How to Improve Your Local SEO and Drive Results Quickly

As powerful a tool as SEO might be, it's not strictly reserved for large businesses. Corporations operating at different locations can also use SEO in various ways. 

But that doesn't mean smaller businesses can't take advantage of SEO, either. It's especially important for small businesses trying to thrive in their local communities.

However, to achieve the best results, they must focus on local SEO, a special branch of SEO.

Developing a local SEO strategy can help your local business increase website traffic. You could also gain new customers and rank higher in search results.

This article will guide you through the process of how to improve your local SEO for your local business. Let's dive in. 

🤔 Why Is Local SEO Important for Local Businesses

Local SEO includes tailoring your content to your local audience. This will allow you to reach customers within the same geographic area.

Using the right local SEO tactics comes with the following advantages:

1. Online visibility and brand awareness

Local SEO efforts increase your business visibility. It will be easier for local customers to find you.

2. Increased quality traffic

High local rankings lead to an increase in quality website traffic. This opens new doors to potential customers.

3. Improved user experience

Developing a local SEO strategy can help you better understand your target audience. This improves user experience.

4. More foot traffic

By appearing in local searches, your business won't only gain more site visitors. You'll get more in-store foot traffic as well. This is key for businesses that rely on local customers.

5. Higher conversion rate and customer engagement

The right local SEO tools can help you increase your conversion rate. This also drives customer engagement.

6. Earned credibility

If you receive positive reviews, it will increase your business's credibility. Your local search ranking will spike as well.

7. Competitive edge

Local SEO efforts will help you stand out from other websites with similar offerings.

Local SEO isn't only effective for brick-and-mortar businesses with a physical storefront. Service-based businesses and even online businesses can use local search engine optimisation.

⚒️ How to Improve Local SEO

If you want your business to succeed online, you need local SEO. That's why, as a local business owner, you must understand why local SEO matters.

Developing an effective local SEO strategy requires significant effort. You also need to understand how to best use the various SEO tools available to you. 

Following these local SEO tips will enable businesses to boost their exposure. You will also become a reliable source in the eyes of potential customers and search engines.

Here are the best local SEO techniques that you can use:

• Doing local keyword research
• Optimising your website for local SEO
• Creating and optimising a Google My Business listing
• Building local links
• Generating local reviews
• Tracking your results

🕵️ Doing Local Keyword Research

Before you learn how to rank local SEO keywords on the first page of SERPs, you must first do keyword research.

This helps you understand what your target audience searches for on Google. You'll know which search queries for products or services they use.

You can then use those keywords on your website.

Another effective local SEO strategy is to target local keywords. These are keywords relevant to your location. 

For example, let's say you run a private medical practice specialising in cardiology. 

You can target specific keywords potential patients might be searching for. Your keyword research will reveal what they are. 

You can use various medical keywords, such as:

• "cardiologist in Melbourne" 
• "heart doctor near me"
• "cardiovascular specialist in Melbourne"

These are otherwise known as long-tail keywords. They're quite important for local SEO. 

They usually contain three or four words and geographical markers. These could be city names, zip codes, neighbourhoods, etc.

🖥️ Optimising Your Website

Optimising a website for local SEO is an important step. It increases your visibility in local search results. 

This, in turn, draws more customers to your site. 

It starts with developing a strategy that will help your site rank higher in local searches. Every good strategy begins with keyword research.

You should then add those keywords to different parts of your site, including:

• Blog content
• Page titles
• Meta descriptions
• Subheadings
• Images
• URLS
• Link anchor text
• Post tags

Creating high-quality content tailored to your target audience can also be beneficial. 

You should create web pages that specifically target what potential customers are searching for. This includes topics related to services or products at a specific location.

You can use your blog to write posts about various topics related to your business. For example:

• How-to guides
• Tutorials
• Customer stories
• Industry news and trends
• Information about your company

Integrating schema markup into website pages can provide extra information about your business. This can lead to higher-ranking positions in SERPs. 

Schema is especially useful for businesses operating at different locations. It allows for extra details about each separate entity.

Another important step is to optimise your website for mobile searches. That's because most online searches are done on mobile devices.

📍 Creating and Optimising a Google My Business Listing

If you want to increase local SEO rankings, you need to create a Google My Business (GMB) listing.

Claiming and optimising a GMB listing can help small businesses:

1. Increase their visibility in local search results
2. Drive more traffic to their websites
3. Generate new leads

Google My Business, or a Google Business Profile, is an online business directory. This is where you can post your local business listing. 

Creating a Google Business Profile includes adding your business on Google Maps. 

Once you've done this, make sure the listing contains accurate info on your business. Your NAP information (name, address, and phone number) should be correct and up-to-date.

There are a few ways to optimise your Google My Business profile, which include the following:

1. Verify your mailing address and phone number
2. Add images of products or services
3. Post special offers
4. Respond to online reviews and questions
5. Provide directions if necessary
6. Set business hours
7. Make sure there are no duplicate listings
8. Update outdated information

Regularly updating your listing is imperative. 

An up-to-date listing will ensure that customers can find the most recent information about your business.

Aside from GMB, you can use other business directories for your local citations. These include:

• Yelp
• Yellow Pages
• Bing Places
• Moz Local
• Facebook Business
• Apple Maps

🔗 Building Local Links

Local link building is crucial for improving your local search engine optimisation strategy.

It involves getting other websites to link back to your site. It can improve the quantity and quality of traffic from search engines. 

Building strong relationships with other businesses can increase your website's visibility. It can also expand its reach beyond organic search results.

This also helps create trustworthiness with users. They're more likely to click on a link if it's recommended by another business or organisation.

When trying to attract links locally, choose those that have high domain authority. They also have to be relevant to your target location. 

Look into directory listings that offer premium listing options. For example, Yelp and Yellow Pages.

You can also opt for industry-specific directories. For instance, like Angie's List or TripAdvisor. It depends on the sector in which you operate.

Connecting with influencers in your area is also a good idea. Just make sure they share content related to your niche.

This could involve guest blogging opportunities. You can also ask influencers to write reviews about your services or products.

Using social media platforms is key. It's ideal for promoting any campaigns or initiatives in your local community.

Post relevant content, local news, and special deals regularly across various channels. For example, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc. 

By doing so, you will further establish yourself as an industry leader. You will also help drive referral traffic. This happens when people engage with your posts and tag their friends and family.

📣 Generating Local Reviews

Over 80% of consumers look at online reviews before they make a decision.

This statistic highlights the importance of generating customer reviews for a business's success.

It's imperative to have customer feedback. It can help build trust with potential customers. It also boosts visibility on search engines. 

If you want to generate customer reviews, you can take advantage of review sites. For example, Google My Business or Yelp. You can do this by asking loyal customers to leave an honest rating and comment on their experience.

Offering incentives (such as discounts or special offers) may encourage more customer reviews. It can also lead to more positive feedback.

The trick is to capture a genuine customer experience. That way, businesses can promote themselves locally and improve their SEO rankings.

📈 Tracking Your Results

When measuring the effectiveness of a local SEO campaign, there's a lot to think about.

This includes website analytics, keyword performance, link-building effectiveness, and more. 

Proper tracking and analysis is very important. Without it, businesses may miss out on insights into their digital marketing efforts.

These are some metrics to keep track of to track your SEO results:

• Organic local search rankings
• Traffic levels from different channels
• Page views per visit
• Time spent on site
• Conversion rates for calls-to-action (CTAs)
• Click-through rate (CTR) from SERPs
• Bounce rates from SERPs

You can also use various analytics and tracking platforms to measure the success of your local SEO strategy.

These include Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Moz, Ahrefs, SEMrush, and more. 

Not only will these tracking tools let you know how to improve your strategy. You will also know how you compare to other websites in your niche.

Keep in mind that it will take time before your local SEO strategy starts to generate results. So, don't expect to see a difference in web traffic right away.

🚀 Improve Your Local Ranking with Local SEO

You can improve your local rankings in more ways than one. But you must first understand how important it is to optimise your site for local searches.

This comes with encouraging customer reviews and updating your GMB profile. You also have to list your business information accurately in different local directories.

Follow the local SEO tips from this guide if you want those results. Also, use useful SEO tools to grow your business online.

If you need help with your local SEO strategy, RankRise is here for you.

As a reliable digital marketing agency, we aim to help our clients improve their SEO and search result rankings. 

We do this by increasing your visibility in search engines. We can also help drive traffic to your website and increase brand awareness.

If you want to know more, feel free to contact us.