When it comes to building brand awareness and drawing in potential customers, digital marketers often start with a crucial yet misunderstood element: top of the funnel (TOFU) keywords. These are not the high-intent phrases someone types in right before making a purchase. Instead, TOFU keywords are what prospects use when they’re in the earliest stage of their buying journey — the awareness phase. Mastering how to identify and use TOFU keywords can help businesses create magnetic content that attracts, educates, and leaves a long-lasting brand impression.
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TLDR: Start Strong with TOFU Keywords
Top of the funnel keywords are used by people who are just beginning to explore a topic, problem, or need. They’re not ready to buy yet — they’re looking to learn. By targeting these keywords, businesses can build trust early, increase traffic, and guide users toward conversions over time. We’ll walk through how to identify TOFU keywords, integrate them into your content strategy, and track their effectiveness.
What Are Top of the Funnel (TOFU) Keywords?
TOFU keywords are search terms used in the early phases of a buyer’s journey. These are typically broad and educational in nature, focusing on questions, how-to guides, or general comparisons. At this stage, consumers are not yet considering specific products but are trying to understand a topic or address a problem.
Common characteristics of TOFU keywords include:
- High search volume
- Low commercial intent
- Informational or question-based phrasing
- Generic and wide-ranging topics
Examples:
- “How to manage time more effectively”
- “Beginner’s guide to digital marketing”
- “What is cloud computing?”
Why TOFU Keywords Matter
While these keywords may not immediately bring in revenue, they play a critical role in building brand visibility and trust. Many businesses overlook TOFU content because it doesn’t convert right away. But by offering valuable information early on, you position your brand as a helpful authority — and that reputation can lead to conversions later.
Key benefits of TOFU keywords:
- Attract wider audiences: Broader search terms reach more people.
- Establish credibility: Quality informational content boosts trust.
- Fuel your funnel: TOFU content feeds users into the rest of your marketing funnel.
- Support SEO goals: Informational content naturally earns backlinks and engagement.
How to Identify TOFU Keywords
Finding good TOFU keywords involves looking for what your ideal customer is curious about before they’re even aware of your product. It requires digging into questions and problems your audience faces and using tools to get data-driven insights.
Here’s a step-by-step method:
- Know Your Audience: Conduct buyer persona research to understand your target customer’s pain points, goals, and online behavior.
- Use Keyword Research Tools: Try platforms like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, Ahrefs, or AnswerThePublic to discover relevant, high-volume, informational keywords.
- Analyze Competitors: Examine top-ranking blogs and websites in your niche to uncover common TOFU topics they cover.
- Explore Forums and Communities: Reddit, Quora, and industry-specific forums are great places to find real-world questions and terminology.
- Check Google’s SERP Features: Look at the “People Also Ask” box and related searches to find more TOFU keyword ideas.
Types of Content That Work for TOFU Keywords
TOFU keywords are meant to offer value, not sell. So, the content you create around them should be useful, relevant, and educational. Avoid turning your blog posts or videos into hard sales pitches — focus on helping first. Sales can come later.
Effective formats include:
- Blog posts: Step-by-step guides, listicles, and tutorials that discuss the topic thoroughly.
- Infographics: Shareable, visual content that breaks down information clearly.
- Webinars and videos: Educational formats that allow for deeper dives into a concept.
- Podcasts: Great for on-the-go learning and establishing thought leadership.
- Checklists/Worksheets: Downloadable resources that tie into your educational content.
Integrating TOFU Keywords into Your Strategy
Once you’ve identified your TOFU keywords, the real work begins — strategically integrating them into your content calendar and optimizing your SEO structure to support them.
Best practices include:
- Develop a content hub: Group related TOFU content under larger topic clusters to boost SEO and aid navigation.
- Use internal linking: Link from TOFU articles to related MOFU (middle of funnel) and BOFU (bottom of funnel) articles to guide users through their journey.
- Optimize meta tags: Title tags and meta descriptions should contain your TOFU keywords to improve visibility in search engines.
- Share and promote: Distribute your TOFU content across social media, newsletters, and syndication platforms to reach wider audiences.
For instance, if your TOFU keyword is “what is sustainable fashion?”, a great piece of content might be an in-depth blog post explaining the term, followed by links to articles about sustainable fashion brands (MOFU), and finally to your own eco-friendly products (BOFU).
How to Measure Success of TOFU Keywords
The ROI of top of the funnel keywords isn’t easy to measure in terms of immediate sales, but there are other important KPIs that show progress and guide adjustments.
TOFU keyword performance metrics to track:
- Organic traffic: Is the piece attracting more visitors from search engines?
- Bounce rate: Are readers engaging with the content? A high bounce rate might indicate low value or mismatched intent.
- Engagement: Time on page, scroll depth, social shares, and comments are all signs of content resonance.
- Email signups and downloads: Track how many people are willing to exchange info for value.
- Backlinks: Are others citing and linking to your content?
Over time, these visitors may become leads or customers, especially as they continue to engage with your brand further down the funnel. Use UTM tags and CRM attribution tools to monitor conversions from these early touchpoints when possible.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
Even with the best intentions, marketers can make several mistakes when targeting TOFU keywords. Recognizing these early can save time and resources down the line.
Watch out for:
- Being too promotional: Remember, TOFU visitors want to learn — not be sold to.
- Choosing overly broad terms: Avoid generic terms like “technology” or “marketing” that are too competitive and non-specific.
- Ignoring user intent: If your content doesn’t align with why the user is searching, it won’t perform well.
- Failing to nurture: Without a path to deeper content or lead capture, you miss the chance to move people down the funnel.
Conclusion
Top of the funnel keywords are more than just search queries — they’re opportunities to make early connections with your future customers. By focusing on informational, high-volume content topics, you can build brand authority, grow organic traffic, and create a funnel that captures attention and converts over time.
Remember: Education is the first step toward trust — and trust is the cornerstone of every lasting customer relationship. So, invest in your TOFU strategy now, and you’ll sow the seeds of conversion for months (and years) to come.
