Local SEO should be considered an integral component of any business with physical locations or services that reach specific geographic regions. Similar to traditional SEO techniques, local SEO incorporates factors like Google My Business, citations and reviews into its formula.
Consumers rely heavily on reviews when choosing local services or businesses, and having access to the appropriate customer reputation management tool can help businesses identify valuable local keywords.
Keyword Research
Local Search Engine Optimization (Local SEO) involves optimizing your online presence for keywords used by searchers in your locality to locate businesses like yours online. This differs from traditional SEO, where the goal is optimizing for terms that people search for when looking to buy specific products or services from you.
Keyword research is key for identifying which keywords are most relevant for your local business. To do so, analyze website analytics and review user queries on Google My Business as well as participate in regional online forums, social media groups, or community platforms so as to better understand your target audience’s language and search terms.
Ubersuggest, SEMrush and Answer the Public are great tools to use when brainstorming local search terms and gathering ideas for relevant search terms. Include service descriptions and mentions of specific locations as part of your local keyword list in order to capture more searches that might apply.
On-Page Optimization
At its core, SEO Local involves optimizing website content for search engines. This involves making sure pages contain relevant keywords and are structured in such a way as to be easily searchable by search engines; and also avoiding keyword stuffing or using unnatural language that might cause Google to penalize your site.
On-page optimization is one of the most cost-effective strategies for increasing organic traffic. Plus, its implementation requires little technical know-how or expertise – making it ideal for local business marketing strategies.
Utilizing the appropriate tools is key to keeping your local SEO efforts on track and improving results over time. A site audit tool such as Semrush can assist with this effort by highlighting pages with potential for improvement; similarly, a business listing management platform like Listly allows you to manage listings across major online directories while collecting reviews as well. By increasing your visibility in local search, your chances of attracting qualified customers or clients increase accordingly.
Local Business Listings
Business listings are an essential element of local SEO strategies, and must remain consistent across directories and platforms. Any deviation can lead to poor user experiences and may cause search engines to mistrust your company altogether. A clean and up-to-date business listing is an effective way of starting local SEO efforts and increasing visibility on SERPs.
Local business listings provide online references to a company’s name, address and phone number even without linking back to its website. Therefore it is crucial that businesses manage their listings themselves so that any incorrect data does not spread onto other websites and damage a brand’s reputation, leading consumers to contact competitors instead of the business in question – leading to revenue losses for both. Furthermore, providing accurate and up-to-date information improves customer experiences, increases brand loyalty, and results in higher conversion rates and revenue generation.
Social Media
Social media can play a pivotal role in local SEO by giving your target audience a platform for sharing their experiences with your business, which helps search engines recognize you as an appropriate result for user queries. Encourage followers to include the NAP (business name, address and phone number) of their posts if applicable – social media posts help bring business in from all directions!
Social media can also assist your efforts to optimize your Google Business Profile to rank higher on Google Maps, directly impacting how many calls and visits come through as a result of searching Google. Google uses customer reviews and star ratings from your profile as one of its key indicators when assessing relevance and distance in local search results.
Recent studies reveal that consumers are shifting their spending preferences in favor of small, independent businesses over brand name offerings or experiences, making local SEO strategies even more crucial than before. To compete in today’s environment it is imperative that your local SEO efforts focus on local searches.