Optimizing for Lawyer vs Attorney Words
-
With Hummingbird update, my client's personal injury lawyer site went from very good positions for top terms in Google to oblivion. The site had primary landing pages for parallel terms such as "dog bite lawyer" and "dog bite attorney", among other.
He does work in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, so we focus on key phrases for both "Philadelphia dog bite lawyer" and "Pennsylvania dog bite lawyer" etc.
I've decided to investigate siloing more deeply, but am unsure whether Google now considers attorney searches to be the same as lawyer searches, which would mean we would silo for "Pennsylvania" and "Philadelphia" not "Attorney" and "Lawyer".
Any real world experience in this anyone? Thanks
-
I read an article that explains a little bit more on what you are addressing here: link removed by admin
-
Thanks Cyrus. I guess I really should not have written any thing but the word SILO!
The entire first part of my discussion item was for background and example. I simply stated that I was "unsure if Google treated them the same". My question is discussed in the third paragraph and located in the fourth paragraph (if readers would pay close attention -- tip, a question mark at the end of sentence means it is a question) and is whether or not anyone has real, tested, experience that would indicate that it makes sense to Silo for the two terms by creating two separate silos.
That said, I have gotten the opinion from Danny Sullivan directly that he believes (and I'm paraphrasing) that Google has long treated the two as synonyms and that there should be no need to silo.
And (to your points Cyrus), I agree as long as the pages have unique content there should be no "penalty", which I always do anyway. That is simple SEO 101, but I include it for future generations reading this thread
-
I don't have any real world experience with these terms, but if I understand correctly, your asking if Google is treating the intent of "lawyer" and "attorney" as the same.
The only way I know to investigate is to search Google for similar terms, like Seattle Lawyer and Seattle Attorney. If we do this for a dozen searches there seems to be some overlap of intent, but it's certainly not 100%.
That said, I think Google would interpret "dog bite lawyer" and "dog bite attorney" as pretty darn close semantic matches, which if overdone could lead to a Panda, duplicate content like situation. I'd probably try to target these terms on the same page, and consolidate my unique content as much as possible.
Hope this helps! Best of luck.
-
Hi JCDenver,
Hang in there. I've asked for extra help from our staff on your question. It could be that the way it was originally phrased has caused some confusion, but you have provided good details and I do hope you'll get a helpful answer soon. Thanks for your patience!
-
Do tell what is clear then...
I see a mix of results, and without all the other variables that go into the rankings, they look just like the results I used to get when I optimized the two terms as separate terms. Sometimes Google showed my attorney keyphrase searches as the home page that was optimized for lawyer. Sometimes they showed it for lawyer.
-
Our primary key phrase for the site is "Philadelphia dog bite lawyer"... has only tangential relationship to the reference of "Philadelphia lawyer" historic meaning. Again, please focus on the actual question please.
-
Maybe you should explain in more detail?
On a tangent..... You know that "Philadelphia Lawyer" is an ancient term with very different meaning that "Philadelphia Attorney"?
-
Hi JCDenver,
I'm sorry I misunderstood your question. Let me ping our other staff members for you to see if anyone has experimented with this. I hope you will receive an on-target answer.
-
I thought that you got a really good answer, and if you do those two searches and compare side by site... the answer is pretty clear.
-
I'm not referring to Local. I am asking about siloing a website.
-
It is not what I was asking.
-
Hi JCDenver,
First, I want to zone in on your statement about the Hummingbird Update. When I think of this in connection with Local SEO and lost rankings, the first thing that springs to mind is this situation:
http://blumenthals.com/blog/2014/01/08/mining-for-google-hummingbird-guano-in-so-cal/
Are you talking about this? Have the results for your target city morphed into a single one-box for a spammy listing? Wanted to ask about this first.
Regarding lawyer vs. attorney, the important thing to find out is how your regional audience searches. Lawyer vs. Attorney is a classic example of this, as apparently, people in different parts of the US prefer one keyword over another. See the comments from Linda Buquet on this post regarding this:
http://searchengineland.com/google-merges-insights-for-search-with-google-trends-134629
This would be something you would need to further investigate, as it has become a bit harder to surface these regional differences. Hope this gets you started.
-
This might seem like a super simplified answer but just google the terms you're concerned about and that should answer your question as to how google is treating certain KWs. Use an incognito window to do so or read up more technical ways http://moz.com/blog/face-off-4-ways-to-de-personalize-google. De personalizing will allow you to see a better picture of how the terms get treated.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Optimizing Site for Multiple Business Services
I am currently optimizing for a site that does a ton of services:
Algorithm Updates | | ccdispoto
Web Development
Logo Design
SEO
Copywriting
Social Media
Email Marketing
PPC Marketing Is it better practice to optimize one "Services" page for multiple keywords or to break each service onto its own unique URL and optimize each page individually?0 -
Optimal SSL Solution?
I am in the process of moving all of my client's websites to HTTPS. I have a client with an SSL certificate through GoDaddy for an e-commerce site, and my host WP Engine offers them for $50/year each. This has been fine, but now I am trying to move about a dozen sites over and I'm just trying to figure out the best, most ideal way possible to do this. I could just go through WP Engine and pay them for the certificates, but after doing research on different SSL providers, I've totally confused myself. I have seen a wide range of prices for certificates, but I can't tell if it's just BS or there is actual value. I'm talking about a $10 certificate vs a $250 certificate through Symantec. Aside from that, I have found a few different types of certificates: single domain certificates, wild-card certificates for subdomains, and a multi-domain certificate. I would love to buy one multi-domain certificate that covers all of my websites - but I'm not sure what the pros and cons are of doing this, specifically in regards to SEO. Can anyone explain what the pros and cons are for these in my specific situation? I'd love to hear any recommendations for my situation, and if there is something else I am missing that is important, please share!
Algorithm Updates | | Millermore0 -
Wordpress Speed Optimization Inquiry
Hello, I am curious to know everyones thoughts on speed optimization for wordpress. I currently use the w3 total cache plugin and was considering adding a CDN like cloudflare. Does anyone have any experiences with utilizing both of these two together? What works best for you?
Algorithm Updates | | WebServiceConsulting.com0 -
Does word order matter for exact match bonus?
Hello, For a two word search does order of the two words matter to get the exact match seo bonus? For example, would matchexact.com get the same SEO bonus as exactmatch.com? I Googled many two word searches reversing the word order and I got the exact same search results suggesting order does not matter (yes I am assuming people are just doing a broad search) Thoughts? Thanks!
Algorithm Updates | | max20120 -
Bing Vs Google SERP
I realize the major search engines use different criteria but I don't see how - for the same home page keyword - my site could rank #3 on page 1 for a Bing search and be off the charts (Page 15+)? on Google. Has Google gone so far off the charts with their new Penguins and Pandas so as to be in a different universe? Seems Google is now extremely over-weighting big sites like Wikipedia, WebMD, eHow, etc. and in doing so vastly reducing the diversity of results shown. I am commonly seeing different pages of the same website appear multiple times in the first 2-3 pages of Google results. What's the point?
Algorithm Updates | | veezer0 -
CPC vs Competition.....
what relation does CPC and Competition have? i intend to purchase some high CPC domains, so i want to know what relation exists between CPC and Competition? should i always consider high CPC domains as highly competitive domains or they does have dependance on each other?
Algorithm Updates | | parallelseo0 -
Top 5 most optimized websites
Throwing this question out to the community but was wondering if anyone can direct me on how I can find the top 5 or 10 ten sites that have been most optimized for search engines. Meaning which web sites have the best reputation when it comes to website optimization for search engines or is there a resource where I can read about websites that have been ranked as the best when it comes to following best practices and have constantly ranked well within their industry? Figured it's always a good idea to learn from the best by looking at what they are doing. Thank you.
Algorithm Updates | | DRTBA2 -
Organic ranking vs Local ranking
After reading this blog entry from Dr Pete on Mirametrix, my question would be:
Algorithm Updates | | echo1
What's more important for a local company, being in the 7 pack or in the top 10 organic results? Which one attracts more clicks? Is the optimization for local ranking just became more important than the traditional SEO?0