Local SEO Tips & Tricks for Small Business Owners

Owning a local business is advantageous yet a challenging task too. SEO is not the only marketing tool for small businesses but is the primary one. Nine out of ten consumers search businesses locally. Optimizing the website for geographical area helps in increasing the search traffic and improving the ranking of the website. But moving along with the local SEO techniques and tips can only help the small or local business owners to achieve success in their business. Here are some of the concepts shared below that why local SEO is important and how one can make way to the top of SERPs.

1. Optimize for GMB (Google My Business)

Okay, so you are aware of GMB or not? The first basic tip for local SEO is Google My Business. Basically, it is a giant digital notebook where a business owner can manage their company’s information. Moreover, it helps the local audience to easily retrieve the information and services provided by your company and will surely thank you.

Additionally, NAP consistency is important. Make sure the information available on GMB listing is accurate. Once the company address is listed, check whether the pinpoint on the map is on the correct place. Also, listing the accurate phone number on site makes it easy for the audience to get in contact with the business.

2. Title and Meta Description Tags

Something more technical that can showcase your business effectively is the meta title and descriptions. These are the kind of HTML elements which do not require any coding and can be customized effectively with the help of content to reflect the webpage. For instance, whenever you search any query then the shown results with blue content and a short description below that are referred to as meta title and description. Optimizing the meta tags is the way to get the customers. So, not only creating quality descriptions is sufficient but optimization is also necessary.

3. Keyword Research

Keywords are important but there’s a huge difference between a regular keyword and local SEO keywords that you need to realize for standing out in the competition. Do you know what’s the difference? It’s simply geography. Including the keywords targeting the local audience and providing the results to their search queries work well. Moreover, there are two types of searchers, one is text searcher and the other is voice searcher. Furthermore, the ways of searching queries vary. For instance, while searching through text, one searches like ‘dentist near me’ whereas the voice searcher goes with a long-tail query. So, using the long-tail keywords can help in targeting the local audience as voice search drives more traffic as compared to the typing one.

Looking at the related search keywords on Google can also make you aware of the audience demand.

4. Inbound Links

Inbound links are the key tip for all the business owners. As business listings give you domain or page authority. It is considered that the higher the authority, the better the overall ranking of the website. But all the links are not created equally as getting the links from highly trusted sources are not easy. You need to earn these links to improve your rankings. These inbound links include:

  • Industry Relevant Links
  • Guest Posts
  • Vendors
  • Distributors
  • Local Business Associations

Now, as you have created the inbound links then what is the need for citations? Essentially, these are the references to your business NAP. You can submit your business profile to various directories like Yelp. This business listing helps the audience in knowing your existence on the internet.

5. Use Structured Data Markup Tool

Structured Data Markup tool also known as schema markup is a format that provides the information of web page, content embedded in it and classifies it. It is a kind of code that instructs Google to highlight which information that is relevant to business. This tool is added to the code of the website that directly provides important information about the products and services to the search engines. Like, if you are offering any special discount or want your customers to know about why your services or products are beneficial, then all this can be done with the help of structured markup tool.

6. Online Reviews Still Matter

Most of the small business owners forget the need for online reviews or just skip because they don’t find them beneficial. You might ask the verbal reviews from the business recommended person but now Google allows the people to leave their feedback on the business page. Reviews play an important role in website ranking plus driving the traffic. Potential customers searching the businesses like you will surely care about the reviews. You can either avail the reviews by including the link in thank you email, post flyers, or simply asking the customers in person. But make sure you ask for the customer reviews as these are important for increasing the conversion rates.

7. Be Active on Social Platforms

Social activeness is important to keep yourself updated about what’s going on in the marketing industry. The social activeness here depicts the platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and more. This is because you will find the world’s population active at least on one of these social accounts which makes it important for your business to remain active. Serve the principle ‘go where the customers are’. Making the use of social media for marketing your business does not mean to do harsh convincing that people think they are being scammed. But using social media in the way it was intended to that is a source to connect with people that can help in driving the potential customers and improving the overall ranking of the website.

8. Make Use of AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages)

AMP is not the factor responsible for taking the website on top but makes it convenient for mobile users by speeding up the website load time. However, the content is another important factor that affects the website ranking but if the pages are not accessible then content hardly matters. That’s why it is a necessity to make the mobile websites faster to further rank in Google SERPs. AMP helps in speeding up the load time and improves the mobile ranking with time. Moreover, AMP streamlines the content on the website in an aligned manner so the content does not get mixed up with images, audio, or the ads.

9. Add Location Pages to Website

Local SEO as the name suggests is all about location. That’s why other than GMB listing, it is necessary to add the location to boost up your business. For instance, if you have business at multiple locations but have only one website then there is no need to worry. You can create the pages on the same website for different locations. This will make convenient for the audience to know where they can find your business according to their area.

10. Maps, Maps, and Maps

There’s no way for locations without a map. It’s Obvious.

There are a variety of things one can do with the maps. And mostly these are used by the business owners to embed with their business. Moreover, linking the business with Google maps is easy. All you need to do is open the Google Maps, enter the business address, and press the link icon. Linking the website with Google maps makes it easy for potential customers to find your business anywhere anytime.

Conclusion

However, all these tips and tricks symbolize that Local SEO is like a lot of work and time consuming too. But one cannot change the fact that they own a business and they don’t have time to learn the SEO tips because we all know that payoff is worth the efforts. If still, you are unable to catch these tips and implement for your local business, then you can look for local search marketing services who offer the digital marketing to SEO services keeping your business on the top.

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