How to Use Ranktracker to Pick Keywords for a Page and Track Them
By Joris van Huët
Enterprise Interim CMO & Marketing Leader · 15+ years · 50+ orgs
Published
2026-10-24
The short answer: choosing a page's keywords and tracking them belong in the same tool, and on Ranktracker's 500-keyword Launch plan a 25-keyword shortlist tracked on desktop and mobile in one country uses 50 of them. Find candidates in Keyword Finder, check each one's difficulty score and live results, save the shortlist as a list, add it to tracking with the locations and devices you sell in, tag it with the page's name, add two or three competitors, schedule a report, and let an MCP client summarise the week while a person checks its claims.
Disclosure: I may earn a commission through some links on this site. It does not change what this page says.
A page is usually briefed on one keyword and judged on whichever keyword someone remembers to check. Tracking the whole shortlist from the day the page goes live fixes the second half of that. For what Ranktracker includes and costs, see the Ranktracker glossary entry.
Before the first search:
- Multiply the shortlist by where you sell. Usage is keywords times engines times locations, per the usage article. For example, a service sold in Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht and tracked on mobile only turns 25 keywords into 25 x 1 x 3 = 75 tracked keywords.
- Use the trial as the decision. The 7-day trial needs no payment details, and the pricing FAQ rules out refunds during the current promotion, per the pricing page.
- Look at what the domain already ranks for. The Discover Keywords page lists them, per the Discover Keywords article. Some of your new page's keywords may already belong to an old one.
- Record a starting position for every keyword, including "not ranking". The report in step 7 compares against it.
What you need
- An account, on the trial or a plan from $39 a month on monthly billing, checked on 24 October 2026 on the pricing page.
- The page, live or planned, and the cities or countries it serves.
- Two or three competitor domains that rank for the topic now.
1) Find candidates in Keyword Finder
Open Keyword Finder and pick a search mode: Suggestion, Related, Idea or Domain, with Suggestion the most used, per the Keyword Finder article. Enter the topic, choose Global or a country, and search. Results come from a database of billions of keywords, updated monthly. The Domain mode lists the keywords a competitor's domain ranks for, per the domain search article.
2) Check difficulty and the live results
Click the magnifying glass beside a keyword to calculate its Keyword Difficulty, a score from 0 to 100, per the KD lookup article. Then open the SERP icon to see the pages that rank. For a fuller check, the SERP Checker takes a keyword, a location and a device and crawls the live results, sometimes for a few minutes, per the SERP check article. Keep a keyword only if the pages that rank look like the page you are building.
3) Save the shortlist as a list
Select the keywords you keep, click Add to list, then Create new list, name it after the page and confirm, per the list article. The list can be exported as a CSV for the writer's brief.
4) Add the domain and the list to tracking
On the Domains page, click Add new tracking and enter the domain; the domain article advises leaving the protocol and URL settings at their defaults if you are unsure. On the keywords step, choose Add from list and pick the page's list, per the add from list article. Set the location, down to a city or postcode, and tick both desktop and mobile if both matter, per the add keywords article. Click Finish, then refresh the window after a minute or two for the first rankings.
5) Tag the page's keywords
On the domain, open the tags icon, click Add, name the tag after the page, choose a colour and create it. Select the keywords and apply the tag, per the tags article. One tag per page means one filter per page in every report.
6) Add the competitors
From the domain overview, open Competitors, click Add, enter each competitor domain and click Finish, per the competitor article. They are tracked from that day on. The article does not promise past data, so add them on day one.
7) Schedule the report and share a live view
On the Reports page, pick the domain, click New Report, name it, set how often it updates, choose a PDF download or scheduled email, and enter recipients separated by commas, per the scheduling article. For people who want to look rather than read, the share tracking link opens the domain's view in real time without a login, per the share view article.
8) Brief an agent each week, and check its claims
Connect an MCP client such as Claude or Cursor to Ranktracker's server with OAuth: paste the endpoint, approve in the browser, and the connection sees only your account, per the MCP documentation. Ask it to list the tagged keywords and pull each one's daily ranking history, then draft a short note on what moved and why it might matter.
The person who sends the note checks it first. Open the SERP Preview for any keyword the draft calls out: it shows the captured results page with your position highlighted, per the SERP Preview article. The agent cannot add keywords or refresh rankings, since those tools are not exposed, and its one write action re-runs a report you already configured without emailing the recipients.
What the helpdesk warns about
- Usage multiplies quietly. One keyword in two engines and four locations is eight, per the usage article.
- New data needs a refresh. After adding keywords or a domain, reload the window, per the add keywords article.
- Competitors start from today. Add them before the page launches, per the competitor article.
- Upgrades go through support. The upgrade article says live chat can upgrade and prorate the plan.
The purchase guide notes that the most popular volume is 500 to 2,000 daily keywords, per the subscription article. Popular is the vendor's statistic. Your number is the one from the multiplication above.
FAQ
How does Ranktracker count keywords?
One keyword, in one engine, in one location, is one, per the usage article. Each extra engine or location counts again.
Can a client see the rankings without logging in?
Yes. The share tracking link shows the domain's live view, per the share view article, and each SERP Preview has its own copyable link.
How do I move up a plan mid-month?
Ask support on live chat, which can upgrade the account and prorate the charge, per the upgrade article.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
I am Joris van Huët, an enterprise interim CMO. 15+ years, 50+ organizations, including ING, P&G, Nestlé, BNP Paribas, WeTransfer and Vinted. I take on innovation projects (venture building, design sprints), agentic marketing (setting up and running AI agents) and hands-on multi-channel work. See the track record.
I wrote and published this with AI assistance, and I answer for it. Claims about my own experience are limited to the track record above, and a statistic links to its source or is labelled as an example. I sell interim and fractional CMO work, which is why this site exists. How this site is written.
A senior operator doing the work: campaigns, channels, CRM and AI agents, live from day one.