The Importance of Local SEO for Reaching Customers in Your Area
Customers looking for products and services in their vicinity need immediate answers. Your business needs to show up at the top when a potential customer in your geographical area looks for the kind of product or service that you offer. Your local SEO strategy will play a key role in determining whether your business will be able to take advantage of this window of opportunity.
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Understanding Local SEO
Local SEO is a strategy aimed at enhancing the visibility of your business in local search results. Implementation of local SEO requires the performance of tasks such as keyword research, optimization of content, and the creation and maintenance of a Google Business Profile.
Successfully implementing a great local SEO strategy would mean increased traffic, better leads, more conversions, and higher ROI. Local SEO is especially effective and necessary in the case of small local businesses, local services, and business with branches in specific locations.
Organic SEO Vs. Optimization for Local Search
SEO can help you improve the ranks of your web pages for specific keywords in SERPs. Local SEO also helps you do this but for local keywords. The key difference between the two is the audience that the optimization efforts target. SEO typically targets the global or national audience, while local SEO is focused on the people of specific geographic areas.
Google uses a unique set of ranking signals to rank local search results, such as NAP citations, Google Map star rating, and shares on social media. Although local SEO is different from organic SEO, it is still dependent on organic SEO because Google gauges the prominence (one of the three main local ranking factors) of your website based on its organic ranking.
Importance of Local SEO
You can estimate the importance of local SEO from this information from Google: From the people who conduct a local search on their smartphones, 76% turn up at the local business within 24 hours. Out of the local searches, 28% lead to purchases. Also, according to a global survey, 74% of in-store shoppers said that they conducted a search for the store-related information before the shopping trip.
Reach Customers in Your Area With Local SEO
Now that you have an idea about the importance of local search optimization, let’s look at some of the ways in which local SEO can help your business thrive in your local area:
Catering to Micro-Moments
Micro-moments is a term that Google came up with to describe those moments when people use their devices to look for things to purchase, place to visit, activities to do, or information about a topic. These intent-rich moments are opportunities for businesses. Local SEO can help you make the most of these opportunities. It can help you ensure that all necessary information about your business appears in front of your potential customers just when they need it.
Better Leads
A successful local SEO strategy will ensure that the information of your business is visible to users who are actively looking for the type of product or service that you offer. Due to this, your business will attract only the best leads. There is a higher chance of conversion with leads that are genuinely interested in your products or services. The convenience of having your information at their fingertips is another factor that leads to more conversions.
Better Google Maps Placement
Local SEO strategy demands that you create, maintain and optimize your Google Business Profile. You also have to increase your NAP citations and maintain their accuracy and consistency. These efforts increase the visibility of your business in Google Maps, because these assure Google of the legitimacy of your business. Google will validate the location of your business, and it will improve the chances of the appearance of your business information in local search results. Better placement in Google Maps will make it easier for potential customers to find the location of your business.
Securing a Higher Rank in SERPs
Local search engine optimization efforts require research into keywords related to the location and the utilization of these keywords in the content and URLs. Optimizing your content and your website with location-specific keywords could lead to a higher rank in SERPs. People attach more credibility to the results that appear higher in result pages. Your website will have a higher clickthrough rate (CTR). This could mean more leads and possible conversions.
Targeting Mobile Users
Local SEO can target desktop users as well as mobile users. About 64% of all searches are carried out on mobile devices. Using local SEO for your business with the focus on mobile devices is as good as placing a business card in the hands or pockets of potential customers at the right time. As mentioned above, when people look for a local business online, they follow it up with a visit within a day.
Reviews from Nearby Clients
Quite often, people look for reviews online before deciding whether to try the products or services of a local business. Potential customers hesitate or back away if there are no reviews of a business online. One of the important tactics of local SEO is to motivate satisfied customers to leave positive reviews online. Positive reviews from local people will help build the reputation of your business, and encourage new people from the local community to try out your products or services. Even the way you handle negative reviews can change the perspective of potential local customers towards your business.
Making the Most of Voice Search
According to research by PwC, 71% of users prefer voice commands for search rather than typing on search engines. This is actually the most common and popular use of voice assistants.
‘Near me’ searches are very common among voice search queries. So, with a great local SEO strategy, you’ll get more success with voice searches. Again, this will it make it easier, simpler and very convenient for local customers to find you. Your business will be there at their beck and call. This could result in higher conversions and increased customer satisfaction.
Wrapping Up
In today’s hyper-connected world, local SEO is important for businesses with a local presence. For small businesses, local SEO is the bridge that can take them from barely surviving to thriving.
For the sake of business growth, a business needs to meet and exceed customer expectations. If you harness the power of local SEO, customers will be able to reach out to you when they are most in need. In other words, local SEO will provide you with opportunities to exceed customer expectations and expand your business.
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