In this article, Local SEO Checklist, I will be giving you working local SEO tips that every local business should know. These tips will help you rank better and convert traffic well. Additionally, these tips will help you advance from your competitors.
Watch the video version of this article below:
What is the secret sauce for local marketing success?
Digital marketing is nothing new. Since the dawn of the Internet age began, we have seen digital marketing grown bigger with so many strategies and platforms added into it. If you grasp the concept of digital marketing, this may sound overwhelming and complicated for companies who are used to conventional marketing and advertising.
Specifically, for local businesses, marketing their business online can be hard with so many trials and errors, where results are far from success. And thus, we question: where do you start marketing your local business online?
Marketing local business should not be that complicated. Start marketing your business on the number search engine on the planet: Google. This is not just something we say, this is based on facts.
As you see below based on the 2018 search market share report in the US, the top search engine is Google, which has 69.03% of shares in the USA alone
The chart shows that digital media is progressing at a faster rate and the best move for businesses, including local business is to start with the number one search platform, which is Google.
Local business marketing tips
Like I have previously mentioned, marketing your local business online should not be complicated. Since you are only targeting the local market, the marketing methods that you do is focused more on local, which removes the many areas in digital marketing.
For starters, what I highly recommend is to be seen and rank on Google Maps 3-pack. This is what it looks like
I am sure that you have seen this in one of your Google searches. So what is Google Maps 3 pack? This is a local search results section in Google that represents 3 local businesses related to the search query. Most of the time, the 3-pack appears on search results for search-intent keywords.
As a local business, you can appear on Google Maps 3 pack doing local search engine optimization (SEO). As the name suggests, SEO is what you need to be seen on search engines such as Google. So here are the local SEO tips that you need to rank higher on Google Maps 3 pack listing:
Local SEO tips
Optimize Google My Business (GMB)
As a local business, the very first thing that you need to have is a free listing on GMB. If you have no account yet, you can create a free account here.
Once you have your GMB, I suggest that you optimize your listing with great company photos. Make sure that these photos are high-quality ones as your GMB photos serve as an online brochure for your customers.
You may also want to utilize frequently the other GMB features such as updates, offers, and more. These are good tools for you to show that you are an active business by updating your GMB with the company’s announcements and promos. In our agency, we always update the post section by sharing our blog articles there with a link back to our blog section.
Lastly, make sure that all-important information about the company is accurate not only within your GMB listing but also across all local listings. By doing this, you are avoiding any
Build citations
There are hundreds of directories that you can embed your company information into, but make sure that you’re using the exact spelling and punctuation for every single listing. For example, you can put let’s say that you’re at an avenue address. You cannot put A-V-E in one directory citation and then put in another one A-V-E-N-U-E Avenue.
If your business is at 123 Main Avenue, you spell it out. Doesn’t matter if you use A-V-E or A-V-E-N-U-E, whatever it is that you use, you use it exactly every place and you spell it out that, you know, on every single directory.
You can use MOZ free tool to check for citation listings. This is a free tool and it’s a great way to do a quick checkup.
Get online reviews
The mistake I often see in local businesses is that they built a good listing online but a lot do not have online reviews of their business. No matter how pretty your website is or how complete your GMB information is, without online reviews, you won’t get visitors to your website.
Online reviews these days signal trust. People are always reading online reviews and they make their buying decision on this alone. If you need help building your online reviews, check out a great review software here.
Final thoughts
Those are my straightforward tips on how you can promote your local business online. These tips may be basic for some, but these are all good foundations for you to start building your online presence without investing a lot in digital marketing. Remember, Google is the king of search today. You can save a lot of advertising costs if you manage your local SEO well by dominating the Google Maps 3 pack. Good luck!
