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Show HN: I’ve made a cheaper SEO research tool (withtelescope.com)

273 points by kulhavy ↗ HN
In the last 13 months I've spent total $1297 for Ahrefs subscription. Sounds like a little too much so I've build my own Keywords Research tool - Telescope.

While building it my total bill was $51 for 2 months and 41k+ keywords found. Every page of keywords costs $0.03 - $0.05. 2 payment options - usage-based subscription or just top up your balance with the amount you'd like to.

Telescope includes a couple of things:

- Keywords Explorer - finding keywords based on seed phrase and filters

- Keywords Ideas - keywords on interception on provided keywords

- Ranked Keywords - keywords a domain you specified with their positions and change since last DB update

- Saved Keywords - to store found keywords and plan the SEO strategy

I've put a lot of love into it and would love to get some feedback. IMPORTANT: every new account gets some free balance to start with. Appreciate it!

131 comments

[ 2.9 ms ] story [ 205 ms ] thread
cranberryturkey
looks cool do you have a trial version?
kulhavy
There is no trial version, but there is a "trial" balance you get after a sign up to try the application. Feel free to contact me on X (Twitter) @ilyakulhavy if you need a little more, thank you!
merlindru
Instantly bookmarked! Great landing page, will definitely check this out. Keep up the great work :)
kulhavy
Thank you!

We're working right now on adding On Page + Backlinks into the app so Telescope becomes go-to solution for SEO

raimille1
Awesome!! Congrats on the value prop and landing!! Very clear.

I run a marketplace in Brazil (kwara.com.br) and we happen to be focusing on SEO at the moment! What's your coverage in Portuguese / Brazilian market keywords? Or is it US only at the moment?

(Ps, I don't mind the tool itself being in english)

kulhavy
Thank you!

We have 150M+ keywords for Brazil (PT) and 30M+ for Portugal (PT) and tons of other countries/languages too

iambateman
Thanks for sharing! There’s so much opportunity to build lower cost tools here. Very cool.
kulhavy
Thank you!

Our main goal is to make it affordable for makers like us. Paying $140\m doesn't seem like a good idea and not many has such a budged, so here is our solution

baxtr
What I learned recently was that all the SEO tool basically query the same back end provider.

So I guess it makes sense that there is innovation on the pricing model side of things.

We use ubersuggest which has a lifetime pricing, quite neat.

kulhavy
You're right, that's exactly what out though process was. Thank you!
matrik
what’s the name of the backend provider?
kulhavy
I'd prefer not to tell, thank you for understanding!
alangibson
That just confirmed that you're using "the same backend provider."

Buy itself that's not bad. The problem is that if you're doing what everyone else is doing, then you're probably not realizing any efficiencies. That means your prices will eventually mirror everyone elses.

weinzierl
I am confused.

I always thought keyword tools use both: backlink data and estimated search volumes.

For example ahrefs has, to the best of my knowledge, its own crawler for backlink data but mostly buys search volume estimates.

Does your tool offer search volume estimates at all and does it come from the same provider as the backlink data?

glenngillen
Majestic
kulhavy
I can say it's not that one, if it's that important to know - DataForSEO is our provider for every aspect at the moment.
nprateem
What's the rough pricing if you don't mind my asking? Their pricing is buried behind contact forms.
kulhavy
It depends. ~$0.01-$0.03 per query
mikkom
Please enlighten us about the backend provider, I'm interested. It seems the OP of this thread is using the same backend as he's not willing to tell it.

edit: Ubersuggest mentioned by someone says in dev blog

https://neilpatel.com/blog/ubersuggest-update/

> My data feed from SEO Power Suite, Data For SEO, and Shared Count totaled $75,253 for January.

Is this the backend mentioned?

Some direct links for others interested in this

https://www.link-assistant.com/backlink-api.html

https://dataforseo.com/

https://www.sharedcount.com/

baxtr
I casually read it on twitter, I can't find it anymore. Bummer. I should have bookmarked it
mikkom
I fortunately found some details myself too (edited the parent), thanks anyway
weinzierl
At first glance these look like sources for backlink data to me, which is the easy part.

I think the real value of a keyword tool like ahrefs lies in the estimated search volume which comes from different sources than the backlinks.

Is this about a monopolistic provider of backlink data or search volume estimates?

55555
The search volume estimates come from creating massive amounts of accounts that scrape Google Keyword Tool.
weinzierl
This would be funny, because the sales pitch of some prominent keyword tools is, that Google Keyword Tool can't be trusted.
weinzierl
Interesting! I always thought, this kind of data was collected from a plethora of borderline shady browser plugins (SEO plugins amongst them, ironically), toolbars and alt-browsers.

This is also, why I think the data must be heavily biased. For example the HN demographic must be severely underrepresented, because most of us are careful what we install.

nickfromseattle
> why I think the data must be heavily biased.

This is correct, but you can estimate the bias.

B2B keywords typically have 2-5x higher search volume/month than the popular tools estimate, for exactly the reason you provided. More sophisticated searchers aren't installing random anti-virus, VPNs, and plugins the SEO tools rely on to calculate keyword search volume.

oloila
I'm pretty sure, that tier-5 services are investing in their own data collectors and buying only small part of data.
cmer
Very nice! Awesome landing page!

FYI, the `www` version of your domain doesn't resolve. You might want to add a redirect.

kulhavy
Thank you!

Oh, you're right! We'll fix this one asap

tethys
Do you offer an API? My issue with most keyword tools is that their APIs suck, with tight limits that force you to only request data in bulk, and so on.
kulhavy
Hey!

No, and we don't plan to have an API yet. Thank you!

tethys
That's unfortunate! I would immediately pitch this tool to my SEO colleagues if it had a (fairly priced) API :)
Bewelge
The background-color and content is missing when pressing the little question mark next to keyword details on the pricing page.

Also thank you for sharing and congratulations on shipping. Will definitely try this out in the coming days!

kulhavy
Thank you for feedback!

We'll fix this asap

TecoAndJix
FYI - Your FAQ at the bottom of each use-case page does not expand
kulhavy
Thank you!

We'll try to fix this asap.

JourneyJourney
How to understand the meaning of what I'm seeing on screen. I'm not versed into SEO but I'd like to. Your tool is very nice to use.
weinzierl
How important do you think this kind of tool is in the age of massive amounts of LLM generated text everywhere?

While content mills that could crank out any keyword optimized content very cheaply existed for a long time it is now basically free. Whereas producing deep and well researched articles maybe doesn't need that razor sharp focus on specific keywords?

Since you made this tool, you probably think otherwise, but I would like to hear your opinion.

heresie-dabord
> the age of massive amounts of LLM generated text everywhere

I would say that meaningless, soulless inputs had already inundated the WWW thanks to the economics of Search Engine Optimisation.

yieldcrv
It doesn’t matter what the reality is, it matters what every idea person, small business, and enterprise believes

They believe they need to buy SEO services, this service can be offered cheaper than competitors

BubbleRings
clicking FAQ from your hamburger menu button is busted fyi. good luck!
scientific_ass
This is super cool and I would love to try it out. We use SEMrush and they are basically charging us +$1000 dollar for the basic plan, with every other feature as an add-on for addition $200 - $400.

Question: Do you have (or plan to provide) features like -

-- Questions around the seed keywords

-- Keyword exports for external analysis with details like volume, difficulty, etc,

-- Can I tag keywords if I save them in a particular list?

In my work, I do SEO research almost every day and have a very extensive keyword strategy. So above features are what's keeping me stick to SEMrush.

kulhavy
Hey, Thank you!

We're planning to add premade filters for "Questions" and "Long tail" and a couple of others filtersets.

Keywords Export is coming for sure.

You can't tag just yet, but we will add this to backlog and implement according to our roadmap.

vivzkestrel
what would it take to build a SEMRush alternative?
kulhavy
Quite some time but we'll get there one day
abdellah123
This is something I've been looking for for a while !! What about keywords for France? and in Arabic?
kulhavy
Thank you!

18M+ keywords for France. Arabic is supported, but not for France

davidkuennen
Thank you! This is great.

Do you happen to know keyword tools that specialize on app store and play store search?

kulhavy
Hey!

Our data provider has data from these marketplaces and if you stick for long enough with us we will add them for sure as current solutions are sooooo expensive.

weinzierl
Email sign-up would be nice.
kulhavy
Hey! Yes, you're right. We plan to add magic link sign up and a couple of other providers
weinzierl
Do you provide keyword popularity and is it based on Google Keyword Tool data or clickstream data?
kulhavy
Hey!

It comes from Google Ads (different tools)

twapi
- No option to download as excel sheet

- No option to sort by columns

kulhavy
Yes, you're right, it's not available just yet, but on our roadmap

Thank you for feedback!

kulhavy
Hey again. We've been working late hours and now columns sorting and csv export are available, thank you for your feedback!
dsmurrell
I don't know that much about SEO. Are you planning on adding a blog section maybe with a few article about how someone might use a tool like this to optimise their own SEO?
hnrodey
search SEMRush or Ahrefs on YouTube. I assume usage of this tool is comparable to other established SEO tools.
kulhavy
Yes, usage is comparable with other SEO tools that does Keyword Research
newbie578
What is the difference between this and Google Keyword Planner? I am asking this as someone with minimum experience in SEO
kulhavy
Telescope comes with more details on the data - Keyword Difficulty, Historic Search Volume, Ability to preview google results for different countries, Keywords for your specific domains and your position.

Soon we'll have backlink data and it'll open up even more details on Keywords, SERP Preview, Domain Overview

p3rls
These are the products that are being used to destroy the internet. It's like selling meth at a school playground to applause. Nice UI execution I guess.
cchance
The question mark on the "KEYWORD DETAILS" on the pricing page... says... HEY ..... lol
kulhavy
Hi! I forgot to update it, will fix soon, thank you!
maxencecornet
For OP: Would you say this is a drop-in replacement from ahref's lite plan ?

What would I miss from ahref ?

kulhavy
For sure you win in pricing using Telescope, but here are the things to consider:

There are quite a few limits in Ahrefs's Starter plan, but on the other hand you have access to Site Explorer and Site Audit which we don't have just yet. For Keyword Research it's almost 1:1.

Thank you!

j45
Hi, congrats on the launch!

Are searches cached locally in my account?

I accidentally reload a page, it seems to run the search again and charge the (free and provided) balance.

Thanks

kulhavy
Hi. Your searches cached locally for some time, reloading the page clears the cache
willsmith72
agreed on this, caching would be very nice. i don't care if results are even a week+ out of date
kulhavy
It makes sense, I agree. We'll try to adjust this
j45
Thanks. I don't want it to take away from the accomplishment this is and look forward to the tweak - it seemed to further charge me if I reloaded an existing search page.