The short answer
What local keyword research is and how it works.
Local keyword research finds the words people in your service area type when they need what you sell, then matches each group of searches to the page on your website that should answer it. For a service business, it comes down to six steps: list your services and towns, collect the words customers use, read what each search wants, check the numbers, map keywords to pages and decide what to build first. Then you measure which pages bring in calls and jobs.
It starts with your business, not a tool. A keyword tool will happily suggest phrases for work you don’t do, in towns you don’t serve. Begin with the jobs you want more of and the places you go, and use the tools to fill in the words.
Done well, keyword research tells you which pages to build, which to fix, what to call them and what questions to answer on them. It also tells you which searches to leave alone: the do-it-yourself questions, the jobs you’d turn down and the towns too far to drive.
This guide walks through each step with examples from home service trades. If you’re new to the topic, our guide to what local SEO is covers the bigger picture first.
Step 1 and step 2
Build a seed list, then collect the words customers use.
Step 1. List services and towns. Write down every service you sell, as specific as you can make it. “Plumbing” is too broad; “water heater replacement,” “tankless water heater installation,” “sewer line repair” and “drain cleaning” are separate jobs. Next to them, list the towns you serve and any you want to grow into. Mark the services that make you the most money and the ones you’d rather not do.
Step 2. Collect the customer’s words. Your team calls it a “main line replacement.” A homeowner types “sewer pipe broken in yard.” You need both. The best sources are already in your business:
- Call recordings and the notes your office takes on new calls.
- Estimate requests, emails and website form messages.
- Your Google reviews and your competitors’ reviews.
- Google’s autocomplete suggestions and the “People also ask” questions on a search.
- Search Console, if your site already has traffic, which lists the searches that showed your pages.
- The services pages of the top-ranking competitors in your area.
Sort what you find into types. Each type tends to need a different kind of page:
Service and town
- Example search
- water heater replacement in [town]
- Page that should answer it
- Service page, or a town page with real local content
Near me
- Example search
- furnace repair near me
- Page that should answer it
- Service page plus an accurate Business Profile
Problem
- Example search
- water heater leaking from the bottom
- Page that should answer it
- Service page that names the problem, or a short guide
Cost
- Example search
- how much does a new roof cost
- Page that should answer it
- A cost guide that links to the service page
Comparison
- Example search
- tankless vs tank water heater
- Page that should answer it
- A guide that links to both service pages
Do it yourself
- Example search
- how to relight a pilot light
- Page that should answer it
- Usually skip, or answer briefly with a safety note
Step 3
Read what each search wants before you target it.
Search intent is what the person is trying to get done. The same topic can carry very different intent. “Roof leak repair” is someone who wants to hire. “Why is my roof leaking” could be a homeowner about to hire or one about to climb a ladder. “Roofing shingles types” is someone doing homework.
The fastest way to read intent is to search the phrase yourself and look at what Google shows:
- A map with three local businesses means Google sees local hiring intent. Your Business Profile and a strong service page compete here.
- Service pages from local companies below the map means a service page is the right answer.
- How-to articles and videos mean people want to do it themselves. A service page will struggle to rank, and the visitors it brings rarely call.
- Cost guides and comparison articles mean people are researching. A guide that answers the question and invites a quote fits.
Results change by location and device, so search from inside your service area, or set your location in the browser, and treat what you see as a snapshot.
A longer, more specific phrase isn’t always easier to rank for or more likely to turn into a job. “Emergency plumber open Sunday” is long and full of intent; “plumbing history facts” is long and worth nothing to you. Judge each phrase on what it asks for.
Step 4
Check the numbers, and know what they can’t tell you.
Keyword Planner. Google Ads’ free Keyword Planner shows average monthly searches for a keyword and close variants, for the location and period you choose. The figures are rounded, and accounts without much ad spend often see ranges in place of exact numbers. The “competition” column describes advertisers bidding on the phrase, not how hard it is to rank organically. Google’s historical metrics guide explains the details.
Search Console. If your site already exists, the Performance report shows the searches that displayed your pages, how often, where they ranked and how many clicked. It only covers your own site, and it hides some rare queries for privacy, but it is the best free data you have.
Paid tools. Third-party SEO tools estimate volume and difficulty from their own data. Their numbers often disagree with each other. Use them to compare phrases, not as counts of customers.
Three things to keep in mind as you read the numbers:
- Local numbers are small. A service in a mid-size town may show twenty or thirty searches a month. That is normal. If each job is worth a few thousand dollars, a handful of calls a month is a lot of money.
- Zero doesn’t mean zero. Tools round small figures down. If customers ask for it and the results show local businesses, it can still be worth a page.
- Demand is seasonal. Air conditioning repair peaks in summer, furnace repair in winter and exterior painting in the dry months. Look at the trend over a year, and have pages ready before the season starts.
Write down the location, date range and source next to any number you keep. A national figure is not the number of people looking for you in one town, and an ad estimate is not a promise of SEO leads.
Step 5
Map each group of keywords to one page.
Group phrases that ask for the same thing. “Water heater replacement,” “replace water heater” and “new water heater installed” all want the same page. Then assign each group to one page in a simple spreadsheet, the keyword map, with these columns:
- The main phrase and its close variants.
- The page that will answer it, whether it exists yet, and its address.
- The intent (hire, research, compare) and the page type it needs.
- The questions the page must answer, taken from your calls and the “People also ask” box.
- Its priority, which you’ll set in the next step.
One page per group. Two pages targeting the same search compete with each other, and often neither ranks well. If you find that, merge them and redirect the weaker one.
Town pages need substance. A “drain cleaning in [town]” page earns its place when it has something only that town’s page can say: jobs you’ve done there, the type of homes and pipes common there, local permit notes, reviews from customers there. Pages that only swap the town name are thin, and Google can treat a set of them as doorway pages.
Put the words where they count. Use the main phrase in the page title and the main heading, written the way a person would say it. Google’s Search Essentials recommends putting the words people search for in prominent places like those. Repeating a phrase or listing towns in every paragraph breaks its keyword-stuffing policy .
Answer the questions. Each question in your map belongs on the page, in plain language. Clear answers help customers decide, and they are what AI search features pull from. Our AI search readiness guide covers that side.
Step 6
Decide what to work on first.
You’ll end up with more groups than you can build in a month. Score each one on four questions:
- What is the job worth? A sewer line replacement is worth more than a faucet repair. Lead with the work that pays.
- Do you want more of it? If your crews are booked solid on one service, push another.
- Who ranks now? If the top results are thin pages from small local competitors, you can likely beat them. If they are national directories and big brands, expect a longer climb.
- What do you already have? Improving an existing page that ranks on page two is usually faster than building a new one.
Start with quick wins. In Search Console, look for searches where your page ranks around positions 8 to 20. Those pages are close. Better titles, clearer answers, more photos and stronger internal links often move them onto page one.
Then work down the list: core service pages first, then the problem and cost guides that link to them, then town pages where you have real local content. For some high-value searches, ads can fill the gap while the organic work builds; our SEO vs. PPC guide explains when that makes sense.
Close the loop
Measure calls and jobs, then revisit the research.
Rankings are a step, not the goal. For each page in your map, track three things: where it ranks for its main phrases, how many people visit from search, and how many calls and form requests it produces. Call tracking and form tracking on each page make the last one possible.
Then read the requests. If a page brings in calls for work you don’t do, its wording is attracting the wrong searches. If a page ranks well and nobody calls, the page needs a clearer offer, better proof or an easier way to book. Ask your office staff what callers mention; they hear the words customers use every day.
Revisit the research when the business changes: a new service, a new town, a new crew, or a slow season you want to fill. A light check in Search Console each month and a full refresh once or twice a year keeps the map current.
Keyword research is the first step of Lithium’s SEO service , and it shapes every page we build or fix after that. A typical local SEO retainer is $1,300 to $3,000 a month. The local SEO checklist covers the rest of the work, and our marketing glossary defines the terms in any research report.
