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Research
Imagine you’re a top-notch plumber in New York City. You’ve got years of experience, happy customers, and the skills to fix any leak or clog.
Yet, when someone in your neighborhood searches online for a plumber, does your name pop up? If not, you might be invisible to a huge pool of customers actively looking for services like yours.
Why does this happen, and how can you change it? The answer lies in understanding what people are searching for and making sure your website speaks the same language. That’s where keyword research comes in.
Keyword research might sound technical, but at its heart, it’s about listening to your customers. It’s like reading minds – or better yet, listening to the questions people ask when they need a plumber.
For example, when a frantic homeowner in Brooklyn types “emergency plumber near me” at 2 AM, will they find you? By the end of this guide, you’ll know how to make sure the answer is yes.
We’ll walk through why keyword research matters (starting with why – just like Simon Sinek advises), break down the key elements and types of keywords, and give you a step-by-step plan to find the best keywords for a New York plumbing business.
Along the way, we’ll use real-world examples (think drain cleaning, water heater repair, and those dreaded midnight pipe bursts) so it all feels relevant and practical.
Let’s dive in with a simple question that drives everything else: What is keyword research, and why should you care?
Keyword research is the process of finding out the exact words and phrases people type into search engines (like Google) when they’re looking for something. In our case, it means finding out what people search for when they need plumbing services.
Keyword research involves “finding and analyzing search terms that people enter into search engines”. In plain English, it’s figuring out what your potential customers are asking so you can provide the answer.
Think of it this way: If you could stand beside a potential customer and hear their thoughts when their pipe bursts, you’d probably hear something like “How do I stop a leak?” or “best emergency plumber in New York”.
Those thoughts are keywords when typed into Google. Doing keyword research is like discovering those thought bubbles so you can make sure your website has the answers.
Why does this matter? Imagine you write a blog post about “innovative flange installation techniques” – it’s detailed and accurate, but if no one in New York is searching for “flange installation techniques,” that post won’t bring you any visitors.
You’d have created great content in a vacuum. Keyword research ensures you’re writing content (or crafting pages) about things real people actually search for. It bridges what you want to say and what your customers want to know.
To put it in a simple analogy, keywords are like the bridges between a plumber’s website and a customer’s query. If the bridge isn’t there, the customer goes elsewhere. Keyword research helps you build that bridge.
It’s a bit like choosing the right sign to put on your shop window – if you fix leaks, you want a sign that says “We fix leaks” because that’s what people understand and look for. On the internet, your “sign” is the keywords on your website and ads.
So, in a nutshell, keyword research means finding the exact words people use when they look for plumbing help, and then using those words in your website content so you and your customers speak the same language online.
Why should a busy plumber care about keyword research? Let’s start with a quick fact: 97% of people use online media to search for local services. Yes, nearly everyone turns to Google or other online tools when they need a local business, including plumbers.
If your plumbing business isn’t showing up for the searches people are doing, it’s almost like your business doesn’t exist for those potential customers.
Here’s another eye-opener: 76% of people who search on their smartphones for a nearby business (like a plumber) visit or contact that business within a day.
That means if someone in New York grabs their phone and looks up “clogged drain service Queens” or “water heater repair near me,” they’re very likely to call a plumber that same day.
If you can be the plumber they find, you stand a great chance of getting that call and winning a new customer. If you’re not in those search results, that business likely goes to a competitor.
Keyword research is important because it helps you get in front of the people who are already looking for the services you offer. Instead of pushing out ads to people who might not be interested, you’re pulling in people who have a broken faucet, a flooded basement, or an ice-cold shower and need help right now. These are high-intent customers – they have a problem and they want a solution ASAP.
Let’s use a quick story to illustrate: Imagine two plumbers, Alice and Bob. Alice guesses what terms people search and writes about “top-notch pipe refurbishment.” Bob, on the other hand, does some keyword research and finds that more people search for “pipe leak repair in NYC.”
Bob uses that phrase on his website and writes a helpful guide about it. When a New Yorker’s pipe leaks and they search for help, whose page do you think shows up – Alice’s or Bob’s? Most likely Bob’s, because he aligned his content with the exact words people used. Bob gets the call, Alice doesn’t.
In short, keyword research guides your content and SEO strategy to match what real customers are searching for. It’s the difference between broadcasting into the void and joining the conversation already happening in your customer’s head.
If you skip keyword research, you might optimize your website for phrases nobody uses – a bit like setting up your plumbing shop in a ghost town where no customers pass by.
On the flip side, doing keyword research helps you focus on high-value keywords – those that lots of people search for, that fit your business, and that you have a shot at ranking for.
There’s also a competitive angle. Proper keyword research can reveal who your real online competitors are and what they’re targeting. As one SEO expert noted, it “determines who your competitors are and which area of the search landscape you can rank for”.
For example, you might discover that big directory sites (like Yelp or HomeAdvisor) dominate “NYC plumber” searches, but there’s an opportunity to rank for a more specific term like “24-hour plumber Brooklyn.” Knowing this helps you find your SEO sweet spot – where you can rank well and attract customers.
Finally, keyword research isn’t just about SEO and Google rankings. It gives you insights into your customers’ questions and concerns. If many people search “water heater making noise,” that tells you something – maybe you should write a blog post about noisy water heaters or mention that in your service page.
It’s market research. By understanding popular searches, you understand your audience better. You can even improve your services or FAQs around what people care about.
To sum up, keyword research is important because it:
Now that we’ve covered the “what” and “why,” let’s break down some core concepts of keyword research – the ingredients that make a keyword valuable for you. We’ll look at the three key elements of keyword research that you should always consider before deciding to target a keyword.
Not all keywords are equal. When deciding which keywords to focus on, SEO experts usually consider three main elements: relevance, authority, and volume.
Think of these as the three legs of a stool – remove one, and your strategy might wobble. Let’s unpack each element in simple terms:
1. Relevance (Search Intent): This is the most important element. Google will only rank your content for a keyword if your content is relevant to what the searcher actually wants. This is where matching the search intent comes in.
For example, if someone searches for “how to fix a leaky faucet,” they likely want a step-by-step guide (informational intent), not a page saying “hire me to fix your faucet” – at least not immediately.
On the other hand, if someone searches “emergency plumber in Manhattan tonight,” they probably want to find and call a plumber right now (transactional intent). You need to choose keywords that match the services or information you genuinely provide – and then create the best, most helpful content for those searches.
In short, relevance means picking keywords that actually relate to what you offer and what your ideal customer is looking for.
2. Authority (and Competition): Google gives more weight to content from sources it trusts. In SEO terms, that means sites with a higher authority (which often comes from having lots of quality content and backlinks from other reputable sites).
If the keywords you want to rank for are dominated by big authorities, you’ll have a hard time cracking page one unless you build up your site’s authority too. For a local plumber, authority might come from being mentioned on local news or blogs, having many positive reviews, and consistently putting out useful content. Consider the competition: Are the current top results for a keyword from huge nationwide websites or well-known brands? If so, that keyword might be tough.
For instance, trying to rank a new site for “best plumbing fixtures” against Home Depot and Lowe’s would be an uphill battle. However, on more local or specific searches, you might see other small businesses ranking – which means you can compete there.
Always gauge how attainable a keyword is. If a keyword’s SERP (search engine results page) is “loaded with heavy sources you can’t compete with (like Forbes or The Mayo Clinic)”, your chance of ranking is lowerblog.hubspot.com. Instead, target keywords where you see businesses like yours on page one.
3. Volume (Search Popularity): This is the number of times people search for a given keyword, usually measured as monthly search volume (MSV). Volume tells you how popular a search term is. If a keyword has a high volume, many people are searching for it each month.
Ranking for it could bring in a lot of visitors. However, if volume is too low (like only 10 people search it a month), even if you rank #1, it won’t bring you much traffic. As one guide put it, ranking first for a keyword no one searches is like setting up a shop in a ghost town. – You won’t get customers because nobody passes by. That said, bigger isn’t always better.
A super high-volume keyword (e.g. “plumber”) is usually very broad and very competitive. Sometimes a medium-volume keyword that’s more specific (“plumber for water heater installation NYC”) can be more valuable to you – it might attract fewer people overall, but the ones searching it exactly need that service, and you have a better chance to rank. Volume gives you an idea of the potential traffic, but you have to balance it with relevance and authority. It’s often smart to target a mix of keyword volumes: some broad terms that many people search, and several specific ones (called long-tail keywords) that fewer people search but are easier to rank for and often indicate a person closer to hiring a plumber.
In summary, whenever you consider a keyword, ask yourself:
The best keywords for you hit the sweet spot of high relevance, achievable competition, and solid search volume. With those elements in mind, let’s look at the different kinds of keywords you might encounter – specifically, the four types of keywords grouped by user intent. Understanding these will further help you empathize with your customer’s mindset when they search.
When we talk about types of keywords, we’re usually referring to search intent – basically, the reason behind the search. In general, search queries fall into four buckets: informational, commercial, transactional, and navigationalclearscope.iolocaliq.com. Let’s break those down with plumbing-related examples, so you can recognize them:
Understanding these four types of keywords helps you tailor your content to the customer’s mindset. If the keyword is informational, don’t jump straight into “Call us now” – first provide value and answers. If it’s transactional, make sure your page makes it super easy to contact you (big phone number, “Schedule Now” button, etc.), because that’s what the user wants. Often, a good SEO strategy covers all these types: you might have blog articles for informational queries, comparison or “why us” pages for commercial queries, strong service pages for transactional queries, and a well-optimized homepage/Google listing for navigational queries.
Alright, now that you know the different categories of keywords and what makes a keyword worth targeting, it’s time to get practical. Let’s walk through a step-by-step guide to actually doing keyword research for a plumbing business in New York. Grab a notepad (or open a spreadsheet) – we’re going to start from brainstorming and end with a solid list of keywords tailored to your business.
So, you’re convinced that keyword research matters. But how do you do it? Let’s break it down into a series of steps that you can follow. We’ll tailor each step to a New York plumber’s perspective, with examples along the way. Whether you’re doing this for your own business or just trying to understand the process, these steps will guide you from zero to a list of targeted keywords.
Start by making a list of what you offer as a plumber. Think in simple terms – especially how a customer would describe your services. For example, your list might include: drain cleaning, faucet repair, water heater installation, sewer line repair, bathroom plumbing, emergency plumber, etc. Also include any specialty or high-value services you provide (maybe tankless water heater installation or commercial plumbing maintenance). Don’t worry about phrasing yet; just get the general topics down.
Now, because you’re in New York, consider if any of your services have local nuances. New York City is huge and diverse – sometimes people search by borough or neighborhood. For instance, “Manhattan plumber”, “Brooklyn drain cleaning”, or “plumber Upper East Side”. If you serve particular areas (Manhattan, Queens, specific neighborhoods), note those down next to the services. Your core topics might then look like: “drain cleaning (NYC, Manhattan, Queens), water heater repair (NYC, Brooklyn),” etc. Essentially, this step is about defining your universe of services and relevant locations.
Put yourself in your customer’s shoes: If you were a homeowner with a given problem, what service would you look for? If your basement is flooding, probably “emergency plumber” or “24/7 plumber near me.” If your hot water is out, maybe “water heater repair.” Try to capture those obvious connections between problem and service. This is the foundation – often called “seed keywords”clearscope.io. They’re the starting keywords from which we’ll expand.
(Pro tip: Check your own website (if you have one) and marketing materials. How do you describe your services there? Also, look at competitors’ sites or Google Business Profile categories for ideas. But generally, as a plumber, you know your services best.)
Next, take each service or topic from Step 1 and think about specific phrases or questions a customer might use related to it. This is where you go from a general topic (“drain cleaning”) to specific, searchable phrases (“how to unclog a drain,” “drain cleaning service near me,” “kitchen sink won’t drain”).
For each item:
At this brainstorming stage, don’t filter yourself. Write down everything that comes to mind. You can also ask your past customers or friends: “Hey, if you had [X problem], what would you type into Google?” Sometimes they’ll come up with phrasings you didn’t consider.
Also, take advantage of free assistance from Google itself: start typing a query into Google and see what Autocomplete suggests. For example, type “water heater repair new” and you might see suggestions like “water heater repair New York cost” or “water heater repair New York City.” Those suggestions are based on real searches by users, so they’re great hints. Similarly, scroll to the bottom of a Google search results page and look at the “Related searches” – those are also user searches that can spark ideasclearscope.io.
Another trick: use the “People Also Ask” box on Google. Search something like “why is my faucet leaking” and see if Google shows a Q&A dropdown with related questions (e.g., “Why does my faucet drip at night?”). These are awesome for finding common questions (and you could even create an FAQ or blog post answering them).
By the end of Step 2, you should have a quite long list of potential keywords – a mix of short phrases, long questions, problem descriptions, and service+location combos. Don’t worry that it’s messy or unrefined. The next steps will refine this into a targeted list.
Now, let’s bring in some free keyword research tools to expand and verify our list. You don’t have to spend money; there are plenty of tools that can help you discover new keywords and see their search volumes. Here are a few steps using free resources:
Using these tools, you’ll want to expand your list (they will give new ideas) and also start to get a feel for which keywords are most popular and which are less so. For instance, you might discover:
Make note of the search volume (even if it’s a rough range) for your keywords. This will help in the next step when prioritizing. Also look at any difficulty or competition metrics the tools provide (Keyword Planner’s “competition” is for ads, but if it says “High” that usually means lots of advertisers – an indicator the term is lucrative; SEO tools like Moz or Ahrefs have their own difficulty scores).
By the end of Step 3, you probably have a huge list of keywords now, maybe even dozens or hundreds. That’s good – we’ll narrow it down soon. Remember, it’s better to have too many ideas and filter down than to miss a great opportunity.
Now you have data – let’s make sense of it. Analyzing competition means looking at who’s currently ranking for the keywords you want and deciding if you can realistically outrank them (or at least rank alongside them) with your content and website authority. It’s also about understanding the search intent better by seeing what types of pages are ranking.
Take some of your top keywords (maybe the ones with the highest volume or the ones you feel are most valuable) and search for them on Google:
After surveying the competition, refine your keyword list:
By aligning keywords to specific pages, you ensure your site structure and content cover everything without overlapping too much.
In this step, you’re effectively trimming your list to the keywords that you will actually use and optimize for. The result might be a dozen or two core keywords (spread across pages), plus some additional ones for blog ideas. That’s plenty for a small business to start with.
Finding keywords is half the battle. Now you need to use those keywords effectively on your website so that search engines can associate your site with them. This step is about on-page SEO – integrating keywords naturally into your site’s content and technical elements.
For each target keyword (or group of closely related keywords), do the following:
After implementing your keywords site-wide, monitor the results. Give search engines a few weeks to a couple of months to fully register changes (SEO is a slow burn, not instant). You can track your rankings manually or use tools, but an easy free way is to check Google Search Console: it will show the average position of your pages for various queries. You should start seeing impressions (views in search results) for the keywords you targeted, and hopefully climbing positions. If some keywords aren’t moving up at all, you might need to re-evaluate if the competition is too strong or if your content is missing the mark.
The bottom line for Step 5 is: turn your research into action. A keyword on a list does nothing for you until it’s strategically placed on your site where Google can find it and users can see it. The good news is, by aligning your site with what people search, you’re also generally improving the site’s usefulness. You’re answering the questions they have and using the language they use – which improves user experience and conversion.
Now that your website is optimized with your newfound keywords, let’s equip you with some additional tools to maintain and expand your keyword strategy without spending a fortune.
You don’t need expensive software to start doing keyword research. There are several free tools and methods that provide plenty of insight for a local business like a plumbing company. We’ve mentioned a couple earlier, but here’s a handy list of some of the best free keyword research tools and what they’re good for (so you can choose the ones that fit your style):
All these tools can be used in combination. There’s no rule that you must stick to one. Many SEO professionals use multiple tools to cross-verify data (since none of them are perfectly accurate, it’s like getting a second opinion). And for a local business, free tools often provide more than enough data to act on.
One tip: keep notes or a spreadsheet of what you find. Over time, you might revisit keyword research, and having your past notes on volumes or ideas is helpful. You may notice that some search terms are growing or shrinking in popularity year over year via Google Trends or Search Console data, which could influence your marketing (e.g., “smart home plumbing” queries rising might encourage you to blog about integrating plumbing with Alexa or whatnot).
With these tools at your disposal, you can research new services you might add or just keep refining your SEO. For instance, if next year you decide to start offering water filtration system installation, you can run it through these steps and tools to quickly gather the best keywords to target for that new service page.
By now, we’ve started with why keyword research matters (so your plumbing business in New York can be found by the right people at the right time), we’ve explained what it is (finding and using the words real people search for), and we’ve gone through how to do it step by step. The key takeaway is that keyword research is about understanding your customer. It’s speaking their language online, so that when they have a problem – whether it’s a leaky faucet or a busted water heater in the dead of winter – your website is there with the solution.
For a plumber in New York, this guide isn’t just theory. It’s meant to be actionable. You can literally follow the steps: brainstorm, use free tools, see what people search in your boroughs, and then tweak your website accordingly. The payoff can be huge: more visibility on Google, more traffic to your site, and ultimately more calls and customers. In the competitive Big Apple market, this can be a big differentiator. Many plumbing businesses are still not fully optimized for the web – by investing a little time in keyword research, you’re leapfrogging those who rely purely on word-of-mouth or outdated Yellow Pages listings.
Remember, SEO (search engine optimization) is a journey, not a one-time task. Keep an eye on trends and update your keywords or content as needed. Perhaps new technology emerges (like “smart water heaters”) and suddenly people start searching for that – you’ll want to catch that wave. Or Google’s algorithms might shift to favor different content formats (for example, videos or FAQs). But what will remain constant is the principle of answering the questions people are asking. If you stay tuned in to your customers’ needs (which is essentially what keyword research enables you to do), you’ll always have a solid foundation for your online strategy.
In essence, start with why – and the “why” here is serving your customers and growing your business. By understanding the words your customers use, you’re not just doing SEO, you’re improving your overall communication and marketing strategy. It’s similar to how you’d talk to a client in person: you listen to their problem, then use terms they understand to explain the fix. Online, you’ve listened (through keyword research) to what people are searching, and now your website speaks to those issues clearly.
So, take this guide and start applying it. Pick one of your main services, do a quick keyword brainstorm and tool search, and see what you find. You might be surprised – maybe you discover that “24 hour plumber NYC” is insanely popular, or that lots of folks search for “eco-friendly plumber New York” (if green plumbing is something you offer, that’s a niche to capitalize on). Use those insights to tweak your site, and keep an eye on your Google rankings over the next few months.
With consistent effort, you’ll likely see your pages climb up the search results for your targeted keywords. And when that happens, you’ll know – because your phone will start ringing more, and you might hear customers say, “I found you on Google.” That’s the direct result of smart keyword research and good content.
Here’s to making your plumbing business easily found and chosen by customers all across New York!
Suggested Meta Title: Keyword Research for Plumbers in New York – Why It Matters & How to Do It
Suggested Meta Description: New York plumbers attract more customers with smart keyword research. Learn what it is, why it matters, and get a step-by-step guide with free tools and examples.
