Your practice region is the location or locations where you practice law. It may be something that you do not usually think about except when determining your keyphrases. So take some time to focus on how expansive you want your practice region to be.

At first, you may think at the state level. This is appropriate if you live in Connecticut or any other state where the two opposite corners are only 120 miles apart.

However, in a state like Texas, California, Colorado, Florida, and so on, you probably want to stick to your metro area unless you have offices to serve the entire state. Plus, the state may actually get less search traffic.

To give you an example, we will use the rather popular practice area of bankruptcy. Then we will pick the fifth most populated state, Illinois. Using the Google keyword tool, we will demonstrate the difference in search volume between state and metro searches.

Keyphrase: Illinois bankruptcy lawyer

Approximate Search Volume: 4,400

What Google is telling us above is that their search engine receives 4,400 searches for the keyphrase “Illinois bankruptcy lawyer” each month.

Now, we will drop the state and use a major metro area.

Keyphrase: Chicago bankruptcy lawyer

Approximate Search Volume: 6,600

So Google receives 2,200 more searches each month for the term “Chicago bankruptcy lawyer”. That is clearly the better keyphrase to use.

By targeting your closest metro area, you will be able to attract a more targeted client base, a local client base, and get more exposure.

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