Trying to do your own SEO for your website can be a daunting task, especially if you have no experience with SEO. For instance, you may not understand technical SEO, how to speed up a website, how to build backlinks, how to do keyword research, how to optimize each page, etc. In fact, to be effective with search engine optimization, you have to be adept with all of these things! In this post, we will cover some of the most basic local SEO ranking factors and what they mean.
I just want to preface this article with a specific mentality. The list below should be considered as a checklist, not a comprehensive checklist, but the highest priority items you need to list for effective local SEO. If you check off more of these boxes than your competitors, you will outrank them more easily. If you have optimized fewer than they have, you will simply have to put in the work to address that. Half the battle is simply knowing where you are in the process – then, it’s just a matter of learning how to optimize the various components and fulfilling them.
Local SEO ranking factors or ranking signals are specific factors that either help your website rank or hurt your website. For any Digital marketing or SEO agency, this is the framework we follow to assess the state of your site’s SEO. Local SEO is at the bottom of the pyramid when building an effective SEO campaign. If it’s not set up right, then the rest of what we do will not be as effective. As you will see below, there are several factors, but this is only scratching the surface. We at Next Level Services are capable of addressing each of these factors to impact search rankings for your website, no matter what industry you may be in.
Google uses these ranking signals to figure out how to place your website on the search engine result pages (SERPS). Local SEOs (like us) look at your site’s signals to figure out the appropriate strategy to get your site ranking. The image you see to the right shows the main factors to be aware of.
Understanding the type of SEO is important. Some we can control easily through the CMS itself. Some of them require a collaborative effort with other individuals or entities, depending on how your organization is set up, and some will require a measured degree of luck and persistence. The main branches of SEO are:
Before we discuss the local SEO ranking factors, we need to mention the branches they are. Technical SEO all has to do with the website. Is it fast and efficient? How is your site structure? On-Page SEO is everything on your actual page that we can control. Every page on your site should be optimized with a purpose. The third type is off-page and is generally out of our control. That doesn’t mean we can’t control it or optimize it – it just means we need put effort into it and know exactly what we’re doing.
The goal of optimizing for local SEO is to get featured in the local pack, which controls a whopping 44% of all clicks for local businesses. The data used in this post was extracted from MOZ’s local SEO Report from 2020. Let’s discuss each of the local search factors listed and how to optimize each one.
It was a shocking report for many as GBP and location had long been considered the unquestioned most important ranking factor. SEOs love on-page elements because we can control them completely. As long as we stay up to date on best practices, it’s generally just a matter of keeping each page focused on specific criteria – a checklist if you will. Here are a few important things to consider for on-page optimization.
Google Analytics shares a ton of valuable data and metrics for your site. As it turns out, the metrics about your organic traffic is pretty important in terms of ranking in local search. Universal Analytics (soon to be replaced by GA4) has an entire tab dedicated to Behavior. Let’s go through a list of these and how you want them to look.
Google My Business (now known as Google Business Profile or GBP) is the easiest place to start when optimizing your local SEO. There is no reason your business should not have a GBP. Any way Google gives you to show off your business on their platform needs to be your #1 priority. Your Google Business Profile is your inside track to injecting your business’s info directly into Google’s veins. There is a lot you can add to your Google Business Profile so they know exactly who you are and what that means to their users (possibly your next potential customer(s)).
If you remember the three branches of SEO, we mentioned off-page. This is the largest part of the off-page SEO that is vital to perform to rank well. Building links to your pages and content will build link equity (also known as link juice), which will flow throughout your site, assuming you have internal linking in place. An inbound link is like a vote for your site in the eyes of search engines. The more trusted the domain, the better the link.
Related: Is linkbuilding dead? I’m sure the suspense of that question is killing you. learn some killer linkbuilding tips here.
Citation signals are a big part of how the local community views your business. It’s no wonder having consistency is important. What does this mean exactly? You just want to make sure your name, address, and phone number (NAP) are all listed the same way across all platforms that mention your business. Yelp, Facebook, Google, Foursquare, TripAdvisor, and Yellow Pages are just a few examples. You can either enter and track these profiles manually, pay for software, or hire us to do all the work for you!
Check out our full guide on NAP SEO for more information.
Google has released a plethora of tools and resources for local businesses to utilize. Sharing Google Reviews is a great way to get your customers to tell Google how much they love you. For instance, our Google Review link can be found here. Please feel free to tell Google what you think about our services now.
Do your local listings (GBP, Yelp, TripAdvisor, etc.) get engagement? What is the CTR? Have you received any calls or bookings through your listings? Google pays attention to your listing engagement. Just like with the inbound links, they will boost your rankings if people are showing interest through your online profiles.
It used to be a firm belief of many that location was the king of local SEO. It’s still important, but the effects of Covid changed the location bias that used to drive local SEO strategy. Listing an address is still vital, however. Even if you are an online-only business, it still helps to have an address to share.
Similar to one of the local SEO ranking factors listed above, location will help you rank within your given area. It might not seem important, especially if you have an online business, but Google still prefers to serve up businesses that are close to where the browsers are browsing.
A lot of folks tend to focus on this factor, paying hundreds or thousands on likes, shares, and subscribers. While all of these are important depending on your business model and industry, they will not impact rankings as much as some might lead you to believe. It does help to share your content on Facebook, LinkedIn, and even Twitter, but it’s not worth all your time to spend chatting up customers on a post.
Your local marketing efforts should be robust with specific goals in mind. There are still many companies that still neglect their website and prefer to be in the trenches, on the phone, or meeting face-to-face. The globe is definitely trending toward a virtual world where consumers research and buy more goods and services online. Understanding the local SEO ranking factors is vital if you want to compete in your locality and outrank your competition.
The good news is, your competitors may not understand the power of SEO yet. That gives you a distinct advantage if you take the knowledge in this article and run with it. If you prefer to outsource the SEO to someone to save you time and effort, we would be more than happy to provide cutting-edge SEO services at an affordable price. We are a Milwaukee SEO Agency based out of Waukesha that serves Southeastern Wisconsin. Of course, we can help any business in America, but our market is Wisconsin/Northern Illinois. If you are interested in exploring a partnership with us, you can either reach out through our contact page or request a quote today. Thanks for reading through this entire article!
In today's digital age, having a strong online presence is crucial for businesses seeking to…
Since Google emerged as a force to be reckoned with in the late 90s, marketers…
NAP SEO doesn't relate to a sleepy form of search engine optimization. It stands for…
This website uses cookies.