Local SEO is critical for relatively small companies operating on a provincial rather than a national scale. While national SEO is more concerned with ranking in search queries throughout the country, a local SEO strategy is more concerned with showing up on search rankings in a given region. This method is focused on promoting your company image, goods, and services to your local customer base if you are in Columbus, Ohio.

Because the approach is so much more applicable to your base of local clients, improving your local SEO implies increased website traffic, leads, and click-throughs. Consider this targeted strategy as a means to assist you in achieving a competitive advantage against more prominent brand names with infinite resources. Through focusing on particular local-SEO tasks, you can offset the edge of larger brands that habitually optimize for broader keywords and depend on rand awareness rather than service offerings to drive traffic.

Furthermore, as shown in a 2021 ReviewTrackers research, 35% of all web traffic is local. Without local SEO, your company may be missing out on a lot of traffic. Below are the top ten strategies to succeed with local SEO.

1. Set up an account with Google My Business.

Improving your Google listing (also known as your Business Profile) is possibly the far more efficient strategy to rank higher on Google Maps and spread awareness in Google Search local results. Nevertheless, to unlock your Business Profile and make these changes, you must have a Google My Business account linked to that account. When you enter all of the required data in your Google My Business account settings menu, the system will apply it to your Business Profile, which will show up in Google Search local searches, Google Maps, and the Google Search Knowledge Panel.

2. Obtain Consistent Positive Feedback from Satisfied Customers

Having your consumers share excellent feedback for your company improves your Google My Business profile and motivates more local clients to come to you. According to BrightLocal’s 2021 Local Consumer Review Study, 88% of customers read online feedbacks as much as specific suggestions.

3. Prepare for Voice Search

Soon, voice search will shoot through the roof. As a result, in local SEO, it’s critical to optimize according to how people would make queries when speaking into gadgets, rather than how they type out their search queries.

Basically, when conducting voice searches, your clients utilize long-tail keywords than when carrying out regular lookups. As a result, you’ll need to modify the SEO of your content to match the far more conversational style of someone talking. For instance, you’ll need to compensate for the standard question starters (who, what, when, where, why, and how).

When maximizing your site for voice, it’s equally critical to think about user intent since these queries are commonly done when users require precise information. They expect an immediate and valuable response when they ask Alexa to change tablespoons to cups while baking. If a prospective client is using voice search to inquire about your company’s hours, this info should be easily accessible.

4. Make Your Website Mobile-Friendly

According to an OuterBox survey looking at mobile vs. computer trends in 2020, the transition to smartphones is happening quicker than anticipated. Phone website visits increased from 57 percent in 2019 to 63 percent in 2020, while computer website visits decreased from 43 percent in 2019 to 37 percent in 2020. A further Acquisio research from 2021 discovered that web traffic from local search results could be particularly lucrative, with an impressive ROI.

5. Concentrate on Local Keywords

Your keywords ought to be helpful to the customer. It makes perfect sense, does it not?

Google’s Keyword Planner allows you to scan search terms by location to have an understanding of the most searched keywords in a particular region. This will enable you to make a list of regionally related keywords for targeting. Once you’ve obtained those, they must show up in your website’s meta content, web copies, and web links.

You equally have to provide references of regional points of interest and access points in your content as well. For example, if your neighborhood restaurant makes dinner in downtown Columbus, add examples on your website.

6. Make Use of Online Business Listings

Websites such as Yelp, YellowPages, Foursquare, and MapQuest are instances of search engines and directories. There are numerous others.

Adding your company’s name, address, and contact information to these listings will not only improve awareness but will also help your online visibility.

7. Acquire High-Quality Backlinks

Link signals score first and second in Moz’s 2020 local SEO Ranking Variables research for local pack (or snack bundle) outcomes and localized organic results, respectively. Link signals are inbound links referring to your website.

It is crucial to collect links to optimize your online visibility further, but the strength of those links is also essential. This is why hiring a marketing agency Columbus Ohio to build high-quality links is paramount.

8. Create a separate webpage for every product/service you provide.

Although it may be enticing to group the entirety of your goods or services on a single page, fight back the urge. Alternatively, devote one page to every specific service or product you provide.

Because search engine crawlers don’t see your brand as a leader in one particular region, putting everything on one page reduces the power of your local SEO juice. This reduces your chances of ranking.

If your company does not offer a range of products or offerings but has multiple locations, simply use location-based web copies on every page. “Digital marketing agency,” for example, would become “Columbus marketing agency” or “digital agency Columbus Ohio.”

Conclusion

SEO evolves at a rapid pace. You won’t know when Google will add new functionalities to its SERPs for local search results, and you can rely on these updates. That is why it is critical to remain at the forefront of local SEO at all times. By incorporating these eight practical steps, you will guarantee that your company not only benefits from hugely profitable local searches but also has a good base when new SEO elements are launched. If you don’t have the resources or time to change these things, you might want to consider hiring a small business digital marketing agency Columbus Ohio.