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When you’re a local business owner, you already understand how important it is to make a connection with your existing customer base, as well as people who are potential customers.
But there’s more to the equation than just ensuring that those customers know about your business and can find you when they need your services. If you want to see a return on your investment in SEO strategies, then you should always be open-minded to find ways to increase local intent and get more local customers for your business.
The Secrets To Marketing Success With Local SEO
Local SEO has been one of the most effective marketing strategies in recent years. But, unfortunately, search engine optimization is also one of the most misunderstood. So let’s take a look at some of the secrets, best practices, and the many moving parts behind this powerful form of online marketing.
On-Page Content Optimization
On-Page Content Optimization for local marketing helps ensure that your website content is optimized so that search engines like Google can easily index and categorize it. Integrating on-page SEO includes things like:
Keyword Utilization – Keywords are a significant part of any successful SEO strategy because they help search engines to identify what your site is all about. They also allow users to navigate your site by finding pages containing specific keywords quickly.
Internal Linking – Internal linking helps to create a natural flow from page to page within your site. Search engine spiders follow these links to other relevant pages, which means they will read and index them too.
Content Quality – Having high-quality content is essential for all successful marketing efforts. Ideally, a comprehensive content strategy includes optimized content for front-facing website pages, well-crafted blog posts, and engaging videos to informative articles. It’s no secret that having great content is key to attracting new visitors to your site.
When you think of your business or corporate website as a brochure and selling tool for your goods and services, it gets easier to understand why putting your best foot forward with on-page SEO is worth the effort. But don’t stop there; off-page optimization is equally important in achieving local search ranking.
Off-Page Optimization
Off-Page Optimizations are steps you take to increase the visibility of your business profile that take place elsewhere than your website. These marketing techniques effectively direct visitors from other internet destinations to your own website and boost organic ranking.
Much like making On-Page optimizations, there are several moving parts to an effective off-page search engine optimization strategy. Here are a number of the most critical components:
Google My Business – With over 90% of consumers using mobile devices, having your company listed in Google My Business is vital to driving traffic to your website. For best results, it’s critical to ensure that your NAP information is correct.
NAP is the acronym that stands for Name, Address, and Phone, so don’t overlook this data’s importance in your marketing strategy. For example, providing internet searchers and people using Google My Business listings with an exact business name, business location, and business phone number is a powerful tool to drive potential customers straight to your door using Google Maps. Further, it provides business owners with a platform to make announcements about COVID-19 related protocols or your involvement at a local event.
Google my business is an innovative business listing platform, and you can’t afford to miss out! After all, it’s logical that the more accessible prospective customers can find your physical location, the more likely they’ll visit your store. Investing and optimizing for Google Ads is another approach to increasing mobile traffic to your site.
Social Media Marketing – Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest, etc., are all excellent destinations for promoting your business. It requires dedication and time to maintain a presence on these social networks, but they can significantly boost your organic rankings when done correctly. In addition, engaging in social marketing activities by sharing recent posts or the latest news helps stretch your Content Marketing budget even further and build brand awareness and generate leads for your business.
Local Listings – If your company isn’t searchable in local directories, you should consider adding your business to online listings. Many listing options are available, including Yelp, Yellow Pages, CitySearch, and others.
Other online resources could include your local Chamber of Commerce, Better Business Bureau, or other websites that provide similar services. Whether you operate one location, manage multiple locations, or your company offers services to a particular or area, listings with accurate contact information, complete with your zip code, help connect you with the community and your local market.
Starting off-page optimization requires some technical know-how, but it’s easy to scale up your efforts once you have a solid foundation. We’ve seen businesses reap significant benefits by implementing a few basic strategies and digital advertising campaigns such as Facebook ads, Google Ads, display ads, email marketing with email ads, and direct mail.
The bottom line is that good local SEO will help you extend your local audience to attract more local customers. And, even with a moderate marketing budget, you can see substantial gains in just a few months. So, if you want to get ahead of the competition, start attracting new customers, and build an email list right away, we highly recommend investing in local SEO.
Be Mindful Of Your Company Reviews
Whether you get a negative review or a positive review, it is always worth taking the time to respond to feedback given through online reviews. It may seem obvious, but people who leave reviews expect a response from companies. If you ignore their comments, you essentially tell them “I don’t care” about their experience or what they had to say.
When responding to a customer review on platforms like Angie’s List, Yelp, Facebook, and Google My Business, make sure that you address the issue at hand without getting into a debate. Try to offer solutions to the problem instead of blaming the reviewer. Keep in mind that your future customer and target audience will consider your responses. There might be negative repercussions if you leave unprofessional responses or don’t respond at all!
If you receive a negative review on review sites, do your best to take it in stride. Some people will love your products or service, while others might not. You cannot please everyone, so feedback can help you improve your operations. Remember that most reviewers are honest in their opinions, so you shouldn’t let a bad review discourage you. When responding, it would be best to keep in mind the tone and demeanor you take in your responses, as they reflect your overall approach to customer service.
Start Attracting The Local Customers Your Company Needs To Grow
It is important to note that search engine algorithms change frequently. Therefore, while this article provides excellent information on optimizing your website for local searches, we recommend that you monitor changes made to Google’s algorithm over time.
As mentioned earlier, it’s essential to understand that local SEO isn’t an overnight process, primarily if your company operates in larger markets such as Cleveland, New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, Chicago, and other major metropolitan areas. When growing your company, regardless of your marketing area, local SEO is one of the first areas to apply focus.
To grow your small business, you must attract new customers to your business directly. Therefore, you need a business page that generates leads and converts leads from your local area into sales. When it comes to generating leads, local SEO is a good option. In fact, it’s among the best bets to achieve first page visibility in search. When you’re on top, it’s much easier to connect with the right people and your target customers.
At Performance Marketing Group, we’re excited to support local businesses with flexible and affordable digital marketing plans and SEO services that get search results in their local community. So when you need to target local customers, we’re here to help!
Want To Talk About Improving Your Local SEO? Call Us Or Schedule A Free, No-Obligation Phone Consultation Today!
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