If your business offers products and services available in the local area, then understanding and implementing local SEO is essential to ensure your business isn’t missing out on potential opportunities to your competitors.
To give some context, a study showed that 46% of all Google searches are for local information. Therefore delivering successful local SEO will help your business to grow by maximising the local opportunities. There are differences between search engine optimisation and local search engine optimisation which we will cover in this blog post.
There are various areas which are important to local SEO from including relevant business information which is referred to as NAP: Name, address and phone number to including regular positive reviews and ensuring to create local content.
Firstly lets look at what local SEO is and why it is important. Then looking deeper at this with our guide to local SEO.
Ben Webster
Creative director at 1PCS. Addicted to design, SEO, pizza and helping companies big and small succeed online.
Share This Article
Subscribe for updates
What is Local SEO
When we think of an SEO strategy this is typically focused on the business as a whole when looking at ranking factors, positioning and business profile. Search engine optimisation is focused on the main services and products a business offers to position higher within the organic results on Google and other search engines.
However local businesses will also need to focus on their local SEO. When a person enters their search query into Google it understands from the keywords/phrases if this search has local intent. If so local rankings will apply and Google will provide local search results.
In order to have the highest position for local searches then local SEO differs with the methods and approach in order to be in the top local business listings on the search results for your local business website.
Map Packs
To make it easy for users to find quickly and effectively the information they need when doing a local search on Google. Within the Google search results is a map pack which is also referred to as a local park.
Google focuses on showing the relevant local businesses from the local area, for example showing the physical location for a business. As part of a local SEO campaign putting in the right search engine optimisation to be positioned within the local pack and map pack can help to increase your enquiries and sales.
When someone searches on Google, they do not necessarily have to include their location or ‘near me’ as Google will know their current location and show local listings based on that information.
If the search has local intent then it will show at the top of the page the top ranking local businesses alongside showing Google maps too. This will include the local business contact information from their business information and it will also usually show their overall Google review rating and number of reviews.
Whilst your business can rank in local packs, you can also rank in the usual organic results shown below the map pack on Google search results.
Shown above is an example of how a map pack looks on Google
Local SEO Research
Conducting a local SEO audit, is part of local SEO basics to begin with to help identify any areas which need work.
As a local business owner search on Google perform your own local keyword research for the words and phrases you think potential customers would be looking for, which could be done using a keyword research tool.
We would recommend when looking at the local results to also expand your local SEO keyword research so it is not only your main local services.
For example if you were an electrician, whilst ‘electrician’ will be part of the keyword research you could also narrow this down to other searches which may also be searched. Such as ‘electrical rewire’ or ‘Office PAT testing’. There are various local SEO tools which can help identify search volume data for different local keywords.
Completing a local SEO audit will help to know from the findings the focuses for tailoring each page of your website using specific keywords for the relevant search intent. In doing this it will help with your local search performance.
Local Citations
As part of your local SEO efforts, a key factor to help both Google and potential and returning customers to find your local business in their search results is accurate local citations. Specifically this is referred to as NAP which stands for name, address and phone number.
This should be included in several places to help your local rankings. Firstly on your website homepage which quite often will be in the footer. It can also be shown on an ‘about us’ page or ‘find us’ page which could also utilise Google Maps to show people exactly where your business is located.
If your business has multiple locations then you could have separate pages on your business with each focusing on the different business locations.
It is important when including your NAP that it is HTML text and not within an image, this helps Google with your local ranking signals as it can identify your local area code in your phone number for example.
Your NAP should be consistent across all locations such as local newspapers, business directories, social media and your website so that all your contact information is correct across all channels, otherwise that could have an impact on your local SEO.
Ensure to include your local contact details on your website to help your local SEO
Link Building
For a business online to succeed in a Google search to be shown to local customers, part of the local SEO work that need to take place is local link building.
There are many elements to improving your link building. This includes taking the time to write effective meta titles and descriptions. Even down to how you use your images on each page will impact your local search engine visibility. For example any images used should include alt text.
In regard to the navigation on your business website, it helps to use internal link building to and from pages where applicable and use SEO-friendly URLs. All of these steps as part of your local SEO strategy will help your local search visibility in the local search results.
Google My Business
Google states that they found 70% of people are more likely to visit businesses with a completed Google My Business profile. As part of our local SEO tips ensuring you have the business listing for Google My Business with a completed profile will help with your local business marketing.
When claiming your Google My Business we recommend completing all the requested Google business profile details as this will help local searchers find your business on Google. This includes:
Business name
Business category
Contact information
Website address
Opening times
Call to action
Relevant photos
Description using relevant targeted keywords
As part of your Google My Business you can also include local reviews and Google posts. We go into further detail on the benefit to including reviews below.
Positive Reviews
Not only do positive reviews help build trust and credibility for your business with visitors to your website, they are also an important part of your local SEO tools to have a successful SEO strategy.
Google takes into account the reviews left on Google for your Google My Business profile when local businesses are positioned in the search results.
As a result it is recommended as part of local SEO tips to request regular reviews from your customers. A link can be provided from your Google My Business profile, making it easy for a review to be left. When a review is left on Google always reply in a timely manner to thank them for their review.
If you receive any negative reviews then reply promptly to try and address any concerns or issues they had. This will help if people are looking at your business for them to see you tackled any problems head on and resolved it for your customer.
It is easy to see why local SEO results are impacted by reviews, as a study found 63% of people read reviews before they even visit a business website or make a purchase for a current offer.
Local marketers therefore will need to frequently request reviews to help increase enquiries and sales, as well as to improve their local SEO.
Encouraging customers to leave you a positive review on Google will help your local SEO
Mobile Search
An important element to your local SEO ranking factors is making sure your website is mobile-friendly and responsive on all screen sizes such as mobile, tablet and desktops. When people are looking at local sites for their search query on search engines it is quite often on mobile.
With a study finding 61% of Google searches are performed on mobile. When it comes to local ranking factors the Google algorithm takes into account the user experience on all device sizes including mobile. As they know their experience on mobile has a strong impact overall on if they felt it was positive or not.
If you had a high bounce rate from mobile searches on your website, this would directly impact your local ranking. Meaning other local businesses likely to be positioning higher in the search results.
Therefore it is worth taking the time to create a mobile friendly website so your local business isn’t missing out on potential business.
How can we help?
We hope our blog post has helped to provide more information on the importance of local SEO for any business providing products or services focused on their local area. With the right local SEO strategy this can have a huge impact to help grow a business with increased enquiries and sales.
Our team at 1PCS Creative have the relevant knowledge and expertise to provide local SEO across any industry or sector. We would be more than happy to discuss with you how we can help your business. Please feel free to get in touch with one of the team.