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13 Local SEO Tips that You Need to Follow

May 29

Local SEO Tips that You Need to Follow in 2021

The vast majority of people search for local businesses nearby. These searchers take an interest in your products or services and, most importantly, they have the purchase intent.

It’s interesting to know that more than 2/3 of these searchers visit a local business the same day they perform a search. The statistics also show that about 1/3 of people, who visit a local business, make a purchase.

Do you run a business locally? If so, you should use the power of local SEO to promote your products or services on the market. You’ll be able to attract the target audience to your business if your site is found in Google local search.

I have a good piece of news for you. The vast majority of local businesses don’t have a local SEO strategy these days. That means that you will find it easy to dominate the local market and leave your competitors behind the scene if you develop an effective local SEO strategy that works.

If your site ranks high in Google local search for target keywords, you’ll be able to attract a lot of new clients to your local business and dominate the market. In this blog post, I would like to share some tips to help you improve your local SEO in 2021.

So, let’s get started.

1. Set Up a Google My Business (GMB) Listing for Your Local Business 

The first step that you need to take in order to improve local SEO is to create a Google My Business (GMB) listing. After that, your business will begin to be displayed in the Google local search. It’s worth noting that Google My Business listing is incredibly important for local SEO.

You will find it easy to create a Google My Business listing for your local business. In fact, this process doesn’t take too much time.

When creating a Google My Business listing, you have to complete the profile, fill in all the fields and provide all the necessary details about your company.

You should select the right category for your local business and describe your products or services in detail.

Pick a subcategory for your local business. If you create a Google My Business listing in the right way, then your business will rank higher in Google Maps for the necessary keywords.

2. Use the Power of the Google Posts Feature to Improve Your Local SEO

Oftentimes, it’s not enough to create a Google My Business listing to achieve the top local search engine rankings. You should also manage your GMB profile in an efficient way and do every single thing possible to improve your local SEO. I would recommend you to use the Google Posts feature to boost your local search engine rankings.

It makes a lot of sense to publish new posts on Google My Business listing. I also prefer to share Google Posts on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and others. By doing so, you’ll be able to drive a high amount of social media traffic to your posts.

If you get more traffic to your Google Posts page, it will be the sign for the search engine that you provide high-quality content on your GMB listing. And of course, this will have a profound positive impact on your local SEO.

3. Add Your Local Business to Other Online Directories

Google is not the only place where people can leave reviews about local businesses. In fact, there are many other online directories to which you can add your local business.

Among the best online directories for a local business is Four Square, Hot Frog, Best of the Web as well as Yelp. Actually, this list could go on and on.

You should also put special focus on local business directories which are specific to the area where your company operates. These online directories will generate quality traffic to your local business and have a huge positive impact on your local SEO. So, adding a business to such directories has to be the number one priority.      

4. Provide the Correct Information about Your Local Business on Online Directories

When adding your local business to online directories, you will have to provide many important details about your company. You’ll be asked to provide such information as business name, business phone number as well as a business address.

Make sure that you’ve provided the correct information about your local business on all online directories. Keep in mind that Google may stop displaying your business in local search if you provide incorrect information about your local business.

Consistency is very important in this process. That means that you should provide the same information on all business directories. Try to avoid providing different information on online business directories.

Let’s say that you write the word street when creating profiles on online business listings. If so, you shouldn’t write the word str. on the other online directories. That can mean different business addresses for Google. 

If you provide the incorrect address about your local business on online directories, a lot of people will not be able to find your company. As a result, you will lose your customers as well as sales. And of course, this will negatively affect your conversion rates. Online directories will not work for your local business efficiently.   

There are situations when local businesses have to relocate. If this happens, you need to make changes to the profile information on the Google My Business listing as soon as possible. Update the business address on all online directories.

5. Pick the Best Local Keywords for an SEO Strategy

If you promote a local business in search engines, then you need to target local keywords. What is great about local keywords is that they have lower competition. But most importantly, local keywords generate local search traffic to the business site’s pages.

What type of keywords do you need to target for a local business? There are two aspects that you should take into account when picking local keywords for an SEO strategy:

  1. You should pick the keywords which are relevant to your products or services.
  2. You should pick the keywords which are specific to the area that you target.           

That means that you should aim to target the relevant local keywords that can generate high amounts of search traffic to your site. You should also pay close attention to the competition of local keywords. Give a preference to the local keywords that have lower competition.

6. Make Your Business Site’s Pages Relevant to the Local Keywords that You Target

First of all, you have to create a list of local keywords for your business. After that, you should aim to improve your local search engine rankings. 

You have to decide for which keywords each of the web pages needs to be optimized. At the next stage, you have to do on-page optimization of your local business site’s pages.

You have to include the keywords into URL, Title tag, Meta description, headings, and content on a web page. 

Make sure that keywords look and sound natural in the content on your site’s web pages. If keywords don’t look natural, they will have a negative impact on readers and user experience.

It’s also important to note that using too many keywords is bad for local SEO. Remember, keyword stuffing is something that should be avoided at any cost.

7. Provide Local Content on Your Business Website

Many businesses try to use the power of content to promote their sites. You can publish either local content or non-local content on your business website.

Obviously, you should focus on local content if you promote a local business.  If you publish non-local content on your site, then you will get traffic from different parts of the world. In this case, you may find it difficult to convert website traffic into customers and sales.

Local content will drive local traffic to your site. This will allow you to get the most out of your content marketing efforts.

What type of local content does your business site need? In fact, there are different types of local content:

  • Relevant content + area. You can create content that’s relevant to your business and optimize it for the area that you target. 
  • Content optimized for local keywords. You can create content that’s relevant to the local keywords. In this case, you should create the content that has something to do with your products or services and then just optimizes it for local keywords that you target. Keep in mind that local keywords have to be inserted into the content on your website pages in a natural way.
  • Local news and local events. You can also create content about the local news and local events which are relevant to your industry.       

It’s worth noting that each type of content works very well for you if you run a business locally. Local content will allow you to improve your local search engine rankings. So, your site’s pages will rank higher in the search for local keywords that you target. Your business will get the local search traffic that converts well into clients, sales and profits. The awareness of your brand will increase significantly.        

8. Optimize Your Local Business Site for Mobile Search

If you read local SEO tips for 2021, then you will find that mobile optimization has to be the number one priority for a search engine optimization strategy these days. Let me explain why it’s so important to have a mobile-friendly site for local SEO.

People tend to use mobile devices to search for local businesses. The statistics show that over 30% of local business site’s search traffic is generated by different types of mobile devices.

That means that you will lose high amounts of customers as well as sales if your site is not optimized for mobile devices properly. The prospects, who use mobile devices, are likely to choose to buy products or services from your competitors.

And of course, you should do everything possible to prevent this from happening. The best thing that you can do is to make it easy for your potential customers to find your local business in the Google search on their mobile devices. 

Check how your website’s pages look on different types of mobile devices. This is something that you need to do from time to time. Your web pages have to look professional and impress your potential clients. If there are some issues with your local business site, then you should fix them and make your site mobile friendly as soon as possible.

9. Optimize Your Local Business Site for Voice Search

The number of people, who use voice searches to find local businesses, is constantly growing. That’s why it’s so important to optimize local business site’s pages for voice searches. 

Voice search optimization is a key part of a local SEO strategy. This type of optimization will put your local business in front of the right target audience. So, you’ll be able to attract additional targeted traffic to your local business site and leave your competitors behind the scene.

10. Attract High-Quality Backlinks to Your Local Business Site

Link building plays a very import in the search engine optimization process. You should build relevant links in order to improve either traditional SEO or local SEO. The only difference is that it would be better to build local links for local SEO.

The big question is - how to attract links for local SEO? Obviously, you should give a preference to natural link-building methods. The reality is, such link-building techniques work well and provide long-lasting results. 

In fact, there are many effective ways to attract local links to a local business site. For example, you can ask your partners to provide you with a link for your website. 

Let’s say that you run a website development company and you develop sites for different types of local businesses. In this case, you can ask your clients to provide a link on their sites. By doing so, you’ll be able to attract a lot of local backlinks for your business.

Has your website development company established a partnership with an SEO company? If so, you can ask your partners to provide a link to your company’s website. This type of backlink will drive the targeted traffic to your local business site and positively affect your local SEO.

You can also use the power of the guest posting technique to build backlinks for a local business. The building process consists of two stages. 

1) First of all, you have to find popular local blogs, which are relevant to your website.

2) Next, you have to contact the owners of local blogs and propose they to accept your content. If they agree to publish your content on their blogs, you will get quality backlinks to your local business site. Without a doubt, such links will contribute greatly to the success of your local SEO.

11. Create Location Pages on Your Business Site

Does your local business operations in several geographical areas? In this case, I would recommend you to create multiple location pages on your business website.

You should create a location page for each area. Each of your location pages has to be optimized for the keywords that you target and the area in which your business operates.

I’ve noticed that some businesses use the same content on all their location pages. They just change the area on each page and don’t re-write the text. I would like to say that it’s a big mistake.

I highly recommend you to provide only the original content on each of the location pages. Your location pages may have the same structure and you can write about the same things, but your content has to be unique on each location page.

You shouldn’t publish duplicate content on your location pages. If your location pages have duplicate content, you are unlikely to rank high for the necessary keywords. Duplicate content will result in Google penalties and have a huge negative impact on your local SEO.

12. Manage Your Customer Reviews Successfully

Google reviews play a very important role in the success of your local SEO strategy. Positive Google reviews have a positive impact on local SEO. On the other hand, negative reviews will negatively affect your local search engine rankings.

You should aim to get as many positive customer reviews as possible and avoid getting negative customer reviews.

Positive customer reviews have a profound positive impact on local search engine rankings. It’s also important to note that positive reviews allow local business owners to increase their conversion rates.

The reality is, people tend to deal with local businesses that have built a solid reputation on the market. That means that you will be able to sell more products or services if your prospects find that your local business has lots of positive customer reviews on Google.

Bad reviews have a huge negative impact on your local search engine rankings and the online reputation of your local business. That’s why you should do every single thing possible to avoid bad reviews.

One of the best things that you can do to prevent bad reviews is to provide clients with great customer service. Even if someone leaves bad reviews about your local business, then you should make an attempt to turn a negative review into a positive one. In this case, you should do your best to resolve the client’s issues and try to make your unhappy client happy.

Negative customer reviews should never be ignored. You should always respond to bad reviews. I would recommend you to apologize to your unhappy client for all inconveniences that he/she experiences.

When responding to bad reviews, you should try to figure out what exactly makes your client unhappy. Next, you should do your best to come up with an effective solution for customer’s problems.

When managing reviews, you should aim to show people that you are committed to the best possible customer experience. If you respond to bad reviews, other people will see that you get serious about your business and take care of your clients. And of course, this will have a positive impact on your business reputation, buyer decision process, and conversion rate.

I believe that business owners should also respond to good reviews. In this case, it makes a lot of sense to thank a happy customer for using your products or services. This will motivate your happy clients to purchase more products or services from your local business in the future.

When managing customer reviews, you should pay close attention to Google reviews. It’s worth noting that Google reviews have a powerful effect on local SEO.

However, you shouldn’t forget about customer reviews on other sites such as Yelp and others. These sites can drive high amounts of targeted traffic to your website. Try to get positive reviews and build a solid reputation for your local business on all popular online directories.     

13. Don’t Put All Eggs in One Basket

It goes without saying that local SEO is incredibly important for the promotion of a local business. However, I don’t recommend you to focus only on local SEO. You can also use other promotional methods to put your products or services in front of the right target audience. 

  • Keep in mind that social media sites can drive high amounts of traffic to a local business. That’s why it’s so important for local businesses to focus on social media promotion. Try to build a solid social media presence for your local business.
  • Put a lot of focus on content marketing. Add a blog to your site and update it with fresh content regularly. Pick the topics for your blogs that your target audience will find it interesting to read. 
  • Create a YouTube channel for your local business and promote it efficiently. YouTube videos will generate high amounts of targeted traffic to a local business. You’ll find it easy to turn your traffic into customers and sales.
  • Don’t forget that offline advertising methods also work pretty well for different types of local businesses. It would be great to consider brochures, business cards, billboards, flyers, print advertisements and other solutions. 

It makes a lot of sense to diversify local business promotion strategy. If local SEO doesn’t work well for your business for some reasons, then you’ll have other sources of traffic that will provide you with effective results. You should also use other promotional methods to attract the target audience to your local business.