If you serve your local community on a face-to-face basis, then you need local SEO to increase your search visibility online.
Whether you own a bricks and mortar business such as a retail store or dentist’s office or you work as a service business such as a contractor or cleaner in a particular location, local SEO practices including local listings and local citations are vital for both boosting your ranking and driving footfall to your store.
However, due to a lack of Google guidelines, many businesses do not understand how to go about local SEO and avoid it altogether.
If this is the case for you and your business, the below guide is exactly what you need.
Keep reading to discover:
- What is local SEO?
- How does local SEO work?
- How to create local listings?
- Why should you audit local listings?
- How to boost your local listings
What is local SEO?
If you have already embraced SEO as a part of your overall digital marketing strategy, you will be pleased to hear that local SEO offers much faster and tangible results.
In a nutshell, local SEO refers to the process of optimizing your online presence to attract more customers from relevant local searches.
When considering how to go about local SEO, it is important to remember that this is not all about Google. Consumers also use other popular search engines such as Yahoo, Bing, Yelp, and Apple Maps to find out about local businesses.
That being said, Google does have an estimated market share of 87% in the United States when it comes to searching for local businesses, so they are the major player in all things local.
Local SEO includes a variety of SEO techniques, including keywords and paid advertising, to maximize your chances of ranking on the first page of SERPs.
How does local SEO work?
To better understand how local SEO works, you need to grasp the terminology used when talking about local listings.
Local Citations
A local citation is any online mention of the name, address, and phone number of a local business. You can find citations on local business directories, on company websites, and on social media profiles.
Local citations are incredibly useful in helping users find local businesses. Plus, they have the added benefit of improving your local search engine rankings.
NAP
NAP simply stands for name, address, and phone number. As mentioned above, these three pieces of information about your business should be on every local citation to ensure maximum online visibility for your local business.
Local listings
Essentially the same as local citations, you can create local listings in directories that specifically cater to your local area or in industry-led sites such as Yelp.
What are the benefits of local listings?
If you are a local business, you can enjoy many benefits from publishing local listings online, both in terms of your user experience and your rankings on Google.
These benefits include:
- A significant boost in your online presence
- Enhanced reputation
- Increased trust in your business
- A platform for customer feedback and sharing
- Higher rankings than your competitors
- Free online advertising via online directories such as Google My Business (more on this below)
- Improved organic SEO
How to create local listings
When creating local listings, you need to think about the content of the listing itself and where you should place them.
For optimal results, make sure that you:
Keep your listings consistent
The simplest way to put off local customers and search engines is by having ununiform, incorrect, or incomplete local listings. 68% of consumers would stop using a local business if they found incomplete information in an online directory. Instead, make sure that every one of your local citations is the same, with no discrepancies in content and formatting.
Check existing listings
Google does not look favorably upon businesses that create a new listing when they already have one published. Make sure you search all old addresses, phone numbers, and variations to see if you have any existing listings on all the major online directories.
Where to start local listings
If you do not have any existing local listings, either because you are a new business or you have not embraced local SEO until now, there are several places that you can publish your listings for maximum exposure.
These include:
Google My Business
Arguably the most influential online local business directory available to you, Google My Business is a free tool that allows you to complete a full business profile online that will show up when users search for your business or business type.
Ensure that you add as much information as possible to your listing and include photos and reviews if you can.
You can create a local listing on Facebook Business in just five simple steps and enjoy the benefits of having your business listed on the biggest social networking site that 2.60 billion monthly active users visit.
You can also link your Facebook listing to other social media sites for even more local exposure.
Yelp
Yelp is the ideal directory for businesses within the leisure industry and is the third most popular review site on the Internet. If you are a relatively small local business, this online directory can help you grow your local reach.
Yellow pages
Yellowpages.com, or YP.com as it is now known, is the perfect online directory for local businesses such as tradespeople, attorneys, dentists, and so much more.
Local directories
As well as making sure you are listed on all the well-known online directories above, it can also be beneficial to search for local directories that directly apply to your business type or industry.
Be sure to look for local directories within your area and industry-specific ones, both of which can help your local SEO efforts.
How to audit local listings?
As briefly touched upon earlier in the guide, before you get started creating new local listings, you first need to check to see if you have any existing ones. If you do, these need to be audited as soon as possible to make sure that they are up to date and do not contain any conflicting information.
Specifically, for Google My Business, duplicate content can potentially destroy any local SEO campaign you have, so you need to make sure you do not have multiple listings. If you do find more than one listing, record the URLs and delete them.
How to boost your local listings
As well as publishing your listings on local directories, there are other ways to boost your local SEO efforts and improve your overall ranking.
These include:
- Get your business featured or mentioned on local news sites, magazines, and blog posts.
- Respond to any online reviews quickly and politely and look for ways to earn more positive reviews.
- Optimize your site for voice search, which is a vital component in local searches.
- Invest in local keywords
- Create location pages on your website
Conclusion
Local SEO does not have to be a daunting process. It should be an exciting one for your business, enabling you to capitalize on your community ties and grow your presence online.
However, if you feel like you need a little helping hand, an SEO agency specializing in local SEO can make sure that your business is taking advantage of every tactic and technique on offer to maximize your chances of local success.
