A question keyword is a search query phrased as a question, usually starting with words such as how, what, why, when, which, can, do or is. “How long does a loft conversion take”, “can I claim VAT on a company car” and “which is better, combi or system boiler” are all question keywords.
How question keywords work
The phrasing tells you a great deal about search intent. Most question searches are informational: the person wants an answer before they want a supplier. Some sit closer to a decision (“which accountant is best for contractors”, “is it worth paying for an SEO audit”), and a few are plainly commercial (“how much does a kitchen fitter cost in Bristol”). Reading the question word, and the rest of the phrase, is quicker than any intent label a tool assigns.
Questions are usually long-tail keywords: each one has modest demand, but together they represent a large share of what people type, and even more of what they say aloud to voice assistants. Google surfaces them in its own results through the People Also Ask box, featured snippets and AI Overviews, which pull a short, direct answer from a page and show it above or among the ordinary results.
Good sources for finding question keywords include People Also Ask and autocomplete in Google itself, the Performance report in Search Console (filter queries with a regular expression such as words beginning with how, what or why), keyword tools that group questions, forums such as Reddit and Mumsnet, and, most valuable of all, the questions your customers ask on the phone, by email and in sales meetings.
Why it matters
Answering questions well is how a smaller UK business earns visibility against bigger brands. A Manchester accountant will struggle to rank for “accountant”, but can rank for “do I need to register for Self Assessment if I rent out a room”, and reach precisely the person who will need an accountant soon.
Clear answers also build trust before the first enquiry. Someone who has had three questions answered plainly on your site arrives at the contact form already confident in you. And as AI search tools summarise answers from across the web, pages that answer a specific question cleanly are the ones most likely to be drawn on and cited.
Common mistakes
- One page per question. Many questions share one intent. Splitting them into dozens of thin pages invites cannibalisation; group related questions on one strong page.
- Burying the answer. If the answer arrives after four paragraphs of preamble, both readers and Google lose patience. Answer first, then explain.
- Answering a different question. “How much does a website cost” needs price ranges and what drives them, not a sales pitch.
- Relying on FAQ rich results. Since August 2023 Google has shown FAQ rich results only for well-known government and health sites, so FAQPage schema is not a shortcut to more space in results for most businesses.
- Copying US questions. UK searchers ask about VAT, HMRC, council tax and planning permission, not sales tax and zoning.
How to act on it
Collect questions from Search Console, People Also Ask and your own inbox into one list. Group them by intent, and decide for each group whether it deserves a dedicated guide, a section on an existing service page or an FAQ entry. Put the question in a heading where it reads naturally, answer it in the first sentence or two beneath, then add the detail, examples and caveats a careful reader needs.
Review the list each quarter, because new questions appear as rules, products and prices change. If you want questions mapped to the right pages across your whole site, so that every page has one clear job, that is part of the keyword research I carry out.