How to Optimize Your Website For Local SEO In 10 Easy Steps
Your website serves as the hub for consumers to learn about your local business, but is it reaching its full potential? Many business owners may be missing out on potential customers due to various issues that all tie back to local SEO.
Optimizing your website for local SEO is essential for expanding your reach and increasing visibility within your community. There are several effective ways to accomplish this, but first, let’s clarify what local SEO is.
What Is Local SEO?
Local SEO is the process of optimizing your online presence to rank higher in search results for users in your geographic area. Unlike traditional website SEO, local SEO focuses on enhancing your traffic, search visibility, and brand awareness in a defined community.
These elements are critical, as BrightLocal’s 2023 Local Consumer Review Survey found that 98% of customers use the internet to find information about local businesses.
These users are often ready to take action and are more likely to purchase from businesses they can easily find online. By improving your visibility, you can drive more traffic to your site and convert more of that traffic into paying customers.
Follow these 10 steps to strengthen your local SEO and help your business thrive.
- Claim and Enhance Your Google Business Profile
- Leverage Local Business Listings
- Research Competitors
- Gather and Analyze Online Reviews
- Optimize Website Design and Performance
- Create Location-Specific Landing Pages
- Write Locally Relevant Content
- Get Involved In the Community
- Secure Local Backlinks
- Promote Your Website
1. Claim and Enhance Your Google Business Profile
Your local SEO strategy should begin with claiming and optimizing your Google Business Profile (GBP). If you have yet to claim your profile, visit Google Business to do so, as it’s a critical step in ensuring your business appears in local search results.
Your GBP is where users find important information such as your business name, physical address, and phone number (NAP). Keeping this information accurate and up-to-date not only reinforces your local SEO efforts but also keeps your business top of mind for potential customers.
Beyond the basics, maintaining an up-to-date profile offers additional SEO benefits. Regularly posting business updates concisely, uploading high-quality photos and videos, and including clear calls to action (CTAs) can significantly improve your visibility in search results, build a sense of urgency for users, and help your business stand out from local competitors. However, be sure to avoid keyword stuffing as it could lead to less visibility or even a profile ban.
Without a Google Business Profile, your business is missing a vital opportunity to reach local customers. Any effort to boost online presence starts by claiming and managing a compelling GBP.
2. Leverage Local Business Listings
Now that your GBP is set up, it’s time to expand your reach. Your chances of appearing in local search results increase when your business information is listed across a variety of reliable sources.
These sources, known as local business listings or local citations, include any mention of your NAP on websites like Yelp, Foursquare, and similar platforms. These listings help build credibility, raise awareness within your community, and improve your business’s online visibility.
Besides well-known citation sites, niche-specific platforms can also provide a competitive edge. For instance, restaurants can benefit from being listed on food delivery services such as Uber Eats. Taking advantage of all relevant listing sites is an easy way to get ahead of the competition, but your efforts shouldn’t stop there.
3. Research Competitors
Let’s face it, every local business shares the same goal, and that’s to appear early and often across the web. That means that just doing the basics won’t be enough to outperform your competitors.
To take the next step, start by analyzing other businesses in your industry to understand why they may be ranking higher than you. For example, if you own a landscaping business, try searching “landscapers near me” and see where you appear in the results. If another landscaping company ranks above you, study their online presence to determine what they’re doing differently.
This analysis involves several key factors, starting with their product listings and overall website structure. How do they organize and present their products or services? What organizational strategies could you adopt to improve your website?
Next, examine how they implement keywords. Identify the terms your direct competitors are targeting and find ways to incorporate them into your website and online profile. If your business is new, you may struggle to compete in generic searches like “coffee near me.” Instead, try targeting more specific variations such as “best coffee shops in Chicago.”
Finally, take a look at how they optimize their GBP. Are they regularly updating their NAP information? Have they categorized their business accurately? Are they consistently collecting reviews? These questions can reveal opportunities for improvement. For example, if a competitor has 30 reviews and a 4.2-star rating, aim to exceed both to improve your visibility in search rankings.
4. Gather and Analyze Online Reviews
Speaking of reviews, they play a major role in improving local SEO. PowerReviews reported that, “95% of consumers use reviews, and 86% consider them to be an essential part of the purchase journey.”
Encouraging satisfied customers to leave reviews on platforms like Google and Yelp is an essential part of enhancing your online presence. Additionally, you could host a giveaway and provide entries to those who leave you a review, include a QR code on receipts that link directly to your review page, or share a review link in follow-up emails and promotional campaigns.
However, just gathering reviews isn’t enough. To demonstrate that you value customer feedback, it’s crucial to actively monitor and respond to reviews in a timely and thoughtful manner. Even negative reviews present an opportunity to show you hear customer complaints and are working to address them.
This means acknowledging the issue, replying soon after the review is posted, and offering a resolution by providing a future discount, a refund, or changes to your process to prevent similar problems from occurring again.
5. Optimize Website Design and Performance
Now that you’ve taken steps to strengthen your online presence, it’s time to shift attention back to your website. Whether you’re building a new site or revamping an existing one, the user experience should be the foundation of your design. A logically structured site not only increases user engagement, but it can also help search engines better understand how each page relates to your business.
To accomplish this, use your knowledge from studying competitors’ websites to identify what flows well and what feels out of place. Implement changes that improve the user experience and seek feedback from coworkers, family, or friends after they’ve tested your site.
If web design isn’t your strong suit, outsourcing it to professionals is a great way to utilize your marketing budget and ensure effective results. After all, your website is often one of the first interactions with potential customers, and you want it to make a good impression.
6. Create Location-Specific Landing Pages
This may not apply to every local business, but if your company has expanded to two or more locations, it’s best practice to create dedicated landing pages for each one. Doing so not only helps customers differentiate between your stores, but it also signals to Google that each of your locations is a separate entity, which provides the chance to optimize SEO for each area individually.
This involves using location-specific keywords across each landing page, including in headings, subheadings, and meta tags. Since what resonates in one community may not work in another, conducting research for each location can help tailor your content to better connect with potential customers.
An easy way to further differentiate your locations is to include photos and videos of each storefront and its team. Visitors may recognize the location or a member of your staff, increasing their likelihood of visiting and supporting a local business. These visuals can also enhance your GBP.
7. Write Locally Relevant Content
After some research on businesses in your area, you may discover that many lack original content. This is a great opportunity to separate yourself from competitors and connect with the community.
Publishing consistent blog posts can enhance your local SEO rankings and improve relations with consumers in your area. This content should focus on locally relevant material that engages and resonates with the audience. This can include your business’s backstory or behind-the-scenes peeks.
If you participate in community events, share that experience through photos, videos, and a recap of the event. Not only does this demonstrate your involvement, but it also creates content that users may reference when searching for related products or services, or when the event is hosted again in the future.
Another option to boost visibility is by partnering with local influencers. Many social media personalities have a strong presence in niche markets and may be open to promoting your business through collaborations or guest content.
Whichever content strategy you choose to pursue, utilizing relevant keywords is a must. This will broaden your reach and improve your chances of ranking higher for terms where your business may currently be overlooked.
8. Get Involved In the Community
All of your SEO efforts could go to waste if it doesn’t connect with potential customers. Actively engaging with your community in person helps ensure that doesn’t happen.
Building a strong local presence encourages positive online reviews and boosts customer interaction with your business. This can both contribute to higher SEO rankings and provide valuable insight into how your business and industry are perceived by locals.
It also opens the door to partnerships with other local businesses, allowing you to support each other’s growth. One of the most effective ways to do this is by exchanging backlinks.
9. Secure Local Backlinks
Backlinks are one of the most important components of SEO. They occur when one website links to another providing it with authority.
Begin by identifying local businesses, news outlets, and blogs that align with your industry. Reach out with a personalized message explaining how linking to your site can provide value to their audience. If you’ve created a blog with relevant content, this is a perfect chance to promote it.
Once you’ve started acquiring backlinks, continue monitoring them to assess their impact and ensure the links remain active. Broken links lose their value, so regularly checking them helps ensure your efforts continue to deliver results.
10. Promote Your Website
By now, you’ve taken several measures to enhance your business’s online presence. The final step is to expand your reach and showcase your work by promoting your website. The goal is to achieve seven impressions as quickly as possible, known as the “Rule of 7.” This is a general marketing principle that suggests a user typically needs to see a brand seven times before taking action and becoming a customer. This can be accomplished through social media ads, display ads, and other promotional methods.
Familiar social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram can quickly generate impressions and contribute toward the Rule of 7. They also allow for geo-targeting, enabling you to tailor ads to your local audience. While social media is often the first promotional tool local businesses use, your strategy shouldn’t end there.
Google Ads place your business in front of people who are actively searching for products or services you offer. This is where your previous efforts towards implementing keywords will pay off.
Display ads can fill in the gaps that social media and Google Ads won’t. They appear across any website and can significantly accelerate the path to seven impressions.
While offline methods can still be effective, digital advertising offers the fastest and most efficient way to reach your target audience.
Need Help With Your Local SEO Strategy?
Taking a comprehensive approach to local SEO can feel overwhelming, but Best Version Media makes the process simple and allows you to focus on running your business. BVM offers a variety of services, including reviews and listings management across multiple directories and search engines.
You can also bundle digital ad campaigns – display and social media – to maximize your marketing budget and reach the customers who are most likely to engage with your products and services. BVM can handle all of your digital marketing needs through one easy-to-use dashboard.
To get started on your digital advertising journey, contact BVM and watch your local business thrive.
