What if Funeral Home Keywords Change?

Keywords are an important part of online marketing, which means you’re probably putting some effort into them. But if you’re not proactively planning for keyword trends to change, you’re setting yourself up for future funeral home marketing failure.

You undoubtedly know the Benjamin Franklin quote about nothing being certain except death and taxes. And while that saying has stood the test of time across more than two centuries, it doesn’t mean that death and taxes haven’t changed. Deathcare providers know better than anyone that the industry has evolved and continues to do so. And as far as taxes go, the IRS didn’t even exist until more than 70 years after Franklin’s death.

With even death and taxes seeing flux through the years, no one should be surprised that keyword trends change. Afterall, the trends that tell you which keywords are likely to land you high on SERPs or connect your pages with the right audience are driven by the people. And people, along with their cultures, interests, and technologies, evolve.

Some Current Evolutions in Funeral Home Keywords
Keyword trends change for a variety of reasons. Sometimes, it’s a temporary context change due to news cycles or fads. For example, in the spring of 2020, keywords across all types of industries skewed heavily toward those related to COVID-19.

At other times, changes in keyword trends reflect a cultural or technological shift. A good example relates to voice search, which is expected to account for around half of all online searches by the end of this year. Voice search changes keyword trends because the way people speak isn’t the same as how they type.

Steps for Staying Current With Keyword Trends
Funeral homes that want to remain competitive with online marketing must understand the current landscape of keyword trends, which means:

1. Doing regular keyword research. Look at what’s showing up in Google and what people are asking in the People Also Ask section. Use keyword research tools such as the Google Ads Keyword Planner or paid services such as SEMrush. Or, pay an expert funeral home marketing firm to keep up with keywords for you.
2. Consider keyword changes. Are these trends relevant to your firm, audience, and content? Do you think the trends are so temporary they’re not worth chasing, or should your content address them?
3. Incorporate keywords. If the keywords are worthy, incorporate them into your content and advertising. You can create new content that address the keywords or tweak existing content that comes close already to include these new keywords.

What you can’t do is assume keyword work is one-and-done. Come back to the table periodically to make sure your funeral home online marketing still connects with searchers.