Try shortening the phrases and including the city and let the G keyword tool suggest phrases. And try the word 'car' instead of 'auto'.

If you want a "one time client" then yeah "shoot". Otherwise analize the keywords for your client, see where the potential is, and work on that. As John mentioned, don't use only auto, use as well car or vehicle etc..analyze the keywords again and start working from there.

OK... thanks for the good suggestions.

John:
Yes, I did try "car" in the place of "auto" in some of my searches... I tried a LOT of different terms. I think the problem is that people don't really search for claims adjusters - they usually go through their insurance company - although they have the option of finding their own.

Trapped:
The reason I said "shoot for general auto insurance terms" is because he could still get good prospects from some of those terms since they both deal with the auto insurance industry.

Jessica:
Good question... I hope there aren't companies out there doing that - I don't want to be one of them, which is what prompted this thread. The last thing I want is an angry client. LOL

Morgan:
Yes, that's what I was thinking... I'm not going to take it if there are no profitable keyword terms. I tried some of the longtail, but they're not getting any volume either... not LOCALLY at least.

I probably need Market Samurai or some type of software to drill down into the local longtail keywords huh?

Thanks for your feedback and I'll keep researching to see what I can come up with!

I typed "Claims Adjuster" into Google's Keyword Tool, and got keywords that have lots of search volume.
For example: (these are local results)
Insurance claims-135,000
Public adjusters -9,900
Public adjuster -14,800
Insurance adjuster -40,500
Claims adjusting -5,400
Claim adjusters -33,100
Insurance claims adjuster -4,400

Along the same lines as vndnbrgj is saying, put those generic (no geo modifier) keywords through some other Google tools as well. I like using Google Trends and Insights (not sure if they are one in the same now, haven't used in a bit). Then you can throw the generic terms through Google Wonderwheel and see if you get anymore.

Then there are independent sites like: lsikeywords.com and keywordfinder.org etc...

Unless your client is located in a very rural area with a very low population, your client should see some targeted traffic if you are targeting all those generic keywords you come up with and adding your specific geographic context to them onpage and offpage.

Saying all that though, it is very true he might NOT receive any significant local GOOD traffic/new clients. To me though, some people might be searching those terms to compare services/prices and what not if they aren't going through their own insurance at the very least looking for more education on the process (there's your lead gen). With multiple high rankings for the basic generic keywords accompanied by your geo modifier, he should pull in something in my opinion. Not sure how much he makes off the process, are they salary, etc?

Maybe give this one a test run. Lower your fee or give him a trial or something. Even if you did all the work and got ranking and found the client didn't want it or that the local traffic is simply not enough to justify an adequate monthly fee, you could always throw some Adsense and/or CPA stuff on there and let it earn for another month or so then flip it....insurance terms tend to make A LOT per click in my experience, so you don't need many clicks to make a few bucks a day.

Hope that helps a bit,

- Jim

How does your client currently get their customers? What are listed under in the yellow pages? How does someone go about finding a claims adjuster? What problem are they looking to have solved?

Not every business can be served by local SEO. Sometimes you need to use other tactics to find them business. Do you only provide SEO or a full marketing service?

MsMotivation1 how'd it go?