What Are Striking Distance Keywords? The Fastest Path to Page 1

Every website has a goldmine hiding in plain sight. Not in the keywords you rank first for, those are already working. Not in the keywords buried on page five, those need months of work. The real opportunity sits in the middle: striking distance keywords, the search terms where you rank in positions 8-20.

These are keywords where Google already trusts your content enough to show it. You just need a focused push to break into the top results. And the payoff is big: moving a single keyword from position 12 to position 5 can triple your traffic for that term, often in weeks, not months.

This guide shows you exactly how to find them, how to prioritize the ones worth your time, and how to push them to page 1.

A striking distance keyword is a search term where your page ranks in positions 8-20 on Google. This range covers the bottom of page 1 and the top of page 2, close enough that targeted tweaks can push you into the high-visibility spots.

Three things define a striking distance keyword:

1. Position 8-20: You're already on page 1 or top of page 2
2. Decent impressions: Google is showing your page for this term regularly
3. Untapped click potential: Your CTR is low compared to what you could get at a higher position

The numbers tell the story. Here's what average click-through rates look like by position, based on industry studies:

Moving from position 12 to position 5 means going from roughly 15 clicks to 70 clicks per 1,000 impressions, a 4-5x increase. That's the power of striking distance work.

There's a reason experienced SEOs prioritize striking distance work over chasing new keywords from scratch.

Speed. Ranking a new keyword from nothing typically takes 3-6 months of content creation, link building, and waiting. Optimizing a striking distance keyword can show movement in 2-4 weeks becuase Google already considers your page relevant.

Certainty. When you create brand new content targeting a fresh keyword, there's no guarantee Google will rank it at all. With striking distance keywords, Google has already validated your page. You have proof of relevance.

Compound returns. Every keyword you move to the top of page 1 strengthens your domain authority for related terms. One page climbing from position 12 to position 4 can pull neighboring keywords up with it.

Consider a concrete scenario. You have a page ranking at position 12 for a keyword with 2,000 monthly impressions. At position 12, you get roughly 30 clicks per month. If you move to position 5, you get roughly 140 clicks per month. That's 110 additional monthly visitors from a single optimization that might take 2-3 hours of work.

Now imagine doing that for 10 keywords at the same time. The numbers add up fast.

Google Search Console is the best free source for striking distance keyword data because it shows you the actual queries Google associates with your pages.

Step 1: Open Performance and Set Your Date Range

Go to Search Console > Performance. Set the date range to the last 28 days for stable, recent data. Check all four metric boxes: Total clicks, Total impressions, Average CTR, and Average position.

Step 2: Filter for Positions 8-20

Click + New > Position. Set the filter to:

• Greater than 7
• Less than 21

This isolates your striking distance keywords right away.

Step 3: Sort by Impressions (Not Clicks)

This is where most guides get it wrong. They sort by clicks. But at positions 8-20, clicks are already low, that's the whole problem. Impressions tell you the real potential: how many people are searching for this term and seeing your page in results.

Sort by impressions, highest first. The keywords at the top of this list are your biggest opportunities.

Step 4: Export and Analyze

Click Export to download the data. You now have a spreadsheet of every keyword where you're tantalizingly close to page 1.

For a programmatic approach, the filtering logic is pretty simple:

interface KeywordData {
  query: string
  position: number
  impressions: number
  clicks: number
  ctr: number
}

function findStrikingDistance(keywords: KeywordData[]): KeywordData[] {
  return keywords
    .filter((kw) => kw.position >= 8 && kw.position <= 20)
    .filter((kw) => kw.impressions >= 100)
    .sort((a, b) => b.impressions - a.impressions)
}

Finding striking distance keywords is the easy part. The hard part is deciding which ones to work on first. Not all striking distance keywords are equal, and optimizing the wrong ones wastes time you could spend on higher-impact terms.

Use this three-factor scoring system:

Factor 1: Traffic Potential (Impressions)

Higher impressions mean more people searching. A keyword with 3,000 impressions at position 14 has far more upside than a keyword with 50 impressions at position 9.

Factor 2: Position Proximity

Keywords closer to the top of page 1 need less effort to move. A keyword at position 9 might only need a title tag tweak. A keyword at position 18 probably needs a full content refresh.

Factor 3: Commercial Intent

Not all traffic is equal. A keyword like "best project management tools" has high commercial intent, those searchers are ready to buy. A keyword like "what is project management" is informational, useful for awareness but lower conversion value.

Combine these into a priority matrix:

Work your P1 keywords first. They give you the highest return for the least effort. Only move to P2-P4 when your P1 queue is empty.

Once you have your prioritized list, here are the five most effective optimizations, ordered by impact-to-effort ratio.

1. Title Tag and Meta Description Optimization

This is the fastest win. Your title tag is the first thing searchers see. If it doesn't match their intent or stand out from competitors, they scroll past, even if you rank well.

What to do:

• Include the exact target keyword naturally in the title
• Add a benefit or differentiator (numbers, "complete guide", year)
• Keep it under 60 characters so Google doesn't truncate it
• Write a meta description (150-160 chars) that acts as an ad for your page

2. Content Depth: Add What Competitors Cover

Open the top 3-5 results for your target keyword. Look at their headings, topics, and structure. Identify sections they cover that your page doesn't.

What to do:

• Add 2-3 new H2 sections covering missing subtopics
• Answer "People Also Ask" questions directly in your content
• Include data, examples, and specific numbers, not just opinions

3. Internal Linking From High-Authority Pages

Your own site has pages with strong authority, your homepage, popular blog posts, cornerstone content. Linking from those pages to your striking distance page passes authority and signals importance to Google.

What to do:

• Find 5-10 relevant pages on your site that could naturally link to the target page
• Add contextual links (not footer or sidebar links)
• Use descriptive anchor text that includes or relates to the target keyword

4. Featured Snippet Optimization

For informational queries, Google often shows a featured snippet above position 1. If you format your content to match snippet patterns, you can jump from position 8 directly to position 0.

What to do:

• Add a concise 40-60 word answer directly below the relevant H2
• Use lists and tables, Google loves pulling these into snippets
• Start the answer with a direct definition or statement

5. Schema Markup for Rich Results

FAQ schema, HowTo schema, and article schema make your result visually stand out in search results with extra information, stars, or expandable sections.

What to do:

• Add FAQ schema for pages with question-answer content
• Add HowTo schema for step-by-step guides
• Validate with Google's Rich Results Test tool

Here's something most striking distance guides completely miss: your traditional Google rankings directly influence whether AI platforms cite your content.

ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews don't pull sources randomly. They cite pages that already rank well in traditional search way more often. Perplexity actively crawls top Google results. Google AI Overviews literally draws from its own organic rankings. LLMs are trained on web data where high-ranking pages are overepresented.

This means every keyword you push from position 12 to position 5 doesn't just increase your Google traffic. It increases the chances that AI platforms will mention and cite your content when users ask related questions.

The flywheel works like this:

1. You optimize a striking distance keyword and move to the top of page 1
2. Google AI Overviews starts citing your page in AI-generated answers
3. ChatGPT and Perplexity begin referencing your content
4. This increased visibility and traffic further strengthens your traditional rankings

Traditional SEO effort compounds into AI visibility.

After optimizing, give each change at least 2-4 weeks to take effect. Google needs time to recrawl and re-evaluate your pages.

Track these three metrics weekly:

• Position changes: Are your target keywords moving up? Even +2 positions is meaningful progress.
• CTR improvements: As position improves, CTR should increase. If position improved but CTR didn't, your title/meta probably needs more work.
• Traffic growth: The ultimate measure. Compare organic sessions week-over-week for the optimized pages.

Don't panic if you see no movement in the first 7-10 days. Ranking improvements from content changes typically take 14-21 days to fully show up. If you see no improvement after 30 days, revisit your diagnosis, the issue might be diffrent from what you initially thought.

Striking distance keywords are the lowest-hanging fruit in SEO. You already have the rankings. You already have Google's trust. You just need to give those keywords the attention they deserve. Start with your highest-impression keywords in positions 8-10, apply the prioritization framework, and work your way through the list. The results will speak for themselves.

For a deeper dive into moving page 2 keywords specifically, check out our Page 2 to Page 1 Playbook.