Are you a small business owner looking to get customers easily online? Then you need to consider local SEO. Local search visibility is quite important for small businesses as it makes up 35% of all search traffic. Sadly, only about 30% of small businesses have a plan for their local SEO.
In this post, you learn about the 5 local SEO factors that help make your business more visible locally.
But first…
What Is Local SEO?
Local SEO is the use of methods or strategies to improve your local online presence and increase local traffic.
Pretty simple, right?
Local SEO can help your business rank high on the search engine results page. This means you will have more people seeing your website, new customer, and ultimately, increase in sales. But only when you do it correctly.
Why Is Local SEO Important?
Google and other local search services now provide local results for customers looking for specific kinds of businesses. This means putting the right local SEO plans in place will regularly place your business at the top of the search results.
Consequently, it will help improve your visibility to potential customers who are looking for your type of business.
What’s more?
Your business will be featured in Google’s local pack category. Google’s local pack features the top 3 businesses that meet the terms used by the searcher.
There are several factors that can significantly enhance your business’ local SEO. Each one has an important value it contributes to your local SEO strategy.
In order to get your desired results, you need to constantly tweak these factors to make them serve you better .
One thing to note is that it may take a while before the results start to show. Be patient. Regularly monitor and improve your local SEO plan to adapt to the dynamic search landscape.
Here are the top 5 factors that can improve your local SEO…
- Google My Business
I can safely say that this is the most important factor as far as local SEO is concerned. You need to pay close attention to it. First, it is currently the easiest way to build brand awareness of your brand. Second, it is absolutely free, for now.
But that’s not all…
There two other reasons why Google My Business is important. For one, GMB signals make up 25% of all local search signals. For the other, 63% of consumers will consult Google for information before they visit your business.
If your business isn’t listed on GMB, you should do that right away.
- Citations
Have you listed your business on Google My Business yet? Good, that’s just a start. GMB is one amongst several platforms where basic information about your business can be cited.
You can have citations from filling a form with basic contact information for your business. This usually happens when you are in the process of opening an account for your business on an online listing platform.
Your business can be cited on platforms like Yelp, TripAdvisor, Facebook, Zomato (for restaurants), etc. This way, whenever anyone types your brand name into a search engine, your basic information will show up on these platforms in the results.
Another way to get your business cited is through blog posts. A news article or blog post on a subject in your industry’s niche could cite your business.
Citations contribute 10% of all local search signals. This may not seem like much but it’s enough to make a significant improvement to your search engine visibility.
You must ensure that all your citations are the same. A simple spelling error in your brand name or typo in your email address can cost a good deal of potential customers.
- Website Optimization
Web optimization is yet another way to improve your local online visibility. Your business website is your digital office. You can optimize it the right way to make it show up in the top page of search engine results.
You can use your website as a citation tool for search engines. To make your website more visible, you need to use the right keywords in the right density in order to make an impression on search engines. This way, people who aren’t really looking for your business can find you.
Keywords could be used as part of a content titles and headings, meta tags, feature images, and schema markup codes.
You should make your homepage or landing page URL simple. This help your customers and search engine find it easily.
Another way to optimize your website for increased visibility is to make your website mobile friendly. Since 57% of local searches happen through mobile devices, it makes sense to put some time and resources to optimize your website for mobile devices.
- Content
69% of businesses say that their blogging efforts have helped improve their lead generation, according to HubSpot. Creating valuable content is a sure-fire way to get more people interested in your business.
Content can turn site visitors to real leads. So ensure that your content provides value to your visitors while at the same time getting them excited about your offering.
Consistency is key. You must make your content consistent with other parts of your site in terms of tone and quality.
The more meaningful content you post, the more your website stands out in SEO. Plus, it enables you to build authority online.
- Reviews
Social proof has always been important in business. Back in the day, it happened through word-of-mouth. These days, it happens through online reviews.
A whopping 94% of consumers revealed that a review convinced them to avoid a brand. 63% of consumers use Google to find reviews about a business before visiting it.
Basically, reviews can easily fetch you real leads. So, you need to strive to get as many positive reviews as possible by providing excellent services. You can ask your customer for reviews using SMS notifications, emails, a face-to-face request and website review landing pages.
Read our article on 6 proven ways to get more customer reviews and ratings to know more.
Since you cannot please everyone, you are bound to have some poor reviews. Respond to them and make the customer know you are interested in helping them meet their needs.
Customer reviews are such a powerful tool, they can increase your webpage conversion by up to 270%. If you have an ample amount of reviews, it’s a good time to show them off. Your reviews can help make your customers’ buying decision easy.
Want to improve your local SEO?
Start now.
There’s no better time to start. Review your current local SEO strategy (if any) and incorporate these factors into it. Optimize each of them as you go along to help you improve your SERP (Search Engine Results Page) position and keep up with the ever changing digital world.
SpotOn Wi-Fi makes reaching your customers to request for reviews for reviews a piece of cake. To find out more, contact us and we will give you all the details.
POSTED ON October 7, 2019Share:
