Whether you have one store or one hundred stores, local SEO can help to drive both footfall and online revenue. It’s Google’s current focus, as seen in the latest algorithm update, Google Pigeon,and should be on your radar too.
The case for local SEO is strong and with a focused effort, can lead to real benefits. A number of social signals including, location based content, links, social profiles and citations are thought to impact local rankings. Improving these areas doesn’t have to be time consuming though and can lead to some quick wins.
To help, we’ve put together our top 5 tips to improve your local SEO strategy:
1) Google My Business
This is the first thing you should do! Google offers Google My Business to help your business be found on Google+, Maps, Search and mobile devices. Simply claim your business page and be sure to complete all areas of your listing including high quality images and description.
2) Make sure your local listings are all correct
Boost your visibility further by setting up the following; Bing Places for Business, a Yell listing and a Yahoo Local page. These listings show up at the top of the local search results, so it is important that your business is listed with each in order to have a chance to show up in the local search results.
Ensure your business name, address, and phone number is exactly how it appears on the contact page of your website. Also, check for duplicate listings – the neater and tidier you appear, the better. The last thing you want to do is confuse people.
Make sure your images are super high quality – no blurry shots here, please. Did you know that you can add a virtual tour of your business? People can actually walk around, or close enough.
3) On-page local SEO
Optimise parts of your website to further increase your chances of appearing in local searches. 2 top tips to improve on-page optimisation:
- Location pages – If your business has a numerous locations it’s important to have a unique location landing page for each, which displays the name, address, postcode and any additional information about the local area.
- Titles and Meta Descriptions
A good meta titles should include your brand name and location and a good description should include your brand name, location, relevant keywords and a summary of page content. Also incorporate local search phrases into Alt tags and page titles.
4) Get reviews from customers
Word-of-mouth is powerful! Now that we have access to reviews online, anytime anywhere, it’s vital that you build a bank of positive reviews. Encourage your customers and service users to shout about you, when they’ve got something great to say. It’s okay to incentivise them but the simplest way is to offer amazing service – then the reviews will take care of themselves. Genuinely good reviews will do absolute wonders for your local SEO efforts.
5) Optimise your social profiles
It takes just a few minutes to improve your social media profiles yet the benefits to your local search are endless. With each profile ensure you:
- Fill out every field with accurate information and quality descriptions. Note: keep the information consistent across platforms.
- Ensure your Facebook page is listed as a local business – that way, people can check into your location. Did you know that Facebook even tells people who visit your page whether you’re open or not?
- Verify your profile – This will connect your website with the profile, so customers know it’s your official social profile.
Make sure that every social profile you have includes your physical location along with your business name and website URL where possible.
Dominating the local search results can really help your business grow, resulting in a strong ROI and customer base. Following these five steps is just the start of your local SEO strategy, ask our team for more.
