Best Ways to Improve Your Local SEO Rankings on Google
Local SEO is of vital importance: appearing on Google Maps, Bing, and Apple Maps can do wonders for your business. If consumers can't find information about you on Google, they won't be able to learn more about you. If they can't learn more about you, they can't establish trust in you.
There is a multitude of different ways for your company to take advantage of the benefits search engines offer to local businesses. In this guide, we're going to show you how your business can make the most of appearing in local search results.
Boost your local SEO and you can increase revenue, build up a customer base, and demonstrate your worth to prospective local customers. It's great for them and it's great for you.
Ready to learn more about how you can boost your local SEO and help your business? Then keep reading!
1. Claim Your Listing
The most important thing that a company can do is claim their listing on Google My Business. When you search for a business' name or click on it on Google Maps, you're shown the Google My Business listing. Companies can boost their local SEO a lot by including great content on their listings.
This should be a cornerstone of your local SEO strategy.
Your listing should feature key business information that consumers will need at a glance, such as your opening hours, what you sell, what payment methods are accepted, etc. You should also show off your business' services or products: include a lot of different images that show your business in a fantastic light.
Apple Maps and Bing
While creating a Google My Business listing is one of the most popular local SEO strategies, you need to consider how you appear in other local listings.
To claim your listing on Apple Maps, you need to use Maps Connect. Similar to Google My Business, Maps Connect also lets you appear in local listings in Siri results.
While Bing isn't used as much as Google, it's the default browser on Microsoft Edge and Internet Explorer, so it's still used a lot. To claim your listing on Bing, you'll need to use Bing Places.
2. Ask For Reviews
A cornerstone of local SEO, asking for Google reviews from your customers is a fantastic way to boost your company's profile. Good reviews make your business' listing look great and could be the deciding factor if someone is considering buying from you.
Reviews are a cornerstone of digital marketing and how you respond to them says a lot about your business.
If someone gives your business a negative review, it's important that you don't respond with anger. Apologize for their poor experience and, if necessary, ask them to email you so that you can resolve their issues.
Responding to reviews says a lot about your customer service. Respond to reviews whether positive or negative and show courtesy to your customers.
3. Boost Local SEO With Local Content
High-quality content is a crucial part of digital marketing and you can help your ranking in local search engine results by publishing great local content. This content should focus on local news and events.
As with other online content, you should focus on making engaging, interesting, and shareable content that will pull in potential customers from the local area. As always, you also need to end on a call-to-action encouraging users to take a look around your website or store.
Local content also has another strong advantage: it can help your social media accounts a great deal. Getting people to share your social media posts can help you out a lot, as it's essentially free marketing. Sharing your posts brings people to your site where you can use other marketing techniques to get a sale: local content brings in local viewers: makes sense, right?
4. Claim Backlinks
If you want to boost your domain authority and increase your local search ranking, backlinks are what you need. Google uses backlinks to index your pages, which means that the more backlinks you have, the more pages of yours appear in search results.
Webmasters know that backlinks are valuable so getting them can be tricky. You don't need to pay for them though: you just need to know where to look.
For instance, let's say that you're a local restaurant. If someone writes a review of your restaurant for a local newspaper, you can ask for a link in the article. If someone blogs about restaurants in your city and mentions you, ask for a backlink.
If another company has endorsed or used yours, you can claim a backlink on their website. Similarly, if you have used the services of another business, ask that they mention your business as a client, and claim a backlink from their site that way.
There are a lot of ways to claim free backlinks from existing mentions. Find out where you're mentioned and where you could be mentioned and claim a backlink! It will help your SEO a great deal.
5. Make Sure That Your Website Supports Mobile Browsers
Appearing in mobile searches is all well and good but if your site isn't well-optimized for mobile browsers, you're not going to win any customers as a result. Not only can badly-optimized mobile sites put off prospective customers, but they can also hurt your SEO. Google cares a lot about a mobile-friendly web and mobile support is a big ranking factor as a result.
Many local customers use their mobile while they're out and about to find a business that has what they need. While this information may appear in your Google My Business listing, there's a good chance they'll want to visit your website for more details. Your site needs to be built with these customers in mind.
We Can Help Boost Your Local SEO
If improving your local SEO sounds difficult, we're here to help. No matter whether you have one location or multiple locations, we're here to help brick and mortar businesses thrive in the internet age. We can make sure that searches result in customers seeing your products and services and getting a great impression of your company. For more information about our services and rates, take a look around our site. If you'd like to know more, get in touch with us!