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Welcome back, we've talked a lot about the local business search landscape, and
discussed why it's important to set up a Google business page.
But what can you do within your own site to improve local visibility?
In this module we'll discuss how to optimize your website's content from
a local search standpoint.
Optimizing your website for local search is a little different than optimizing
your website for general organic search, though there are a few similarities.
We'll discuss why it's important to include location data on your pages.
How to adjust your strategy if you have multiple locations or
multiple services, and some other best practices for on-site local SEO.
Because your website caters to a local audience, your website should have
keywords and information related to the location you service.
This includes information your audience may expect to find as well as
information that helps reinforce the consistency of your business location.
This would include general directions,
information about the area, the city name, zip code and more.
When optimizing a website for local SEO, the name,
address, and phone number of the business are extremely important.
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For example, you might want to say, located in Davis California,
also servicing Dixon, Woodland, Sacramento, and surrounding areas.
If you offer multiple services,
It's a good idea to devote a page to each of the services that you offer.
This allows you to better optimize for
core set of keywords related to your business and location.
For example, if you are a Spa in Davis you might want to create a page for massages,
a page for manicures, a page for facials and other related services.
Your title tag can then include your service and location.
This will help you rank for a variety of queries a user might be using
such as massages in Davis or manicures in Davis.
It's also a good idea to have a blog on your site,
blogging on a consistent schedule keeps your content updated on a regular
basis which helps boost freshness related signals in Google's algorithm.
If your location is mentioned in your blog post,
this can help boost your authority on a topic within your local area.
An idea to naturally incorporate local keywords
would be to encourage readers to comment.
Maybe even share their hometown in these comments.
Blogs are also great for assisting with the development and
growth of your social media presence.
You can share your content on popular social networking sites, like Facebook,
Twitter, and Pinterest.
Depending on the type of business you or your client has,
you can also incorporate social platforms, like Instagram, or Periscope.
Since social media can indirectly lead to better rankings.
Getting a local audience engaged with you on social channels and
sharing your content can only help.
Not all of your posts need to relate to your location, but it is helpful if you
can find a way to include location related information without sounding spammy.
Don't forget that posting great local content and
resources can help you earn links from other local sites and businesses.
Brainstorm ways you can create great resources that everyone finds useful and
will link to.
Depending on your business type there are a lot of ideas.
If you are a spa, for example, a resource featuring the best parks and
secluded spots in your city to relax or meditate in, would be a great resource.
Search Engine Land published a post with great ideas for local blogs.
You can read that at the link provided in your course materials.
Another helpful element to consider
is using structured data to gain rich snippets in search results.
Rich snippets can improve the way your search engine result
displays in organic listings.
Rich Snippets often provide additional information to the user such as
review stars, this can catch the users eye and
result in higher clicks through to your site.
Review stars are common example of Rich Snippets.
For example if I were to search for
the Art of SEO one of the results I get is from O'Reilly.
And includes review stars based on the reviews users have given this book
on their website.
Another example is found in real estate.
If I were to perform a search for
real estate, I would see a list of upcoming open houses in my area.
This is accomplished through information imbedded into the html of a page.
A website schema.org is a collection of vocabulary and structured data.
If you are working with a small business owner, these sites are usually built on
platforms like WordPress which contain plugins that make this process easy.
For more detailed explanation of implementing structured data,
I recommend visiting Moz's SEO Guide on structured data at the link provided.
You can also visit schema.org to look at available formats.
You should now have an understanding of the similarities and
differences between local SEO and traditional SEO.
You should also know how to optimize a website for a local search.
Now let's move on to what you can do offsite to increase your presence for
local searches.
Rebekah MaySEO Manager & Lead SEO Instructor, Lead Qual
