A lot of people take a shotgun approach when it comes to their SEO and content strategy, and then wonder why it isn’t bringing people through their doors. But if you want to attract local clients, getting traction on your content isn’t enough. It has to be targeted and marketed towards your local audience. Local SEO should also be your first concern, as it will help you get visibility with the people who matter the most. Here are a few ways that you can improve your local search results.
Table of Contents
Claim Your Listing
Everything starts with your Google my Business listing. If you don’t have one, then you simply won’t be listed in local business results, which take up a huge portion of real estate on first page results.
So, the first thing you have to do is claim your page and make sure that you fill it with your information. The most important part is to make sure that your contact information (name, address, phone number) is consistent everywhere you posted it online. This means your website, social media, directories, or any service you’re working with.
Understand How Local Intent Keywords Work
While Google has started to veer away from keyword-based rankings, they still play a central role when it comes to SEO. If you don’t build your content and strategy around the right keywords, you simply won’t be able to attract the people you want consistently.
This is why keyword research should be the cornerstone of your SEO strategy. But you have to understand the difference between general keywords, and intent keywords, especially the local ones. Ten Golden Rules has a nice piece on the subject. They teach you how to use suggested search results to start your research, direct you to useful and free keyword tools, and offer a few tips on how to implement the keywords in your content strategy.
Get Local Citations
Getting cited locally is one of the best ways to get visibility fast and climb up the local rankings. This could be a link or not. Press is a good way to get naturally cited, but you can increase your chances by listing with local directories who are closely related to your business, your chamber of commerce, and any association in your industry.
Work on Service and Encourage Reviews
However, if you don’t offer great service to your clients, all of this will be in vain. Google places a lot of importance on customer reviews, so you have to either correct the situation if you have bad reviews or start generating more reviews. One thing you could do is simply ask. You could remind people to review your business on your material, such as tray covers, bags, or packaging. You could also start a loyalty program and ask your members if they reviewed you yet. Most will be happy to do so and are more likely to give you a good review since they’re regulars.
Conclusion
Getting local attention from search engines is a great, low-cost way to consistently get high-quality traffic to your site. Make sure that you follow these few tips, and never neglect the clients in your backyard if you want to increase foot and site traffic.
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