Any business that has a physical presence can benefit from local SEO used in that particular geographic area. Local SEO is a strategy used so that the business is more visible on local search listings. If you have a clothing store in a particular area, people residing in the area will get to know about it through word-of-mouth or advertising. But if someone were to search for clothing stores in the town online, local SEO services ensure that your business lands on those search results.
Why Do You Need Local SEO Services?
If your business doesn’t land on the local search results, that could mean a loss in traffic and customers to your business. That is when local SEO services come into the picture and help small businesses compete with businesses that are on a higher level. While national SEO focuses on rankings throughout the country, local SEO services focus more on SERPs.
It is a fact that without local SEO, companies would lose out on a significant amount of traffic, conversions, and leads from your pool of local customers. Here are 10 ways to boost local SEO ranking with the help of the best SEO services.
Create and update your Google My Business listings
Every day, users and searchers are dependent on Google for business listings with correct information. Use the right name, address, and phone number for your Google My Business account. Include a brief description of the nature of your business. Keep the logo attractive and the entire layout appealing to the searcher. Use high-quality and professional shots of your products, your store, and maybe your staff too. Keep updating your account so that potential customers can contact you.
Attain reviews from happy customers
Positive reviews are of paramount importance to the business. If your customers leave a positive review or a thank you review, it will go beyond any local SEO tactic. When a searcher comes across your page and sees 5-star reviews for your business, he/she will be more inclined to buy from that from any other store as reviews play a key role in building trust and confidence. With this, you’re not only optimizing your ranking but also your clickthrough rate and conversion rate.
Create local content
Nothing can grab a local’s attention more than content that is related to a local issue. You can write blogs, cover local news stories, or update them about upcoming events. You can create videos of your business covering different locations of the city or charity events. Keep your local customers in the loop and make your business accessible to them.
Having an active presence on social media can get you the traffic that your business needs. Sometimes, social media is more impactful than any other marketing strategy as most of the population is heavily dependent on the digital world now. Using the best local SEO services, you can optimize all your social media handles on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and more. Include photographs of your products and client testimonials on the main page to grab more attention.
Embrace more local keywords in your content
Keywords have proven to be effective over the years for SEO optimization. So for the local market, using local keywords makes sense right? Using Google’s Keyword Planner, you can filter keyword search based on the location and get to know the popular search words for a given geographical area. Once you have a list of the locally relevant keywords, include more of them in your content, meta description, and URLs.
Add location pages to your website
Location pages are more important when you have more than one physical presence in the area. These pages should include your name, phone number, address, store hours, and testimonial. Attach Google maps pages to each physical presence so that people can reach easily.
Make yourself known on Online Business Directories
Online business directories like the YellowPages not only help in gaining visibility but will also boost local SEO. The details of name, address, phone number should be consistent throughout all online directories you’re in. Provide a thorough description of your business and include a backlink to your website.
Create high-quality backlinks
Create high-quality content so that people would want a link to your website. Engage with local influencers or use social media to get them to link back to you. Use guest blogs of exceptional quality to get more links. These links get you the best organic results locally.
Make sure your website is mobile-friendly
With access to the entire world in one’s palm, you do not want anyone to miss your website right? There are more mobile visits to websites than there used to be for desktop visits. Having a mobile-optimized website can be a key player in the game. Ensure that your website loads quickly within 3 seconds. Any delay here and people will shift to another website. Use bigger fonts so it is easy on the eyes. Any image or text, use them sparingly.
Social listening may not be the apt local SEO tactic but its benefits are many. In social listening, you can go and check for what the local customers are saying. They may complain about a lack of outdoor spaces and you can use this to create an outdoor space just like they want. Mentioning this on your social media handles and your online guides can boost your local SEO services.
Local SEO Services: Gaining More Importance Than Ever
SEO tactics keep changing as the years go by due to different industries coming up and due to the advancement of the internet. With the help of these 10 ways, you can always be prepared for what comes next for your business. And that is why you need to hire the best SEO services so that you can always be on top of your local SEO game.