The stability of lanthanide complexes and the efficiency of the energy transfer process, which makes these molecules interesting materials for technological applications, are correlated to the chemical environment surrounding the metal ion. In particular the efficiency depends on the relative position of the antenna (the ligand moiety that acts as photon absorption center) and the lanthanide ion (the emitting center), while the stability of the complex is correlated to the strength of the coordination between the rare earth and the ligands. For these reasons, knowledge of the structural properties of the complex is an interesting task to achieve. Since a large number of ligand structures hold the carboxylate group (COO-), which is used as an anchor for binding the antennae to the lanthanide ion, in this work we will show how the vibrational shifts of this group, induced by the interactions between the carboxylate moiety and the metal center of the lanthanide complex, can be used for obtaining in a simple way information on the structure of the chemical environment surrounding the lanthanide ion.