Local SEO is a strategy that search engine experts use to optimize sites for a specific region. You can make your business more visible within the area through localized SEO. This helps small businesses and service providers outrank large enterprises in search results on Google.
If done right, local SEO can help you generate traffic and leads in no time. You can create brand awareness and establish yourself as an authority in your industry. Common tasks associated with local SEO include:
- Finding local keywords
- Optimizing Google My Business profile, and
- Building “NAP (name, address, and phone) citations
However, there is more than meets the eye when it comes to localized SEO. But before we talk about how local SEO works, let’s clarify why it’s so crucial for a business.
Why Is Local SEO Important?
The world has become a global village and today’s consumers search online for their queries. In fact, 90% of people prefer to browse the web to find relevant services or products. And that’s not it. According to HubSpot, 46% of all searches in Google are associated with local intent. It means nearly half of the searchers are looking for businesses that are closer to them.
This means local search engine optimization can help you get:
Better Online Visibility
Localized SEO puts your brand in front of the audience when they are looking for similar businesses. For example, your fast food restaurant will be the first option that pops up on Google when people nearby search for pizza or burgers. Similarly, if you offer legal advisory services, people who search for legal help online will be more willing to visit you.
So, in a way, your business gets better online visibility and you get more leads.
Quality Lead Generation
For small local businesses, nothing is more frustrating than an unqualified lead. Taking care of visitors who aren’t interested in your services or products is a total waste of time. But with proper localized SEO, your small business can weed out irrelevant traffic. With the right local SEO strategy, you can ensure that your business is only visible to the right kind of people. Paul Hoda, an SEO expert in London, agrees that SEO is crucial in the realm of digital advertising.
Your brand will appear online when customers search for relevant queries. This will increase the targeted web traffic while boosting quality lead generation.
Tap Into the Shopping Boom
One of the many benefits of local SEO is that it can increase in-store foot traffic. But we are witnessing a rising trend in online shopping. Instead of visiting a store, people now tend to order online. This is not a shocking development, especially after the pandemic, but a drift.
What’s more interesting is that consumers are more willing to buy from local stores rather than large brands. But you cannot reach out to these local customers without a strong online presence. This is where local SEO can help you strengthen your digital footprint.
More Calls and Visits
We have already discussed that local SEO helps businesses sell online. The same can be said for businesses that sell services. People will start noticing you when you put your services business online and improve its local SEO. You can easily add your address, contact number, and website on Google Maps.
The service helps people find destinations and services around them. So when you have a registered business on Maps, it’ll ultimately generate leads. Customers in need will visit you in person or make calls inquiring about your services or products.
Build Trust Level
It’s an open secret that customers tend to read reviews before shopping for something or hiring someone online. Reviews are a big decision factor for many people that builds trust. The more reviews a business has, the better reputation and visibility it’ll enjoy online. Even with a strong local presence, you cannot attract visitors if your business doesn’t have strong reviews to display.
Reviews work like a secret ingredient for local businesses and service providers. On one hand, reviews approve of your authority while on the other hand, they display higher levels of consumer trust.
How to Improve Local SEO
Now that you know the benefits of local SEO, let’s move on to the crucial part. Yes, we will talk about how to do local SEO and rank local SEO. There are several strategies and ways to improve localized search rankings. However, we are only going to discuss the most important ones.
Claim Your Business Profile
This is the very first thing that you need to do in order to improve local SEO. Google Business Profile (formerly known as Google My Business or GMB) is of critical importance. You can easily create it by yourself and it’s totally free. You can give it a personal touch by customizing the profile with images, posts, offers, and more.
Collect Customer Reviews
We have already highlighted the significance of reviews for local search engine optimization. Reviews from reviews buyers indicate that you are a reliable, trustworthy business. But they also work as social signals and strengthen your localized SEO. They kind of act like approval stamps and Google also tends to rank businesses that have more reviews.
However, more is not always better because you need reviews from a variety of sources (customers). The best way is to reach out to your loyal customers and ask them to drop positive reviews about you.
Do Local Link Building
If you are familiar with SEO, you already know how powerful backlinks are for an online business. However, you need links from local websites for local search engine optimization. This means getting citations from directories within your region and high DA magazines. We recommend you target high authority domains that are from the same region (country, province, or district).
Takeaway Words
We hope you now have a better understanding of local SEO. The benefits of localized SEO are immense if you know how to rank local SEO. You can stand out from the crows within your local region by improving it. It can help you generate high traffic and quality leads, and can also greatly boost your revenues.
In case you are unaware of local SEO, contact an expert SEO agency like Brandsterz. We can help you rank on the top pages of Google in minimum time and with less budget.