Is Ahrefs Good for Beginners? (Answered w/ Proof)

I use Ahrefs to start and build profitable websites, so let’s get right to it.

Is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Ahrefs is good for beginner writers and bloggers because it offers a user-friendly interface, a cache of SEO tools, video tutorials, and a streamlined process for finding easy keywords. Beginners can use Ahrefs to write quality content that ranks on the first-page search results of Google.

Now, let’s break down these reasons with video and screenshot proof.

6 Reasons Ahrefs is Good For Beginners (Explained)

There are at least six reasons Ahrefs is good for beginners. It doesn’t matter if you are brand new to blogging, search engine optimization (SEO), or website building.

Ahrefs is your one-stop-shop for everything you need to choose a profitable niche, select topical categories for your website, and find easy-to-rank-for keywords. I’ve used Ahrefs for over a year now for all of my websites, and I consistently rank on the first page of search results in Google.

Here are the 6 reasons Ahrefs is good for beginners:

1) Intuitive design & features

One of the main reasons Ahrefs is perfect for beginners is its intuitive design.

Even as a complete newbie to keyword research, I was able to easily use the tool without much instruction. I picked up the necessary basics very easily because of the wonderful layout and design.

To be crystal clear, I had ZERO issues with understanding how to use the main functions.

That wasn’t true with other keyword tools I’ve tried, many of which provided limited data or confusing interfaces.

2) All-in-one SEO toolbox (It’s like having an entire SEO company at your fingertips)

Ahrefs provides the high-end services of an entire SEO company, right at your fingertips.

It’s an all-in-one toolbox designed to help you perform your own SEO, even if you don’t know the first thing about it.

Use Ahrefs to:

  • Track keyword rank (Who is ranking for a particular phrase?)
  • Identify issues (Is Google telling you that there are no backlinks pointing to your site? If so, Ahrefs can help you figure out why.)
  • Explore backlinks (Who is linking to your website or any website)
  • Discover influencers and authority sites in your niche (Who is your biggest competition?)
  • Identify link-building opportunities (Good for SEO)
  • Compare keywords (A tool within Ahrefs lets you compare keyword volume and difficulty, so you can figure out which terms are worth your time.)

Ahrefs is constantly updating and improving, so expect even better features to keep you ahead of your competition.

3) Tons of beginner friendly tutorials and videos

If you ever have any questions about how to best use Ahrefs, the company provides a video tutorial (or series of tutorials) in beginner-friendly language.

Not only that, but the Ahrefs YouTube channel contains dozens of other tutorial videos as well.

On the Ahref YouTube channel, you can pick from dozens of topics like, “How to Get Your First 100 Backlinks,” “How To Find Low Competition Keywords for SEO,” and “SEO basics: What is SEO and Why is it Important?”

It’s okay if you aren’t super tech-savvy and don’t know how to dig into a website’s metadata or error logs. Ahrefs provides quick-starter training so that everyone can understand how their tool works.

4) You can find easy keywords to rank new websites

Ahrefs is a powerful tool for finding keywords.

You can uncover low competition keywords that your competitors miss because they don’t use the tool (or they use a less powerful tool). I’ve done this over and over again for brand new websites.

In fact, I use Ahrefs for this website every month.

There are several different ways to use Ahrefs to find keywords. I explain (and demo) my two favorite ways in this article.

And I know it works because this is the latest data from my newest website using Ahrefs:

5) You can find all of your competitor’s easy keywords

A very cool feature of Ahrefs is Site Explorer. Essentially, you can plug any website into the tool to find the keywords for which the website ranks.

So, instead of having to search for good keywords one by one, you find an entire cluster of keywords.

It’s so easy that it almost feels like cheating.

6) You can use Ahrefs to write awesome blog posts

How do you use Ahrefs to write awesome blog posts?

You find untapped keywords (or a cluster of keywords) with Ahrefs.com, then use the Ahrefs Chrome Extension to find related keywords to use as subheadings.

When you write articles with Ahrefs, you can rank for dozens or even hundreds of different keywords with a single quality article.

You can even study your competitor’s related articles to figure out how to produce better content. For example, I regularly find competing articles with short content (under 600 words), poor formatting (tiny font, big blocks of text), and no media (images or videos).

Is Ahrefs a Good SEO Tool for Beginners?

I consider Ahrefs the best SEO tool for beginners.

Why is Ahrefs a good SEO tool when you first start out with blogging? Ahrefs presents an overview of everything you need for SEO on the dashboard.

You can quickly see:

  • The overall health of your site
  • The number of broken links on your site
  • Referring domains
  • How much organic traffic your site gets
  • How many keywords your site ranks for (overtime)
  • How many keywords your site ranks for in different countries

You can also explore your own website for specific SEO issues so that you know exactly what you need to fix (and you can hire someone cheap of Fiverr or Upwork to help you fix it).

Is Ahrefs a Good Tool for Beginners To Find Long-Tail Keywords? (Low Competition, High Volume)

Ahrefs is by far my favorite keyword research tool to find long-tail keywords.

I use Ahrefs every single day for the majority of my keyword research. You can look for keywords on Google, YouTube, Amazon, Bing, Yahoo, and so many more. 

It’s not the cheapest tool on the market, but it is the best tool hands down for keyword research.

If you just want to try it out, there is a seven-day trial for $7 (not an affiliate link). You pay $7 and, honestly, you can do your whole keyword research for a month, even several months in advance, if you want to. 

I typically do my keyword research for only the next 30 days because keyword research results can change quickly.

As a case study, I’m going to walk you through an example of how I use Ahrefs to find low competition, high-volume keywords for my websites.

If you’d rather watch the video, check it out here:

Video by Writing Secrets via YouTube—Is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Just for fun, we’re going to search “dragons” and see what comes up.

On Ahrefs, go to Keyword Explorer:

Screenshot of Ahrefs Keyword Explorer ToolIs Ahrefs Good For Beginners?
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Type your keyword into the big box (see screenshot below). Note: You can also type a batch of keywords separated by commas. For our example, we’ll just look at one keyword.

A few other things to keep in mind:

  • Choose Google (it wil probably be highlighted by default, but it’s always a good idea to double check)
  • Choose your preferred country (as you can see in the screenshot, my account is set to the United States)

Screenshot of Entering Keyword in Keywords Explorer Tool
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Once you click the search button (magnifying glass), you go to the keyword overview screen.

It looks like this:

Screenshot of Keyword Overview Screen
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Notice that the keyword difficulty of 58. I probably wouldn’t go for the keyword “dragons” as a new website (too hard to rank) but look at all the information you get.

You get the keyword volume, the cost per click, and access to matching terms (to name only a few). I love looking through the questions section because you can often find untapped keywords.

Let’s click on “View All,” which is at the bottom of the questions section, to get even more details.

You now arrive at the “Matching Terms” page toggled to only search for questions related to your keyword. In our case example, that is “dragons.”

Screenshot of Ahrefs by the author

On this screen, you can see the keyword difficulty (The red, yellow, and green numbers in the Keyword Difficulty, or KD, column). Red keywords are hard, yellow keywords are somewhat difficult, and green keywords are the easiest to rank for on the first-page search results on Google.

You can filter the keywords further by:

  • Keyword difficulty (0-100)
  • Search volume (In the US and globally)
  • Number of words in the search phrase (word count)
  • SERP Features (SERP stands for search engine results page)
  • Included words (such as best, vs., etc)
  • Excluded words (such as Quora, Reddit, forum, free, etc)

I recommend that you look for green keywords with a keyword difficulty of 0-10. The more search volume the better, but keep in mind that the search volume is just an estimate.

I’ve written high-traffic articles on supposedly “low volume” keywords that get hundreds or thousands of searches per month.

Is Ahrefs a Good Competitor Analysis Tool for Beginners? (Case Example)

Ahrefs is also a good tool for ethically scraping your competition’s keywords.

Once again, if you want to view the video, watch how I use Ahrefs for competitor research.

This is one of my favorite hacks for finding keywords, especially for new websites. But it works for any website, no matter how big. I’ll walk you quickly through the exact steps, illustrated with screenshots.

First, click on Site Explorer in Ahrefs:

Screenshot of Site Explorer Tool on Ahrefs
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

Then, paste the name of the website into the Site Explorer search box and click “Enter.” You’re going to open a screen with lots of detail about this website.

Screenshot of Site Explorer Tool on Ahrefs—Specific Website
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

I’ve highlighted the three most important metrics that I look for on the above screenshot.

Here is a written list of those metrics:

  • The Domain Rank or DR score (you can see that this example website is currently at .08, which is very low).
  • The Organic Traffic (Even as a new website, this one gets over 1,000 pageviews per month)
  • Organic Keywords (this is where you find what keywords the website ranks for on Google).

Now, go to Organic Keywords. You’ll end up on a screen with a list of keywords.

Screenshot of Organic Keywords on Ahrefs—Specific Website
Screenshot by Author of Ahrefs—is Ahrefs good for beginners?

On this screen, filter for keywords with a keyword difficulty (KD) score of 0, or at least under 10. Also, filter for positions 1-10. The position means where the website ranks on Google.

If this relatively new website can rank in the top 10 search results for a low-competition keyword, odds are you can, too. All you need to do is write a better article on the same keyword with stronger content.

Best Ahrefs How-To Videos for Beginners

I love good resources, so here is a shortlist of some of my favorite informational how-to videos on Ahrefs.

Final Thoughts: Is Ahrefs Good For Beginners?

Ahrefs is by far my favorite keyword and SEO tool for beginners. I don’t see that changing anytime soon, but I’m always testing new tools to find a better one.

One new tool that I’m experimenting with (and that I see great potential for) is lowfuit.io. I encourage you to check it out with me.

What to read next: