If you have a business, you’d want your brand to be recognized and come out on top in any kind of ranking. To do this, you need support from your loyal customers, but you must also consider improving your online presence. One way to help improve your ranking online is by applying local SEO to your company website.
Local SEO is a great way to help boost business visibility in a specific physical area, and this is achieved through having enough of an online presence so that internet searches would include your business in their results. If you are able to maximize this strategy, your products and services will easily appear to potential customers doing local searches.
This is why you should consider these local SEO pointers to improve your business’ online visibility further:
1. Update Your Google My Business Account
Have you ever tried searching for a local business on Google? If you have, you’ll usually see the details of the business on the right side of the screen for desktops, and on the top part of the results page for mobile searches. In both instances, you’ll see the business name and its details, such as the address, phone number, directions, and even photos.
If you just started your business and haven’t created a Google My Business Account, now would be an excellent time to make one. It’s a perfect way to appear in the search results even if you don’t have a website yet. You just have to create a Google My Business account, verify the ownership of your business, and ensure that the details are correct so people can readily contact you and find your business’ location.
To make the most out of your Google My Business account, you may want to include everything that customers would want to know. These include your operating hours, accepted payment methods, and even a list of the products and services you offer.
2. Post Content Related To Local News And Events
Since you aim to boost the local ranking of your company website or blog, you may want to include articles about news or events going on in your area. Doing so will help people find your page by clicking on these contents. Once they see that the author of the article is a local establishment in their area, their curiosity will be piqued, and they’d want to find out more about your offerings as a side result.
You can also post content about activities or causes that your company supports, or set up pages that are location-specific if your business has branches in multiple places, too. These strategies are sure to grab your local market’s attention.
3. Make The Most Out Of Customer Reviews
Never underestimate the power of customer reviews. Most of the time, people like reading other people’s reviews before paying the store or shop a visit. So, it’s not enough that you take time to keep your online information up-to-date continuously, but you also have to ensure that your services are top-notch. By doing so, so your customers can post excellent reviews as a result.
For example, if you recently opened a small hotel, you’d want to ensure getting good reviews on high-traffic travel blogs or popular hotel listing sites. When people travel, they want to make sure that they get their money’s worth. So, whether they have a good or bad experience in your hotel, they’ll be sure to let people know through these reviews.
In addition, it also wouldn’t hurt to ask your happy customers in person if they could leave a positive review to help support your hotel. If you had a great rapport with them offline, you can convert it to great feedback online.
4. Consistent Business Details Everywhere
There are so many platforms online where you can make pages for your business, even without the benefit of having your own website. You can utilize Google, Facebook, Yelp, Bing, and so much more. Some people may prefer one source over the other, so you must ensure that you have the correct details on every platform where your business page will appear.
If you have different or incorrect information listed in one of these pages that the customer tries to contact, you would be missing out on a sale. You definitely don’t want this to happen, so you have to check your page accounts regularly to see if they display consistent and up-to-date information about your business.
5. Expand Your Reach Through Social Media
Social media is commonly used by netizens to connect with their loved ones and share bits and pieces of their life. However, as time passed, some platforms developed sections for promoting businesses and opening up marketplaces, too.
Taking your business to these platform spaces is a great way to promote it since almost everyone in your local area probably has at least one social media account. Thus, the more you put your business out there, potential customers will become familiar with it. Your business name would generate enough online recall for these netizens to perhaps pay your store an actual visit one day.
Imagine if your friends also helped spread your brand online by sharing your posts about the products and services you offer. That’s a sure way to grab the attention of your target market.
6. Have A Mobile-Friendly Website
If an individual is looking for a particular business within a specific area, they are most likely to search using their phone. Nowadays, you can’t expect people on the go to always carry a laptop and put it out when they need to search for something. Thanks to technological advances, more things can be done through a smartphone—including finding what you’re looking for in a specific area.
Thus, to get the attention of your next possible customers, it’s now a necessity that your website is mobile-friendly. Most sites are usually fit for viewing in desktops only, so the layout may look like they’re all over the place if accessed through mobile phones. No potential customer would waste their time trying to rotate their phone just so they can get a good view of your website.
7. Consider Hiring A Local SEO Firm
While there are various online strategies you can learn to help improve your business performance in the local scene, they could also be challenging. If you have done everything you can on your own and are still not satisfied with the results, you can always consider working with online experts like the ones at SEO Builder.
A team of digital professionals who know what they are doing will surely help get your business the recognition it deserves. These SEO experts are already knowledgeable of the latest strategies and trends in digital marketing, so they are sure to help boost your sales and brand. You are sure to get the best results with minimal effort.
Conclusion
Local SEO is indeed a great way to boost your business ranking if you’re looking to target a specific area. If you successfully maximize it with the help of these tips, it will result in increasing physical traffic to your store, which leads to more sales and better brand recognition.
However, don’t feel too pressured. If you find yourself still unsure of what to do, or if you’re still clueless on where to start, you can always ask for help from local SEO firms to come up with the best strategy for your business. Either way, it’s a win-win situation for you.
As a blogger with more than ten years of experience in the industry, Heather Campbell has gained thousands of loyal readers online. Aside from publishing content on her own blog,
Author Bio
Heather author of this article also works with countless websites and contributes articles.
