Your instincts are good to notice that educational content is being returned for that query. My experience suggests that Google's algorithm is tweaked to deliver educational content if the query is vague or not clearly a search for a product or service. That way they err on the side of not making the organic channel a big advertisement.

The keyword "concrete garage floors" could be a user looking for an installer, but it could also be someone looking for pictures or DIY instructions or a simple definition. There's no way to know exactly, but Google has to deliver something so their engineers make a judgement call and attempt to have page 1 represent a mix of the likeliest intents or intent.

They don't always get it right and some industries slip through the cracks as far as correctly interpreting keywords as commercial in intent – again, erring on the side of education. In your case it looks like Google is interpreting this mostly as an educational query, so your best bet at ranking should be with a landing page that educates. An overview of the basics, benefits, and considerations when it comes to concrete garage floors would be a good start. You could even describe DIY techniques and describe why it might not be a good idea if you have a point of view on that (being as unbiased as possible). You probably won't rank for secondary DIY keywords and you probably don't want to, I only recommend that because it seems like that's a consideration for some people so you want to be able to address that option in the sales pitch your page will be making.

As for good secondary keywords, I always advise people to consider intent first. If you don't offer or have anything to say about the secondary keywords you're finding, it's not worth optimizing for them because the user isn't looking for you. If you're fishing for people who want to find an installer or service, try adding common modifiers that imply purchase intent. Words like "service," "company," "business," etc. are usually out there.

So for the particular keyword you mentioned I would make it an article style page that answers all the basic questions you can think of regarding that service. Doesn't necessarily have to be on the blog, could be in an internal page. That doesn't matter, just that it has some meat to it.

Even for keywords that seem to clearly ask for products / service I've seen educational content win out. I think it's a good failsafe and a better user experience particularly for services where there are a lot of considerations and possible questions latent in what might look like a simple search.

arejayismyname
It's a top of funnel, informational keyword. these types of people are just starting to consider refinishing, and want to know what's involved.

People searching transactionally would search "concrete garage floors (city)" or more likely "garage floor installation (city)".

Go after the queries that match your service + intent the most accurately, don't create content about epoxy on a service page if it's not a service you offer. When optimizing and doing keyword research, be sure to target your location/service area(s) within the keywords.

mjmilian

Does that mean I should choose another keyword instead for a landing page – or does it not matter that much?

Yeah, you need to choose a different keyword.

If Google is showing 1 type of page, which is different to the page type you want to rank, it wont rank your page within the top results, as Google is seeing the intent as different and we cant force a different type of page to rank.

At first glance, it seems like a good keyword, but Google is telling me otherwise.

You re doing the correct thing here, which is checking the intent that Google believes people have when searching for this keyword, which as /u/arejayismyname/ pointed out is informational, rather than commercial.

Good keyword, just different intent.

FStudio
How to Choose The Best Keyword?

To know your target audience.

Ask your clients. Try to replicate their search journey.

SEO isn't choosing "right keywords". SEO is the part of marketing. Who are your clients? Which are their needs and pains?
As a searcher I spend a lot of time to find useful information about many products.

digimark
For your page to rank higher or even appear in search results you need to have higher domain authority and page authority for that search query. just by mapping keywords you cannot expect it to appear in search results…

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