Google Ads Keyword Research: Finding High-Intent B2B Terms in 2026

The "Search Volume" metric is the biggest trap in B2B marketing.

If you are selling $50,000 enterprise software, you do not need 10,000 searches per month. You need 50 searches from the right people.

Most "Keyword Research" guides are written for SEOs who care about traffic. This guide is written for Media Buyers who care about Pipeline.

In 2026, finding keywords is easy. Finding intent is hard. We will dismantle the traditional "Keyword Planner" workflow and replace it with an Intent-First Architecture.

---

Part 1: The Four Layers of B2B Intent

Not all keywords are created equal. In B2B, we categorize them by "Wallet Proximity".

Layer 1: Problem Aware (The "How-To")

• Query: "how to track employee time"
• Intent: Educational. They have a problem but aren't looking for a product yet.
• Strategy: Avoid for Paid Search. This is an SEO play. If you bid here, your CPA will be low, but your "Demo Booking Rate" will be 1%.

Layer 2: Solution Aware (The "Software")

• Query: "employee time tracking software"
• Intent: Evaluation. They know the solution is software.
• Strategy: Core Campaign. Moderate CPC, decent volume.

Layer 3: Feature Aware (The "Specifics")

• Query: "time tracking with jira integration"
• Intent: High. They have specific requirements.
• Strategy: High Priority. Use "Integration" keywords to qualify the lead instantly.

Layer 4: Brand/Competitor Aware (The "Wallet Out")

• Query: "Toggl alternative", "Harvest vs Clockify pricing"
• Intent: Immediate. They are comparing vendors.
• Strategy: Max Bids. These users are fundamentally ready to buy.

---

Part 2: The "Pain Point" Mapping Method

Stop looking for "industry keywords." Start looking for "pain keywords."

The Framework:

1. Interview your Sales Team. Ask: "What specific problem was the prospect trying to solve when they called you?"
2. Map to Queries.

| Pain Point | Traditional Keyword | Pain-Based Keyword | | :--- | :--- | :--- | | "Our bills are always late" | accounting software | "automated invoice reminders" | | "It takes too long to export" | video editor | "fast rendering video editor" | | "We keep getting hacked" | cybersecurity | "ransomware protection for enterprise" |

Why this works: Pain-based keywords have lower volume but 3x higher Conversion Rates. You are intercepting the user at the moment of highest frustration.

---

Part 3: Competitor Reverse Engineering (The Lazy Way)

Why guess when your competitors have already spent thousands testing?

Tools Needed:

• SpyFu / SEMrush (or simply manual Google Searches).
• Google Ads "Auction Insights".

The Workflow

1. Identify your top 3 competitors.
2. Plug their domain into a tool like SEMrush → "Advertising Research".
3. Filter: Look for keywords they have been bidding on for > 6 months.
   • Logic: If they have paid for a keyword for 6 months, it is likely profitable.
4. Export this list. This is your "Seed List".

---

Part 4: Keyword Planner "Hack" for B2B

Google Keyword Planner hides data. It often groups "crm" and "customer relationship management" together.

How to get granular data:

1. Open Keyword Planner.
2. Select "Start with a Website".
3. Enter your COMPETITOR'S pricing page (e.g., competitor.com/pricing).
4. Result: Google will scrape the specific terms on that page. You will often find high-intent terms like "enterprise license cost" or "per user billing" that you missed.

---

Part 5: The "Qualifier" Strategy (Negative Keywords)

In 2026, Broad Match is aggressive. You need to verify who is searching.

B2B Negative Keyword List (The Required Blockers):

• Employment: jobs, hiring, salary, resume, intern, part-time.
• Education: course, learn, tutorial, definition, wiki, example, template (unless you use templates as a magnet).
• Price Sensitive: free, cheap, open source, crack, nulled.
• Consumer: home, personal, diy.

Pro Tip: If you sell Enterprise Software, add "small business" as a negative keyword. It sounds counter-intuitive, but you don't want $50/month clients if your minimum is $5,000/year.

---

Part 6: How to Organize Keywords (The STAG Method)

Do not dump all these into one Ad Group. Use Single Topic Ad Groups (STAGs).

Campaign: SaaS - Core

• Ad Group: Integrations
  • software with zapier
  • slack integration crm
• Ad Group: Alternatives
  • better than salesforce
  • hubspot competitor
• Ad Group: Features
  • email automation tool
  • visual pipeline builder

Why? The ad copy for "Integrations" must mention "Connects with your stack." The ad copy for "Alternatives" must mention "Switch and save 30%."

---

Part 7: Validating Keywords with "Micro-Testing"

Before you commit your annual budget, run a Validation Sprint.

1. Create a new Campaign: "Test - High Intent".
2. Budget: $500 total.
3. Keywords: Pick your top 20 "Pain Point" keywords.
4. Bidding: Maximize Clicks (with a bid cap).
5. Duration: Run until you get ~500 clicks.
6. Analysis: Check the Search Terms Report.
   • Are the actual queries relevant?
   • Did anyone convert?
   • If quality is > 80%, graduate them to your main campaign.

---

Part 8: Broad Match in 2026?

Should you use Broad Match for B2B? Yes, but carefully.

The "Risk" with Broad Match: Keyword: crm software Matches to: free crm for students

The "Power" of Broad Match: Keyword: crm software Matches to: best enterprise contact management platform for healthcare

The Rule: Only use Broad Match if you have:

1. Smart Bidding Enabeld (tCPA/tROAS).
2. Offline Conversion Imports (OCI) setup so Google knows what a "Qualified Lead" looks like.
3. Negative Keywords heavily populated.

Without these 3 guardrails, Broad Match will bankrupt you.

---

---

Part 10: Advanced Tech: Using Regex for Keyword Filtering

When you download a list of 10,000 search terms, Excel filters are too slow. Use Regular Expressions (Regex) in Google Ads Editor or Analytics to find gold.

1. The "Question" Filter (Upper Funnel) Finds users asking questions.

• Regex: \b(who|what|where|when|why|how)\b
• Action: Exclude these from "Demo" campaigns. Add them to "Content" campaigns.

2. The "Comparison" Filter (Bottom Funnel) Finds users comparing you.

• Regex: \b(vs|versus|or|compare|alternative|competitor|review)\b
• Action: Bid +50% on these.

3. The "Urgency" Filter Finds users who need it now.

• Regex: \b(fast|urgent|emergency|now|24h|today)\b
• Action: Use "Call Only" ads for these queries.

---

Part 11: Python Script for Keyword Clustering

Stop grouping keywords manually. Use Python & TF-IDF (Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency) to cluster them automatically.

Note: You run this locally in Jupyter Notebook.

import pandas as pd
from sklearn.feature_extraction.text import TfidfVectorizer
from sklearn.cluster import KMeans

# 1. Load your keyword list
keywords = ["crm software", "best crm", "email marketing tool", "email software", "sales crm"]
df = pd.DataFrame(keywords, columns=['keyword'])

# 2. Convert text to numbers (Vectors)
vectorizer = TfidfVectorizer(stop_words='english')
X = vectorizer.fit_transform(df['keyword'])

# 3. Cluster into groups (e.g., 2 groups)
kmeans = KMeans(n_clusters=2, random_state=0).fit(X)
df['cluster'] = kmeans.labels_

# 4. Output
print(df.sort_values('cluster'))

Result: The script will mathematically group "crm software" and "sales crm" together (Cluster 0), and "email marketing tool" and "email software" together (Cluster 1). It saves hours of manual sorting.

---

Part 11a: Deep Dive into Token Analysis (The Science of N-Grams)

Most advertisers look at whole keywords. Data Scientists look at Tokens (N-Grams).

What is an N-Gram? An N-Gram is a contiguous sequence of n items from a given sample of text.

• 1-gram: "software"
• 2-gram: "best software"
• 3-gram: "best software for"

Why this matters: If you analyze 10,000 search terms, you might find that while no single keyword is a clear loser, every keyword containing the 1-gram token "definitions" has a CPA of $500.

The Script (Python) to find Toxic Tokens:

from collections import Counter

# Fake Search Term Data (Term, Cost, Conversions)
data = [
    ("best crm for small business", 50, 1),
    ("crm definition wiki", 10, 0),
    ("what is a crm system", 15, 0),
    ("buy crm software", 40, 2)
]

# Tokenizer
toxic_tokens = Counter()
for term, cost, conv in data:
    if conv == 0:
        for word in term.split():
            toxic_tokens[word] += cost

print("Most Expensive Zero-Conversion Tokens:", toxic_tokens.most_common(5))

Action: Run this analysis on your Search Query Report (SQR). You will often find tokens like "template", "login", "portal", "staff" are quietly eating 20% of your budget across hundreds of different long-tail queries. Add these tokens as Negative Phrase Match keywords.

---

Part 11b: Micro-Segmentation Logic (The "Layer Cake" Structure)

Once you have your clusters, how do you structure them? We use the "Layer Cake" approach to maximize ad relevance.

The Layer Cake:

1. Base Layer (The Intent): "Time Tracking"
2. Modifier Layer (The Feature): "+ Invoicing"
3. Qualifier Layer (The Vertical): "+ for Agencies"

Ad Group: Time Tracking - Invoicing - Agencies Keywords:

• agency time tracking and invoicing
• billable hours software for creative agencies

Ad Headline: "Time Tracking & Invoicing | Built Strictly for Agencies"

Why this beats broad structure:

• Click-Through Rate (CTR) hits 15% because the headline matches the exact 3-layer intent.
• Conversion Rate hits 20% because the landing page headline matches the ad.

The "Rule of 3": If a keyword has 3 distinct modifiers (Intent + Feature + Vertical), it deserves its own Ad Group (STAG). If it only has 1 or 2, group it in a broader STAG.

---

Part 12: Case Study: The "Zero Volume" Keyword Strategy

Client: Enterprise Cybersecurity Firm. Problem: Keywords like "ransomware protection" were $150 CPC. Budget couldn't compete with Microsoft/CrowdStrike.

The Strategy: We stopped bidding on "Protection". We started bidding on "Symptoms".

• Instead of [cybersecurity software], we researched what an IT Director types when they are panicking.
• Keywords: server files encrypted .lock extension, decrypt .odin file, recover files after hack.

The Results:

• Search Volume: 10/month (Google showed "0").
• CPC: $12.00 (No competition).
• Conversion Rate: 45%.
• ROI: 4,000%.

Lesson: The highest value keywords often have "Low Search Volume" warnings. Ignore the warning. If the intent is real, bid on it.

---

Part 13: The "Competitor Brand" Bidding War

Should you bid on your competitor's name? e.g. Bidding on [Salesforce] if you are HubSpot.

The Economics:

1. Low Quality Score: You are not Salesforce. Google knows this. Your QS will be 3/10.
2. High CPC: You will pay 3x what Salesforce pays.

When to do it:

• You have a "Killer Feature": "Salesforce requires a 1-year contract. We are monthly."
• You are the "Challenger": Nobody knows your brand, but everyone knows theirs. You are paying for awareness, not just clicks.

The "Trojan Horse" Ad Copy: Don't trick them. Be direct.

• Headline: Switch from Salesforce? | Save 40% on Renewal
• Desc: No annual contracts. Migration in 24 hours. See the comparison.

---

Part 14: Seasonal B2B Keywords (The Q4 Sprint)

B2B has seasons.

• Q1 (Jan): "New Budget". Queries: implementation, strategy.
• Q4 (Nov/Dec): "Use it or Lose it". Queries: pricing, fast setup.

Strategy: In November, bid aggressively on "fast deployment" keywords. "CRM setup in 2 days". Enterprise buyers are looking to dump remaining budget before Dec 31st. They don't care about "features", they care about invoice date.

---

Part 15: Cross-Channel Keyword Research (LinkedIn to Google)

Your Google Ads data is limited. LinkedIn Ads data is qualitative.

The Workflow:

1. Run a LinkedIn Video Ad to a broad audience (Job Titles: IT Manager).
2. Retarget the viewers on Google Ads.
3. But wait... which keywords do IT Managers search for?

The Reverse Look:

1. Look at your LinkedIn "Demographics" report.
2. See which "Functional Skills" are trending.
3. If "Cloud Security" is a top skill in your engaged audience, go to Google and bid on [cloud security best practices].
4. You are using LinkedIn to inform your Google keyword strategy.

---

Part 16: The Impact of Semantic Search (Google BERT & MUM)

Gone are the days when Google just matched text strings. Today, Google uses BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) and MUM (Multitask Unified Model) to understand context.

What this means for Media Buyers:

1. Stop "Keyword Stuffing": Having "best crm" in your headline 3 times is now a penalty.
2. Write for the "Click Intent": If the user searches "crm integration", they don't want a homepage. They want the documentation URL.
3. Prepositions Matter: "CRM for small business" vs "CRM with email marketing". The algorithm knows the difference.

Strategy: Simplify your keyword lists. You don't need [crm for small business], [small business crm], and [crm small biz]. One Broad Match Modified keyword: "crm" "small business" covers all 3 semantic variations perfectly.

---

Part 17: Voice Search in B2B? (Yes, it's real)

Executives don't type. They talk to Siri/Google Assistant while driving.

• Typed Query: "managed it services nyc"
• Spoken Query: "Who is the best managed IT provider for law firms in Manhattan?"

How to capture this:

1. Question-Based Keywords: Bid on how much does managed it cost.
2. Conversational Ad Copy: "We serve Law Firms on 5th Ave."
3. Local Extensions: Voice search is heavily tied to Google Maps. Ensure your GMB (Google My Business) is linked to your Google Ads account.

---

Part 18: International Keyword Expansion (The "False Friend" Trap)

Scaling to EMEA or APAC? Do not just translate your keywords.

The Trap:

• In US: "Vacation Rental Software" -> High Volume.
• In UK: "Holiday Let Software" -> High Volume. "Vacation Rental" -> Zero Volume.

The "Culture-First" Workflow:

1. Hire a native speaker (or use a local VPN).
2. Search your core term.
3. Look at the organic results. What words do they use?
4. Example: In Germany, they search for "Handy" (Mobile Phone), not "Mobiltelefon". If you bid on the dictionary word, you lose.

---

Part 19: The "Keyword Lifecycle" Management

Keywords are not static. They rot.

The Monthly Pruning Ritual:

1. The "Low QS" Purge: Filter keywords with Quality Score < 3. Pause them. They are dragging down your account average.
2. The "Zero Conversion" Purge: Filter keywords with Spend → $200 and Conversions = 0. Pause them.
3. The "Winner" Graduation: Filter keywords with Conversions > 5 and CPA < Target.
   • Action: Isolate them? No (Hagakure says no).
   • Action: Ensure they have absolute top impression share. If not, raise bids.

---

Part 20: Tools of the Trade (Beyond Keyword Planner)

1. AnswerThePublic: Great for finding "Question" queries (Who, What, When).
2. Keywords Everywhere: Browser extension that shows volume on the fly.
3. Google Trends: Critical for checking if a term is "fading" (e.g. "NFT marketing" - dead) vs "rising" (e.g. "AI marketing" - booming).
4. GSC (Google Search Console): This is your secret weapon.
   • Link GSC to Google Ads.
   • Run the "Paid vs Organic" report.
   • Find query terms where you rank High Organically but have Zero Paid presence. Bid on these. You already know they are relevant.

---

Part 21: The "Negative Keyword" Library for B2B (Extended)

Copy and paste this list. It saves lives.

The "Learner" List (People wanting info, not products):

• guide
• tutorial
• strategic (often implies high-level theory)
• ppt
• pdf
• presentation
• case study (unless you want to pay for readers)
• statistics
• whitepaper (use LinkedIn for this, not expensive Search clicks)

The "Job Seeker" List:

• intern
• resume
• salary
• glassdoor
• opening
• careers

The "Cheapskate" List:

• free
• open source
• crack
• activation key
• torrent
• nulled

---

Part 22: Keyword Research for PMax (Performance Max)

"PMax doesn't use keywords." -> False.

PMax uses "Custom Intent Audiences" which are built from... keywords.

The Strategy:

1. Take your top 10 converting "Search" keywords.
2. Go to Audience Manager → Custom Segments.
3. Create "Top Performing Search Terms" segment.
4. Add this as an "Audience Signal" to your PMax asset group.

Why? It tells PMax: "Find me people who typse these specific words, then show them ads on YouTube/Gmail/Display." It anchors the AI to reality.

---

---

---

Part 23: The Future of Keyword Research (SGE & AI Overviews)

Search Generative Experience (SGE) is changing the game. Users are searching less for "keywords" and more for "advice".

• Old Query: "best crm for startups"
• New AI Query: "Compare HubSpot and Salesforce for a 50-person startup with a tight budget and focus on email marketing."

How to Optimization for the AI Era:

1. Longer Tail is King: The new query is 20 words long. Your "crm" keyword is too broad. You need broadly matched intent-based tokens to capture this.
2. Answer the "Next Question": AI tries to predict the follow-up. Build landing pages that answer the series of questions a user has, not just the landing page.
3. Brand Authority Signals: AI prioritizes brands with high "E-E-A-T" (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness). Your ad is just the hook; your content must be the authority.

The "Zero-Click" Threat: Google is answering simple questions (e.g., "what is cpa") directly in the SERP.

• Strategy: Stop bidding on "Definition" keywords. The Click-Through Rate (CTR) will plummet as AI answers them instantly.
• Pivot: Shift budget to "Complex" keywords where an AI summary isn't enough (e.g., "how to migrate from Salesforce to HubSpot without data loss").

---

Glossary of Key Terms

Intent Layering: A strategy of categorizing keywords not by topic, but by how close the user is to making a purchase (e.g., Problem Aware vs. Solution Aware).

Long-Tail Keywords: Highly specific search queries (usually 4+ words) that have low individual search volume but high conversion intent and lower competition.

Negative Keyword List: A list of terms that compel Google not to show your ad. This is the primary defense mechanism against wasted spend in Broad Match campaigns.

Token Analysis: Breaking down search queries into individual components (1-grams, 2-grams) to identify specific words that correlate with poor performance across multiple queries.

Zero-Volume Keywords: Keywords that Google Keyword Planner claims have "0" monthly searches, but in reality, may have ~10 highly valuable searches per month.

Semantic Search: Google's ability (via BERT/MUM) to understand the meaning and context of a query, rather than just matching the literal text strings.

STAG (Single Topic Ad Group): An ad group structure where keywords are grouped by a tight theme or intent, ensuring high ad copy relevance.

---

FAQ: Keyword Research

---

Conclusion

Keyword Research in 2026 is less about "finding words" and more about User Psychology Filtering.

1. Anyone can find "crm software".
2. Only a pro bids on "crm implementation for manufacturing" (High Intent).
3. Only a master excludes "free crm" (Negative Filtering).

Your Checklist:

• [ ] Map keywords to the 4 Layers of Intent.
• [ ] Use Regex to filter the junk.
• [ ] Verify with Micro-Testing.
• [ ] Layer Negative Keywords aggressively.

Do this, and you won't just get traffic. You'll get Revenue.