Anyone searching for a particular product or service nearby will often include a location marker in their search phrase. A location marker can be a street or city name, or the name of a popular attraction. For example, someone living in Dayton, OH wants to know where the closest 24-hour convenience store is located. They may do a Google search using “open convenience stores near 4th Street” or “convenience stores near me”. Incorporating location markers in website content is the core of local SEO marketing.

Businesses that take advantage of local SEO marketing techniques will include as many relevant location markers as possible in their website content. By targeting local customers with marketing strategies that employ a variety of location markers, small and medium-sized companies can optimize their ability to attract new customers and enjoy excellent conversion rates. Additionally, since local SEO techniques focus on specific customers that are searching for your product/service, it is much more cost-effective than broader types of SEO strategies.

What is Local SEO Marketing?

A professional local SEO marketing company like Marketing Done Right understands how to expertly use location markers and other SEO elements specifically focused on local. But for a business to rank high on Google searches, local SEO services know that companies must have a Google My Business page that is complete and accurate.

Local SEO services can evaluate a company’s online marketing strategy and make the necessary changes for maximum optimization. Changes may include:

• Creation of local landing pages that highlight a company’s specific location (street names, landmarks, parks, etc)
• Suggest consulting a reputation management company if reviews are slanted towards negative aspects of your business
• Regularly check the accuracy of your company’s name, contact information, and address across social media platforms
• Improve the quality of outbound and inbound links
• Optimize your website to be accessible on smartphones
• Using SEO for developing meta descriptions, headers, title tags, and URLs

Local SEO for Your Business

Google My Business

In addition to modifying website content to include numerous insertions of city and street names, local SEO specialists will register your company with Google My Business.

Businesses with a GMB page appear in local “pack” listings. Local packs are, in essence, search engine results pages (SERPs) that show areas associated with a search. A GMB page is what Google searchers view first when conducting a search that includes location markers.

Benefits of Customer Reviews

Customers can leave reviews on GMB pages. Positive reviews can influence rank on Google searches and also make all the difference between gaining and retaining new customers.

Analyzing Statistics

Our local SEO marketing company can also monitor the number of views each GMB post, photo, and profile receives. Availability of real-time statistics like views is the best way to determine if a newly launched marketing campaign is effective.

Keeping an Active Website: Blogging

Ever notice that your search results provide you articles that were recently written in the last few years? The same goes for local results, for the most part. Google rewards new, relevant, and engaging content over old pages. Some great ideas for blogging content can be based on questions your customers ask you. There are others with the same question!

Using Online Business Directories

Local SEO specialists will ensure your business is listed on Yelp, YellowPages, WhitePages, Foursquare, and other popular directories. Directories with consistent NAP (Name, Address, and Phone) will show Google that you are verified by other sources. A quality SEO Specialist will work with both data aggregators and individual listings in your industry. You are a good candidate for an update to online business directories if you:

• Have never done a NAP submission
• Changed your Name, Phone Number, or Address
• Interesting in improving local search results in Google My Business and Organic Listings

Other Ways to Optimize Your Website for Local SEO

• Improving page loading speed to 90+ using Google’s PageSpeed tool
• Including all business addresses–not just the primary location–associated with your company
• Creating a webpage for each business location (a good example of this would be a physician who has several offices throughout a larger city or county)
• Making phone numbers “clickable” on laptops, tablets, and smartphones
• Adding a map to each location webpage
• Adding testimonials and reviews to each location webpage
• Adding schema markup, a type of microdata that creates a “rich snippet”. Rich snippets are simply enhanced summaries of a webpage that appear in search returns. Google, Bing, and Yahoo began collaborating with Schema.org over a decade ago.
• Optimizing content with keywords, long-tailed keywords, authoritative links, updated information, and local SEO marketing techniques

A Local SEO Company You Can Count On for Superior Results

Marketing Done Right’s team of local SEO specialists stands ready to propel your company to new levels of success. Whether your company is new or established, we have the expertise necessary to make your business profitable, competitive, and notable.