data the tool generates. This should result in you finding better and higher performing niches.

If you’re already a Jungle Scout subscriber, you should see Keyword Scout underneath ‘Keywords’ on the main menu on the left sidebar.

Now, let’s take a more detailed look at how Keyword Scout can help you with your niche research and product selection strategy.

How it Works (and How it Differs to Other Tools on the Market)

Discover New Keywords

When you perform a search using a keyword in other tools, you typically get a list of results that only contains variations of that main “seed” keyword. This is not a “smart” search, as it only focuses on your narrow search term instead of giving you new and original related keywords.

Keyword Scout, on the other hand, gives you those dynamic search results and this is the biggest difference compared to other search tools.

For example, let’s take the keyword “yoga mat”. If you search for this term in any of the existing keyword research tools, the results you’ll get will always have the word “yoga mat” in it.

With Keyword Scout, the results may not even contain the “yoga mat” term, because it looks for terms that are related to yoga mats and displays them in the search results too.

Though most of the results are to be expected based on the search term, results like “yoga bag” or “workout mat” would not appear if you used other keyword research tools.

The inclusion of these relevant terms gives you an idea of other possible keywords you can add to your listings. More importantly, it helps you discover new keywords that you might be able to build on and research further.

Who would have known that there are 17,935 monthly searches for “workout mat”? You may not have even thought about that as a relevant term to yoga mats, but that’s what the tool can find.

With Keyword Scout, it’s not just about the volume of search data for specific keywords. It’s about finding relevant, related and quality keywords.

Find Niche Products

As an Amazon seller, you probably already know that “yoga mat” is a bit too broad of a term. Your chances of ranking – and making money – with such a broad search term are close to zero.

However, by using it as your initial search term in Keyword Scout, you will get loads of related keywords. Some of them will be so specific and so niched down, that they will represent an entirely new niche that you can take advantage of.

Let’s take the case of “yoga mat strap” from the results above as an example.

Yoga mat strap’s are an entirely different product from our original search term “yoga mat” but with 8472 monthly searches, we can’t discount the fact that this product has the potential to be your next winning product.

All you have to do now is some deeper research about the amount of competition for this keyword. The general rule in keyword research is that if the product has a high search volume but relatively low competition, then you’ve got yourself another product to sell.

“Yoga mat strap”, to be quite honest, is still a bit broad. It can still be further niched down by adding more keywords that would make it more specific. Another search using this term in Keyword Scout should give you the ideas you need!

As you can see with this example, the most important feature of Keyword Scout is the ideas generated from that initial keyword search. This powerful tool gives you countless ideas that you may never have thought of, and all you have to do is start capitalizing on them.

The benefits of Keyword Scout don’t end there though. Now I will show you how the information provided in the search can also help you make the right decision about your new potential niche.

Get Demand and Exact Search Volume

Many other keyword tools only work on search volume estimates, which is not the most reliable source of information. What you need is accurate data straight from Amazon and that is what Keyword Scout gives you with its access to the Amazon API.

It is this accuracy that puts Keyword Scout miles above the competition. With this tool, you are getting accurate data on your exact search terms, as well as “broad match” terms.

Keyword Scout includes your keywords, synonyms, phrases and even misspelled words (based on real customer searches).

One of the reasons why Jungle Scout’s keyword research tool stands out is that it provides you options to sort the search results either by using the “Exact Match Search Volume” or the “Broad Match Search Volume”.

If you only want to see the search results that shows the exact match, all you have to do is click on the Exact Match Search Volume option. As you can see below for our “yoga mat” term, there is a big difference between the exact and broad search volumes:

What this tells you is that there are variations on the main term that are getting a lot of searches. It is these variations that you want to discover and use as your niche, rather than the broad term which is far too competitive.

Save Money with PPC Bid Suggestions

Appearing on page one for your keywords is one of the best ways to boost sales. By becoming more visible to buyers by showing up on top of search results, you are increasing the chances of people buying from you.

There are several ways to rank for keywords and this is where Keyword Scout rises above the competition.

One of its best features is suggestions for “Estimated Exact Match Headline Search Ads” (HSA) bids and Pay per Click (PPC) Ads bids, something you won’t find in any other Amazon keyword research tool.

This tells you exactly how much you will need to spend in order to get your listing in front of your customers eyes. Knowing this from the beginning helps you decide if the niche is worth it, or if you have the budget to fully exploit the niche.

Ranking for keywords has never been this easy because the tool’s bid suggestions are based on actual Amazon data. As you can see below, this data is presented in a very easy to read table, giving you all the information you need at a glance:

• HSA Bid is the estimated headline search ad bid for the selected keyword.
• Exact PPC Bid is the exact bid to win 90% of keyword bids on Amazon.
• Broad PPC Bid is the broad bid to win 90% of keyword bids on Amazon.

This feature will not only help you get higher rankings for your keywords, it will also help you save money in return because you’re sure you’re bidding the right amount for your listing advertisements.

You don’t have to dig deeper to find information about PPC or HSA anymore because the tool gives them to you straight away. There’s no need to guess!

If you are on a budget and want to get more bang from every buck, this feature will definitely come in handy and the savings on this alone should more than pay for the subscription cost of Jungle Scout.

Giveaway Estimates for Ranking Faster and More Consistently

Another proven way to rank faster is through promotional giveaways of your product. With the right number of giveaways, you will see your product on page one in no time.

But how much of your product do you need to give away to get results? Too many and you are wasting money, too few and you won’t get the results you are after. Keyword Scout removes the guesswork with its data on recommended giveaways.

This information can then be used within “Launch” (formerly Jump Send), another feature of Jungle Scout, to generate the optimum number of discount codes to get customers interested in your product.

As you can see, there is an entire column within the Keyword Scout search results dedicated to how many units should be included in giveaways:

By providing you bidding suggestions and giveaway recommendations, the software makes the process of ranking your product so much easier.

Having this information is like literally looking through a crystal ball, giving you an unfair advantage over your competition.

How easy can it be? Picture this.

1. Determine the keywords you want to rank for.
2. Create a promotion offering your product at a discount with Launch.
3. Create a listing for your product promotion.
4. Select “I wish to use a keyword targeted URL” and enter up to three keywords you would like to rank for.

That’s it! From this point forward, all you have to do is watch your promotion go live.

Understand Keyword Relevancy

One of the key factors that determines how a product is displayed on Amazon search is keyword relevance.

You can think of relevance as keywords or search terms buyers use to search for or describe products. They are mostly found in titles, bullet points, product descriptions and even photo alt text.

If you can put the right keywords in each of these locations, you are increasing the chances of your product ranking high on searches as the algorithm will see your listing as a good match.

Keyword Scout provides a Relevancy Score which indicates how closely related the search result is to your keyword or search term.

This will help you determine which of these search results you can use or add to your listings to make your products more searchable and visible to buyers.

As you can see, scores can range from 100, which is an exact match to your term, down to 0, which has no relevance at all:

The higher the relevancy score, the more related it is to your search term and the more prominently it should feature in your listing. All that’s left for you to do is to spread them over your titles, your bullet points, or product descriptions.

If you can riddle your lists with keywords that have high relevancy scores and search volumes, imagine how high your product could rank.

Speed

Apart from providing you real Amazon search data, one of the immediate differences you’ll notice using Keyword Scout is the speed in which it provides you the search results and the sheer volume of variations you are given.

Keyword Scout displays search data within 10 seconds regardless of the volume, a massive improvement over similar search tools.

The time it takes to display thousands of search data may not be such a big deal for some, but when you’ve got a busy day and a ton of tasks waiting to be completed, it’s appreciated.

The Verdict

It’s no secret that we’re big fan’s of Jungle Scout overall, but we’re being completely honest when we say Keyword Scout is simply the best Amazon keyword research tool on the market, bar none.

This is mostly because it’s far more than a simple keyword search tool. Keyword Scout has features that are designed to help you discover new niches and then gives you all the information you need to rank highly and optimize your listings.

Features like the suggested PPC bids, recommended giveaways, and relevancy score are features you won’t find in any competing Amazon keyword tools.

The tool uses real, up to date Amazon data that makes for accurate volume estimates.

If you’re looking for a reliable and accurate keyword research tool that will help you find new opportunities and optimize your product listings, Jungle Scout’s Keyword Scout tool is your best choice.

Be sure to read our full review of Jungle Scout if you haven’t already, and you can click here to access Keyword Scout as part of the Jungle Scout web app subscription.