What is Local Search Engine Optimization?

This heatmap study shows how important local search rankings really are!
Most small business owners don’t realize the major differences between “organic seo” and “local seo” and wonder why they aren’t getting leads or phone calls. While both should be performed to maximize the online real estate of your business, local SEO has become an important business tactic for physical storefronts for many reasons. The main reason is that most local searchers click on the map pack results and not on ads or organic listings. As you see in the image on the left, a majority of the clicks on the 1st page go to local results and it’s not even close.
That being said, Google uses a completely separate algorithm when determining how to rank local business in the “map pack” and you need have a specific strategy in place to be effective. A business with a physical storefront doesn’t receive a lot of sales or leads from online users in different cities. Of course there is some benefit to ranking in a large geographical region, but it’s even more important to rank highly in specified local search markets. A majority of your customers are performing local searches such as “Lansing Dentists”, or “Plumbers in Lansing”. If you are a local storefront business and aren’t currently highly visible in local searches then you are simply losing business to your competitors.
What Local SEO Services Do You Provide?
As I mentioned above, Google has an entirely different algorithm for ranking local business sites. Yes, there is some slight crossover, but it’s essential to follow the best local search practices to show up highly on the map pack and STAY there. Here are some of the main services that we provide in all our local SEO Campaigns.
- Optimized and relevant setup of your Google Business account.
- A full citation audit to discover inconsistent listings and opportunities of growth.
- Local directory citations. We make sure you are in the best directories for your business market.
- Rich media citations that are beefed up with geo-tagged media to help increase relevance.
- Social media citations. They are becoming more important and you can’t be left behind.
- Offpage link building and landing pages for cities outside of geographical area