Getting Real Data Out of Google About Colombia Isn't Simple
I spent about three weeks last year trying to compile accurate search volume data for keywords related to Colombian tourism. The obvious tools gave you numbers that were either wildly inflated or straight-up stale. The real issue is that Google's free tools don't actually break down most data by country the way people expect. You need to combine multiple sources and understand what each one is actually measuring before you can trust any single number. The process starts with Google Trends, but most people use it wrong. They type in a keyword and look at the highest peak without checking the time range. If you're researching something like "Cartagena hotels," you'll see a spike in December, but that spike might be seasonal noise from a single influencer post rather than genuine demand. I always set the date range back to five years minimum and compare it against the "Colombia" region specifically. This filters out global chatter that happens to include Colombia but isn't actually driven by Colombian or in-Colombia interest. Google Keyword Planner requires a Google Ads account, which most people don't have. Setting one up takes about twenty minutes and costs nothing if you never run an ad. Once you're in, you can search for keywords and get monthly search volume ranges. The ranges are broad—sometimes 1K to 10K—but they're more reliable than anything free. The trick is to export at least fifty related keywords at once and look for patterns across the ranges rather than fixating on individual numbers.
Here's something most guides won't tell you: Google Trends normalizes data to a 0-100 scale, which means it shows relative interest, not absolute volume. A keyword peaking at 100 might represent only 500 searches in a given month if the overall search ecosystem for that topic is small. I learned this the hard way when I was advising a client who thought "tours Medellin" was outperforming "tours Cartagena" based purely on Trends scores. The actual volume was roughly three times higher for Cartagena. Always cross-reference Trends with Keyword Planner's absolute numbers before making decisions. Semrush and Ahrefs both have Colombia-specific data, but their numbers diverge significantly from each other. In my experience, Semrush tends to overestimate volume for Spanish-language keywords in Colombia by about thirty percent compared to what Keyword Planner reports. Ahrefs is usually closer but still off. Neither is the source of truth. The most accurate approach is to treat them as directional guides and anchor your strategy around Google's own data whenever possible. I ran into a specific edge case that took me two days to resolve. I was tracking search interest for "vaccination requirements Colombia" during early 2023. Google Trends showed steady interest, but Keyword Planner returned no data at all for that exact phrase. The problem was that Google's autocomplete and related queries had split the intent across multiple terms like "Colombia vaccine requirements" and "requisitos vacunas Colombia." I had to build a matrix of at least fourteen keyword variations, translate each one, and map them back to the same underlying user intent. Without doing that, I would have concluded there was zero search demand when the combined volume was actually substantial.
Another thing that catches people off guard: Colombian Spanish search behavior is different from Spanish spoken in Spain or Mexico. Keywords like "buscar apartamento" will perform differently depending on whether the searcher is in Bogotá, Medellín, or Buenos Aires. I use the location filter in both Trends and Keyword Planner to isolate Colombian Intent specifically. When I don't, the data gets diluted by searches from other Spanish-speaking countries that happen to include Colombian-related terms. The biggest limitation with all of this is that Google doesn't provide search volume for long-tail, low-frequency keywords. If you're looking at niche terms with fewer than a thousand monthly searches, you'll often get a "not enough data" response or a range that starts at zero. This is a real problem for specialized industries. The workaround is to use Google Autocomplete manually. Type your root keyword into google.com.co and note what auto-suggests. These suggestions are based on actual recent searches, so they reflect current intent even if no volume data is available. It's tedious but it works. YouTube search data in Colombia follows a completely different pattern than web search. People search for "how to get from Bogota to Cartagena by bus" on YouTube far more often than they search the text version. If your research involves travel, logistics, or any visual how-to topic, you need to check YouTube's own search volume tools or use a platform like TubeBuddy. I found that for the Colombian market, YouTube keyword data can be up to twice as accurate as Google Web data for travel-related queries.
Get the Full Details
Google Search Console is useful but only if you already have a website ranking for Colombian keywords. If you do, the query report under Performance will show you exactly what Colombians are typing to find your content. The data goes back thirteen months and includes click-through rate, average position, and impressions. This is the most accurate keyword data you can get because it comes directly from Google's index of real user behavior. Most people overlook it because they think it only helps their own site, but it's a window into what Colombian users actually want. Keep in mind that all of these methods have blind spots. Google's data changes constantly. A keyword that showed 5K monthly searches in January might drop to 2K by March due to algorithm updates or shifting user behavior. You're always working with a snapshot, not a permanent record. For time-sensitive projects, I recommend re-running your keyword research every six weeks. It's overhead you probably don't want to deal with, but skipping it means you're building strategies on stale numbers. If you need a starting point for your own research, the most practical path is to create a Google Ads account, pull Keyword Planner data for your target terms filtered to Colombia, cross-check the top results against Google Trends with a five-year view, and then validate the gaps using Autocomplete on google.com.co. That process usually takes me about forty-five minutes and gives me enough confidence to move forward without needing expensive third-party tools.
