What Is Local Search?
We are always looking out for local services around us such as petrol pumps near me, metro stations near me, stationary shop near me. This all comes under local search. In local search, you get to know about all the local businesses which are running near you. This helps you to find the intended services quickly as per your need.
Most of the time, Google is showing you the results of small-scale businesses. Why? Because they operate on a regional local search and hence are providing people with the services which they search for.
Optimizing your local SEO is very important. This is because it brings out more relevant traffic your way and at the same time helps you reach specific local audience.
Without local SEO services, your business might be losing a significant amount of traffic and hence this can be cured when you make your local SEO successful.
Why Is Local SEO Important?
The main reason why Local SEO is important is that search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing aim to provide the exact and the most relevant results to the searchers. Local SEO is something that is done to show the results as per the proximity of the user. For instance, if a user is searching for an ice cream parlour near me, then the work of a local SEO would be to provide the local results, unlike an ice cream parlour existing 10 km away from the user.
Today, in this blog, you will get to know everything about how to optimize your website for local search so that you reach the target audience.
Top 4 Ways To Optimize Your Website For Local Search!
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Add Your Physical Address On Your Site
Well, adding a physical address of the place where you operate is the most relevant thing you must do. As people are searching for some service so they would be requiring some address, where they can reach and hence avail the service.
You can add the address in the footer section of your website. If you have multiple addresses, then preparing a separate address or location page would be an ideal choice. You must also add your contact details so that your customers can contact you easily.
Along with that, you can even think of providing directions to them with the help of maps. This would also prove to be beneficial. This approach is also known as N.A.P Approach (Name, Address, Phone Number) and it should be optimised to get maximum results from your local SEO efforts.
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Prepare A Google My Business Page (GMB)
Google My Business Page or GMB is a listing that is created by the business to list their business locations online. Creating GMB is completely free of cost. Whenever you search for some local business, the listings which you see on the search engine results page are what GMB exactly means.
The main purpose of inserting a GMB listing for your business is to make people know some specific aspects of your business such as the opening hours, directions to the location of your business, varied timings, closing days, among other essential things.
Some CTA (Call To Action) buttons are inserted in the GMB (Google My Business) so that the intended customers take the necessary actions.
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Try To Get As Many Customer Reviews As You Can
Getting customer reviews is the best thing which you can do to make your business trustworthy in the eyes of Google and the customers as well. Today reviews keep so much relevance in terms of trust and hence gaining that trust is essential.
You can get customer reviews on Google My Business (GMB) as well as on other social media sites like Facebook, Amazon, Flipkart, and some important niche-specific or generic local directories as well.
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Build A Mobile-Friendly Site
You must have observed that most of the audience make use of their mobile phones to search for some local service near them. Only a few make use of the desktop for the same. A mobile-friendly site is good for both SEO ranking factors as well as customer experience.
If you are a local business, then you must not miss being a mobile-friendly site as this way you can lose up on your potential customers.
There are several ways to check whether your website is mobile-friendly or not such as running a technical SEO audit, or you can even take Google’s mobile-friendly test.
Closing Words!
Well, as of now you must have realized how relevant is the local search for small businesses. It not only increases the visibility of your business towards your potential customers but also helps to launch your local business online.
