SEO remains a crucial consideration for content marketers, and we’re here to help distill the data into insights you can use. In this ongoing series we look at search volume trends to help you identify opportunities. This month we dive into retirement. Whether you’re in financial services, healthcare or another industry targeting those in retirement or nearing retirement, it’s important to know what your audience is searching for, and when.
1. Let’s start high level: The search term “retirement” has steadily risen for the past 10 years. (The 2021 lows in November were actually above 2013’s January peak.) Each year, almost without fail, annual searches bottom in November and early December before spiking to highs in January. So make sure your landing pages and pillar pages are published or updated by early December so they’re ready for that New Year boost — and don’t waste time trying to time little jumps in between.
2. Searches for “IRA” have historically spiked in the second week of April, almost exactly on April 15. But a trend has emerged the past three years: The window of meaningful search volume is opening significantly wider. In 2019, searches didn’t touch 60 on Google Trends’ index until mid-January. But later that year 2019 saw those numbers in December. In 2020, search volume touched 60 by November 15, and this past year as early as October 15. The window is widening post-April as well — volumes didn’t drop below that 60 level until May 18 last year. This should be welcome news for retirement marketers who have long tried to expand IRA season.
3. Broadening our look at the IRA space, the terms “IRA,” “Roth IRA,” “IRA limits” and “Roth IRA limits” rank in that order, with “IRA limits” and “Roth IRA limits” barely registering compared to “IRA.” This could mean long-tail opportunities exist for content marketers focused on “IRA limits” and “Roth IRA limits.”
4. When it comes to searches around “social security benefits,” search volume volatility has decreased dramatically over the years, which suggests this topic is now worthy of evergreen content and year-round promotion.
5. “Medigap” is another popular retirement search term. Its October spikes are not surprising given they coincide with Medicare’s open enrollment window, but it is interesting that troughs in search volume have steadily risen, and October spikes have jumped significantly higher since 2019.
6. One easy-to-miss SEO target is “retirement gifts.” With an average monthly volume of 22,503, this keyword is nothing to scoff at — it’s just shy of “pension” (24,365), and beats both “retirement communities” (15,227) and “retirement plan” (9,176). The yearly highs always register in May, so find a way to incorporate retirement gifts into a piece of evergreen content and promote it with gift-themed creative. Or if you have time, create a new piece dedicated just to this keyword!
What search trends are you seeing around retirement? Need help incorporating search trends and SEO into your retirement content? Please reach out to us, and we can schedule a time to learn more about your goals and challenges.
