Keyword Research Tools for Law Firm SEO

Select­ing the most appro­pri­ate search terms to embed in your online con­tent plays a sig­nif­i­cant role in the health and growth of your dig­i­tal audi­ence and SEO rank­ings. While it’s nat­ur­al to think that key­words are as sim­ple as search terms relat­ed to your prod­uct or ser­vice, they’re much more intri­cate and com­plex. Key­words are spe­cif­ic words and phras­es that audi­ences use to find the goods and ser­vices they’re after.

A few fac­tors are involved in the pop­u­lar­i­ty of search terms. Mis­spellings can deter­mine how words are typed in. Trends can trig­ger phras­es and search­es that are indi­rect­ly relat­ed to what you pro­vide. Geo­graph­ic loca­tion and device speci­fici­ty deter­mine search jar­gon accord­ing to search prox­im­i­ty. Big-name com­peti­tors also nar­row the like­li­hood of rank­ing for some of the most pop­u­lar keywords.

On top of a num­ber of influ­ences, key­words are con­stant­ly evolv­ing due to the nature of lan­guage, trend cycles, inter­net reach and of course, Google’s ever-chang­ing search algorithm.

Consumers ultimately drive keywords

Google adapts to the con­sumer; if the con­sumer changes their lan­guage to find a prod­uct or ser­vice, Google mod­i­fies its algo­rithm to ensure it pulls up accu­rate infor­ma­tion. The search engine notes what con­sumers search for on the go, from home, in a rush, when day­dream­ing, etc. If you keep up with the present-day key­words, you can improve search rank­ings and ensure that your web­site also pulls up toward the top when your tar­get audi­ence is search­ing for your service.

How­ev­er, it also means if you’re using the wrong key­words, you’re miss­ing out on the major­i­ty of your con­sumers who’ve changed their lan­guage or search­ing habits and are now being pre­sent­ed with alter­na­tive sources for their needs. Stay­ing up-to-date on key­word research is one of the most use­ful efforts you can con­tin­u­al­ly make toward grow­ing your brand and mak­ing sure your audi­ence knows where and how to find you online.

Research, aware­ness and indus­try exper­tise can all help you make the most of your SEO strat­e­gy. Let’s have a look at research­ing key­words for law firms.

Law firm research generates its own SEO results

When it comes to your law firm, an SEO strat­e­gy is espe­cial­ly reliant on key­words. In most cas­es, prospec­tive clients are vis­it­ing your law firm’s web­site because they need your ser­vices. This means that unless you offer nation­al online assis­tance, you’re like­ly tar­get­ing con­sumers in your spe­cif­ic geo­graph­ic location.

From coast to coast in the U.S.A, cit­i­zens speak using notice­ably dif­fer­ent into­na­tion and syn­tax. Zoom in on the map to one loca­tion, and you know per­son­al­ly well that every­one in that area has their own way of describ­ing their needs. Now con­sid­er your tar­get demo­graph­ic – would they describe their legal needs dif­fer­ent­ly from anoth­er demo­graph­ic? Are they more or less like­ly to be search­ing on-the-go or in their cur­rent location?

Research­ing your prospec­tive client needs to iden­ti­fy how they’re search­ing and with what terms can guide you into deep­er key­word research so you can opti­mize your con­tent and SEO efforts.

How to Research Keywords

There a few key ways to mon­i­tor your key­word rel­e­van­cy. Imple­ment as many research tac­tics as con­sis­tent­ly as you can so you can get the best results on your SEO strat­e­gy and get your brand in front of more prospec­tive clients.

Check out these two sim­ple tips:

1. Stay up-to-date on the legal terms list

Keep your con­tent writ­ers and edi­to­r­i­al researchers updat­ed on legal terms. By arm­ing your con­tent team with an accu­rate vocab­u­lary base improves writ­ing, ensures prop­er con­text and secures the qual­i­ty of your writing.

While this list might evolve nat­u­ral­ly, make a point to review and update it on a quar­ter­ly or month­ly basis. Notice where terms have changed, skewed or evolved in search­es, ser­vices and client receptiveness.

2. Use a keyword planning tool

A tool for key­word plan­ning can save you time, effort, mon­ey and headaches over under­stand­ing when and how search jar­gon changed so dras­ti­cal­ly over the course of a year.  Try using the plan­ning tools list­ed below to run this part of your strat­e­gy most efficiently.

While these two tips are short and sweet, please include them to keep your con­tent updat­ed, fresh and rel­e­vant to what your audi­ence is search­ing. It’s the only way to ensure that con­sumers will come to your site and solic­it your busi­ness. Let’s take a look at the top tools on the mar­ket you can use to stream­line your SEO efforts and get the most out of your strategy.

SEO Research Tools for Law Firms

It’s always best to get spe­cif­ic when it comes to key­words in your indus­try. How­ev­er, when you start out­lin­ing the demo­graph­ic details to look into, it can get over­whelm­ing. A few of our favorite tools to use are list­ed below.

-       Google Sug­gest

-       SEM­Rush

-       Word­Stream Key­word Tool

-       Google Key­word Planner

-       Uber­sug­gest

Google Suggest

Google sug­gest is the drop-down list of relat­ed search items that pops up as you type in your search to Google’s bar. At first, the search­es are ran­dom, but as you fin­ish typ­ing your search phrase or ques­tion, you’ll notice how spe­cif­ic the phras­es get. Click on one of the phras­es, fol­low to the results page and note what brands are list­ed as search match­es. This is a free tool you can use any­time to gauge the rel­e­van­cy of your key­words and to find out more about what types of ques­tions con­sumers are asking.

SEMRush

SEM­Rush offers insight into com­peti­tors, PPC and SEO. Users can eas­i­ly search for both high-vol­ume and low-vol­ume words. Hav­ing an under­stand­ing of what oth­er sites are using to gain traf­fic can help your brand accu­rate­ly assess which types of key­words are the most valu­able to include. Remem­ber, you want to rank favor­ably and also avoid com­pet­ing against the high­est-vol­ume words with the small­est chance of traction.

SEM­Rush offers a lim­it­ed num­ber of search­es per day before it requires a paid membership.

WordStream’s Keyword Tool

This key­word tool is immense­ly help­ful when it comes to launch­ing group ads. Tar­get­ing key­words for adver­tis­ing can be a huge play for mar­ket­ing in brand aware­ness and audi­ence turnover. Use this tool to thor­ough­ly pre­pare your adver­tis­ing approach and con­fi­dent­ly launch your ad campaign.

Google Keyword Planner

Key­word Plan­ner pro­vides a quick glimpse into the basic sta­tis­tics of Google search­es, includ­ing month­ly search vol­ume, over­all vol­ume and cost per click per search word or phrase. This allows you to assess the qual­i­ty of and invest­ment in your select­ed key­words before bring­ing a cam­paign to the market.

Ubersuggest

Uber­sug­gest is sim­i­lar to the Google Key­word Plan­ner, but it’s uber-spe­cif­ic and up-to-date. Users of Uber­sug­gest are privy to research on key­words not yet list­ed by Google’s Key­word Plan­ner, so you can be for­ward-think­ing and for­ward-plan­ning in your strat­e­gy creation.

These help­ful tools are a short list of rec­om­men­da­tions to get you going on opti­miz­ing your law firm’s key­word research. Com­ment below to share more resources and plan­ning ideas with the community.

Rosy Strategies

When you’re ready to imple­ment an SEO strat­e­gy for your brand, we have the resources you’ll need at Rosy Strate­gies. Our team can help iden­ti­fy exact­ly which tools you need to auto­mate, opti­mize and dri­ve your SEO mar­ket­ing home. Reach out to learn more.