Getting Keywords for Plumbers

Before we get down to the keywords, you need to put yourself in the mind of a user.  There are lots of things they may search for that may very well result in them doing business with you.  So let’s look at the general concepts
‘find a plumber’
‘plumbing contractor in Los Angeles’
‘fix a broken toilet’

As a plumbing business these are all keywords that may well result in somebody new doing business with you.  As you start choosing keywords a bit later it worth putting yourself in the mind of a user and thinking what types of keywords somebody looking for what you offer would use.   The good news is Google will give you lots and lots of suggestions.  But as it’s up to you to choose the words you need to put on your keyword hat and select keywords that have a good probability of having a positive outcome for your business.  In addition, users will often use a search engine to describe a problem so consider using keywords that describe a problem ‘blocked drain’, ‘how to unblock a drain’, ‘my toilet won’t flush’.  The scope is huge, so it’s worth spending a bit of time thinking about your keywords.

Now the other thing I want to address is the local nature of the service you provide.  It’s obviously vital, as far as possible to get prospects within the area you operate.  There are a few solutions for this and implementing these will make a huge difference

1. Your keyword selection.  If you take some of the keywords we’ll find and add a local component to them that’s going to make a huge difference in ensuring you get targeted prospects.  So for example, if we take the word ‘plumber’ which is very general and add a geographical qualifier to it like ‘plumber Los Angeles’, we’ve already begun to target the traffic you will get.  Now you can actually take this several steps further ‘plumber in Santa Monica’.  So it’s worth creating a list of geographical place names that you want to associate with your general keywords.  Other tactics like adding zip codes also works very well in getting you the right kind of prospects, so ‘plumber in 90210’ would also work well if that’s your area.
2. City targeting – Google allows you to limit your advertising to certain metropolitan areas.  So for example you could select ‘Los Angeles’ or another feature they offer is to allow you to run your advertising a certain distance from a point on a map.   So you could say show my ads in a 15 mile radius of a certain zip code. 

It’s worth pointing out that city targeting is based on the IP address of a user’s computer.  Which means it’s not an exact science, so some users within your area won’t see your advertising and similarly some users outside your area will see it.   However, in general terms it works well and helps you maximise your budget. 

Personally, I’d pursue both strategies.  Select a slightly larger geographical area than and then target within that area by using laser targeted keywords – anyway more about this later.

Getting Started with Adwords – Step by Step Guide