Local Search Optimization Guide - Local Search, Local SEO

Local SEO is the optimization process for local results in search engines. Your website shows up in Google search and Google Maps

Local SEO focuses on delivering results relevant to the current position of the searcher. If you search for ‘delicious buffet’ Google will give you the results that are closest to you.

Local search

Local SEO is very different from regular SEO campaigns and local search results are changing faster than any other way.

Content:

Ranking factors in Local Search

Basic steps on local SEO

Step 1: Set up or Request a Google My Business Listing

Step 2: Set up or validate your business on the secondary search page

Step 3: Set up citations for your business

Step 4: Collect Comments and Reviews

Step 5: Add content reviews to your website

Step 6: Add Your Location to Your Website

Step 7: Outbound links

Step 8: Test your website’s Download Speed

Step 9: Is your website mobile friendly?

Improve with Local SEO

Step 10: Create high quality, unique Content regularly

Step 11: Optimize for Voice Search

Step 12: Get backlink your content

Step 13: Add Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) to your Website

Ranking factors in Local Search

The weight of ranking factors in local SEO has a few other factors compared to conventional SEO such as Location signals, your business signals, links and onpage factors. They still play big roles. The difference is that the type of link you want to focus on will be very different.

Moz’s Local SEO ranking factor

Weight of Local SEO ranking signals in Pack / Finder:

Signals of your business information: 19%
Link signals (Anchor text, Authority domain, number of backlinks): 17%
On-Page Signal (NAP – Name, Address, Phone): 14%
Signal cited: 13%
Review assessment signal: 13%
Signal behavior (Clickthrough rate): 10%
Signal personalization: 10%
Social network signals: 4%

According to the Street Fight Merchant Local Merchant survey, 25% of small and medium businesses say search engine optimization is the marketing area they need the most help with.

Google introduced the Pigeon update in July 2014, changes to local search algorithms and search optimization.

Ironically, as many businesses become aware of the need for search engine optimization, SEO becomes more complex.

Although these steps are still part of the local optimization process, Hummingbird has integrated many traditional signals into local search.

Basic steps on local SEO

Step 1: Set up or Request a Google My Business Listing

You need to claim Google My Business page.

When setting up you need to do the following:

Add a long, unique description that is formatted correctly and includes links.
Choose the right type for your business.
Upload as many photos as possible.
Add local phone numbers to your list.
Add your business address that matches the business address on your local website and directory.
Upload high resolution profile pictures and cover photos.
Add open time / day (if relevant).
Receive real reviews from customers.

NAP (Name – Address – Phone: Name, address, phone number)

Consistency is the key here. You need to make sure you have NAP on your entire site (i.e. every page). Moreover, you must use correct details / formatting when you mention your address on other websites (For example: local citations).

You will also want to use the Schema.org markup on NAP to give search engines all they need to properly display your company information.

The screenshot above shows that local businesses in London have put their NAP at the bottom of their website, marking it with data markup Schema.org.

Here is the code you can customize with your website:

<p itemprop = “name”> COMPANY NAME </p>

<p itemprop = “streetAddress”> ADDRESS LINE 1 </p>

<p itemprop = “addressLocality”> CITY </p>,

<p itemprop = “addressRegion”> REGION </p>

<p itemprop = “postalCode”> POSTCODE / ZIP </ p.

<p itemprop = “telephone”> PHONE NUMBER </p>

</div>

Or expressed by json-ld as follows:

{

“@context”: “http://schema.org”,

“@type”: “LocalBusiness”,

“image”: “https://Bizzvn.com/images/logo.png”,

“address”: {

“@type”: “PostalAddress”,

“addressLocality”: “Cau Giay”,

“addressRegion”: “Hanoi”,

“postalCode”: “100000”,

“streetAddress”: “226 Cay Tram, Go Vap”,

“addressCountry”: “VN”

“description”: “Bizzvn Comprehensive SEO Solution, Provides SEO knowledge to make search engine friendly website”,

“name”: “Bizzvn Comprehensive SEO Solutions”,

“telephone”: “0916883366”,

“openingHours”: “Mo, Tu, We, Th, Fr 08: 00-17: 00”,

“geo”: {

“@type”: “GeoCoordinates”,

“latitude”: “21.0312024”,

“longitude”: “105.7800692”

“url”: “https://Bizzvn.com”,

“sameAs”: [“http://www.facebook.com/Bizzvn”,

“http://www.twitter.com/Bizzvn”,

“http://plus.google.com/+Bizzvn”]

}

</script>

Results appear in Google Search

Local search results in Google search

Results appear on Google Map

Step 2: Set up or validate your business on other search pages

Bing Places
Yahoo Small Business (now Aabaco Small Business)
Yelp Cho business owner
Map of Apple
Facebook is investing heavily in local search. Become a popular platform for consumer reviews and your Facebook business page can appear in search results.
LinkedIn: if you have ever traded with other businesses, you should register a business on LinkedIn.
Other social media or media sites that fit your audience and interests (i.e. Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, YouTube).

It is a good idea for most businesses to set up with these search pages.

Step 3: Set up citations for your business

Citations are additional websites on the web where you can list your business (e.g., businesses, industry, directories and associations based on location, etc.).

Main tools: in national citations, there are several citations or collections. They not only recognize and provide information to the search engines, but also push out business information for small quoted websites. These collections include:

Localeze
Infogroup
Acxiom
Factual

You can set yourself up or use a service like Moz Local or Yext to complete them.

There are loads of other free citations that you can set up. Avoid quality websites or suspicious content. Do not pay for quotes (with outstanding exceptions of those listed below).
There are only three types of quotes that are worthwhile:

Your local chamber of commerce, or other prominent business directories / groups
Better sales office
Industry-related associations in the region or the country. For example, Financial Advisors should join the Financial Planning Association (FPA).

Remove duplicate quotes and error quotes. Duplicate listings or different addresses and phone numbers will confuse the Search Engines and harm your chances of ranking well. Moz can help you identify some error lists.

Step 4: Collect Comments and Reviews

Collect as many positive reviews as possible. Address, but not obsessed with regular poor reviews. Unless you have specific industry-specific websites that depend on reviews, I will make Google My Business and Yelp look at priority.

Step 5: Add content reviews to your website

Content review refers to the use of keywords on the page to let search engines know what your page is about.

Your Google portfolio should become the keyword for one of your pages, usually the homepage because it usually has the highest Domain Authority and the page most citations (and links) will point to. This page must contain at least 300 words related to keywords. More text will be better for search engines, finally remember that the text must be valuable to your visitors.

No matter which page you choose, ‘category + city’ is often part of the keyword phrase. For example: Las Vegas financial plan

Your ‘Keyword + city’ will appear

In Title Card: On the homepage, add your business name. (e.g. Las Vegas Financial Plan | ABC Financial)
In your page title (h1 tag)
In your content where appropriate. It is recognized as having more important meaning near the beginning of the article, or when it is in bold or italic in your content.
Alt attribute. Text on your pictures

Step 6: Add Your Location to Your Website

Include your NAP (for each position) in the Header, Sidebar, or Footer so that it appears on all pages of the website.
Create a separate website for each location. This page must be part of the navigation (for example, in a drop-down list under the Navigation Title of ‘Location’).

Step 7: Outbound links

Although there are questions about the effectiveness of this practice, the idea behind it is that you prove your relevance and credibility by linking to reputable websites or community websites in the same field.

Step 8: Test your website’s Download Speed

According to Kissmetrics, 47% of people expect a page to load in 2 seconds or less and 40% will actually abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load. As such, Google has put a focus on speed and provides tools for you to check your website’s load time.

Step 9: Is your website mobile friendly?

2015 witnessed the arrival of mobilegeddon and expected that your website would be mobile friendly. You can check the mobile performance of your website in Google Console.

Improve with Local SEO

Step 10: Create high quality, unique Content regularly

It is important to realize that search engine optimization is not a one-off, but rather part of your overall marketing effort.

Although content creation is not highly technical, it has a high level of commitment that many small businesses often disobey.

Create content about your industry, common customer questions, and current events in your community.

Whether you produce articles, videos, images or podcasts, your content will help prove both your relevance and reputation to the search engines as well as to the expertise of your potential customers.

Step 11: Optimize for Voice Search

Voice search continues to grow and spread. This means longer natural language search queries.

How do you optimize for voice search? Create content that answers those natural language queries and use those queries as keywords. Voice search is usually mobile, so make sure your site is mobile friendly and the content for these searches is clear and clear.

Step 12: Get backlinks from your content

Backlinks – links from other sites to your site are still among the strongest SEO signals and also one of the most difficult to implement.

Again, one of the pillars of developing a strong backlink is the development of good content, refer to the article Make a backlink based on content.

While building backlinks can become very time consuming, there are simple steps you can take to support the purchase of backlinks without having to be a professional link builder.

Links to other regional websites or blogs from your site and content. Let them know that you have linked to them.
Create shareable content – “SEO process to the top” list, “SEO without backlink”, etc.
No proclamation and prayer. Share your great content – via social media and email, with other industry and blog or website areas.
Guest posts on related and quality blogs.

Step 13: Add Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) to your Website

By the end of February 2016, Google’s AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) will be available to everyone. AMP is designed to make mobile pages faster, and with Google’s emphasis on speed and user experience, it will certainly impact future search rankings.

Google’s goal is for “all content to be published, from news articles to videos and from blogs to photos and GIFs, to work using Accelerated Mobile Pages.”

If you determine the AMP is right for your website, you can start by following the instructions provided by Google.

Conclusion

Local SEO is becoming one of the essential components for every business and brand that wants long-term success on search engines. If your business has an online business strategy but has not implemented Local SEO, then the sincere advice you should plan to do this as soon as possible because of the benefits and value that local SEO brings.

Good luck!

Local Search Optimization Guide – Local Search, Local SEO

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