As a business owner, have you recognized the importance of Local SEO yet? Do you know that around 46% of all Google searches are local? 

According to Neil Patel, Around 89% of net users search for a local business with their smartphone every week and 58% daily.

According to Moz’s local SEO report, Google My Business Signals which include keywords and proximity, top the ranking factors. 

Local SEO is essential for small business owners who wish to generate business at a regional level. While national or international SEO focuses on ranking in searches across the country or across nations, local SEO helps you appear in the SERPs of a specific location that covers the radius of your business. 

Local SEO for business helps strategize to market your products, brand, and services to local clients. 

For an in-depth understanding of: 

How Local SEO Services Can Help Websites Rank Better  

Now that we have established how important Local SEO is for your business, we will share some tips to optimize it to get the best results it. 

8 Best Techniques to Improve your Local SEO. 

1) Create a Google My Business Account 

Optimizing your Business Profile is one of the most effective ways to rank better on Google Maps and the SERPs. 

For doing this, you need to have a Google My Business account associated with that profile. So if you don’t have one, you might as well create a new one. 

After adding all required information to the Google My Business account dashboard, it is added to your Business Profile, which appears in the local results of Google search, Google Search Knowledge Panel, and Google Maps. 

Keep these points in mind while optimizing the business profile: 

  • Create the account and verify the ownership of the business 
  • Provide the latest and accurate details 
  • Always include a logo, acceptable payment methods, hours of operation, and the product or service you sell with multiple images. 
  • Ask for customer reviews online and make sure to respond to them. 
  • Make a regular announcements about products, events, and offers. 

2) Create a Dedicated Contact Page 

People want to know everything about your business. Make sure you provide them with all the details they might be looking for. 

  • For this, you must have a dedicated contact page on your site with your name, address, and phone number. Also include your working hours, days, and time on the page. 
  • Since it is the contact page, it should have all your Social Media details and registered addresses so people know about your presence. 
  • Phone numbers and social media handle links should be clickable for ease of access. 
  • Get Regular Reviews from Customers 
  • Word-of-mouth publicity is the best, though now in the form of virtual reviews. 
  • It is thus essential that you have customer reviews that visitors can read on your business account. 
  • You can ask for a review post-sale or send a post-purchase email or text requesting satisfied customers to write a review. 
  • Respond to existing reviews professionally, thanking reviewers and resolving complaints of negative reviews. 

3) Capitalize on Voice Search 

Voice search is a digital marketing trend that is here to stay. So, using it to optimize your local SEO will only make sense. Understand how people ask questions on devices, as compared to how they type their searches. 

After research, you will know that customers use long-tail keywords while doing voice searches compared to regular searches. 

Keeping this in mind, you will have to adjust the SEO of your content and make it more of a conversational tone. Include question-starters like who, what, when, where, why, and how while crafting content for ranking in voice search. 

Considering user intent is also vital when optimizing for voice, as they may need a specific piece of information. If a customer wants to know your business’s hours, this information should also be readily available through your voice search. 

4) The Website Should be Mobile Optimized 

Over the past couple of years, comparing the mobile vs. desktop trends indicates a shift to mobile. 

Website visits through mobiles have grown from 57% to 63% as per WordStream 

The same source says that 75% of mobile searches with a local intent usually produce in-store visits within 24 hours! 

This makes mobile an essential device for your site visit. You also need to make your site mobile-friendly at once. 

  • To do this, you have to ensure your site loading speed is less than 3 seconds. 
  • Bigger and clear fonts will ease the readability. 
  • Use lesser images as AMP pages do well with mobiles. 
  • Give a good UI for a good user experience. 

5) Use Location-Specific “About Us” Page 

Location pages become mandatory when your business has multiple locations in an area. Such pages should mention: 

  • Working hours 
  • Google Maps attached to each location page 
  • Name, address, and phone number 
  • Customized descriptions 
  • Clients area-specific Testimonials 
  • Promotion details 
  • Parking availability 
  • Unique content for each page 
  • If there is only one location the “About Us” page will focus only on local essential information. 

6) Target on Getting High-Quality Backlinks 

As per a study conducted by Moz, link signals are the first and second most important factors for snack pack and localized organic results respectively. Link signals are backlinks pointing to your website. 

Getting links is essential to boost local SEO, but they should be quality links. 

Here is how you can get high-quality backlinks: 

  • Craft quality content for your site so that others would want to link back to your content. 
  • Do guest blogging on reputable sites that have high domain authority. 
  • Get local influencers on social media to link back to you. 

7) Make Dedicated Webpages for all Products/Services that you offer 

It is much easier to accommodate all products and services in one long page. But this will make the page bulky and slow in loading. The better option will be to create one page for each product or service that your business offers. 

Your Local SEO results will be different when you create individual pages like this. Search engines can then deem your brand as an authority in a specific service eventually improving your rankings. 

Same way, if you have only one product/service, but multiple locations, then you have to utilize location-based copy for each page. For example, “Uncle Jones” will become “LA Uncle Jones” or “Lisbon Uncle Jones.” 

Apart from these points, it is a thumb rule that your site is always keyword optimized. It should have relevant and recent content which makes sense to your prospective viewers. 

Your keywords should rank in the SERPs and lead the readers to your site where they find the specific information that they are looking for. 

When this happens over some time, gradually these readers will get converted into actual clients and your Local SEO efforts will result in actual store visits. 

8) Online Business Directories 

Get your business name, address, and phone numbers into Online business directories like Yelp, MapQuest, Foursquare, YellowPages, Facebook Pages, Instagram for Business, Google My Business, LinkedIn Company Directory, Apple Maps, and many more. They will help increase the visibility of your business and boost your local SEO results by many folds. 

The company listing should include information such as business name, address and phone number, backlink to your website, and a thorough description of the business. Make sure it is consistent across all directories.

Final Thoughts

SEO keeps changing, as you never know when search engines introduce new features on their SERPs for local searches. You have to be prepared for these changes. 

That is why it is crucial to ace your local SEO results. By implementing the above-mentioned techniques in your SEO strategy, you ensure the best lucrative local searches for your business and a solid foundation for any new SEO features that come your way. 

You can always take professional help with your SEO implementations and consult a trusted digital marketing agency in your area. 

For further information on Local SEO please visit our website or contact us for a personalized SEO plan.