Local search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of optimizing your online presence, from your website to online business profiles, to appear higher in relevant local search results, like “west hollywood plumber” for a plumbing company that serves West Hollywood, CA.

There are a few differences between local SEO and traditional SEO, including:

• Search intent: Local SEO focuses on searches with a localized intent, like “bakery near me,” while traditional SEO focuses on non-localized searches, like “productivity app.” Typically, businesses providing in-person services will use local SEO.
• Tactics: Local SEO and traditional SEO also use different tactics. For example, almost all local SEO strategies will claim and optimize citation listings, like Google Business Profile, because of their impact on local rankings.

In most cases, companies will invest in both traditional SEO and local SEO because they drive revenue.

Local search engine optimization is important for a few reasons, including:

• Relevancy: Search including “near me” have increased by two times over the past year. That means that more people are looking for an easier way to find businesses close to them online. With local SEO, you can reach users at a critical moment.
• Conversion rate: An impressive 80% of local searches, which makes appearing in relevant local searches even more important. Increasing your visibility could transform your business, helping your organization expand its service area, teams, and community impact.
• Tracking: You can also measure local SEO’s impact by tracking visits, phone calls, and more. With ODS’s local SEO services, you can also track local SEO’s bottom-line impact, attributing which in-store sales and leads closed because of local search.

With local SEO, you can improve critical metrics for your business, like:

• In-store visits
• Sales
• Leads
• And more

Multiple local SEO ranking factors influence your rankings, including:

• User experience
• Backlinks
• Keywords
• Google Business Profile
• Reviews
• Proximity

Optimizing your company’s website, plus local listings (like Google Business Profile) for local search rankings, takes time and skill. If you’re like most businesses, you have a packed schedule, which can mean a neglected local SEO strategy. That’s why organizations invest in local SEO optimization services.

When it comes to how to do local SEO, you’ll need to focus on these seven local SEO strategies. If you opt for local SEO services from ODS, we can handle all of these steps for you!

1. Optimize your Google Business Profile listing

Hallmarks of local search, Google Business Profile listings contain key information about businesses — and they appear when people search companies near them. For example, a quick search for “best pizza shop near me” yields the following results.

The listings at the top of search results make up Googl’s local SEO 3-pack. Searchers can see the locations of these pizza shops on the above map, and clicking the results displays the restaurants’ Google Business Profile listings.

These listings contain key information like a company’s address, hours, website, phone number, and even images.

If you want your business to appear in Google’s local SEO 3-pack, at the top of results, you need to claim and optimize your Google Business Profile listing. You’ll also want to keep your business name, address, and phone number (NAP) information consistent across your online listings to improve your chances of earning a top spot in results.

For more information on how you can optimize your Google Business Profile listing, check out our helpful blog post.

2. Build local citations

In addition to claiming your Google Business Profile listing, you’ll also want to build local citations.

These citations contain information like your company’s name, address, phone number, and website.

Citation building campaigns can help you earn local listings on sites like Bing, Yelp, Foursquare, Facebook, Apple Maps, TripAdvisor, and more.

Sites like BrightLocal can help you get started building citations, and local business SEO services from companies like ODS can ensure your citations are updated and driving relevant traffic to your website.

3. Target keywords

To rank at the top of local search results, you’ll also need to target local keywords on your website and in your site content.

Let’s look at an example.

If a dental practice in the Harrisburg area wants to rank in more local search results, they could optimize their page titles, meta descriptions, and site copy to include the keywords “Top Harrisburg Dentist” or “Award-winning Harrisburg Dentistry.”

In addition, the practice may consider creating some location-specific pages on their site. For instance, they could create a page for “Harrisburg Dental Services,” and highlight various dental services they offer to Harrisburg residents.

Targeting location-based keywords can help your business appear in more local searches so people in your area can find and contact you.

4. Monitor ratings and reviews

For local businesses, it’s crucial to monitor and respond to online reviews.

Ratings and reviews can appear on your website, as well as third-party sites like Google Business Profile, Yelp, and Facebook. Positive or negative, it’s important that you reply to all reviews to show customers you take their needs seriously.

People look at reviews before visiting local businesses, so keeping your reviews updated and responding to questions and comments will encourage more people to visit your business.

Worried about putting in the time to manage your business reviews? ODS offers online review management services to keep your digital presence in tip-top shape.

5. Build links

Earnings backlinks from other reputable, local businesses can also help to boost your local search rankings.

How do you earn links?

Start by creating valuable content that targets local keywords related to your business. If other sites like what they see, they can link back to your site in their content.

Search engines like Google consider both the number and quality of backlinks when ranking sites, so it’s important to have a strong backlink profile, complete with links from authority businesses in the local area.

6. Analyze user experience

It’s also essential to provide a great user experience (UX) on your site if you want to attract more local traffic.

If your website doesn’t provide a positive UX, visitors will waste no time hitting the back button — and your bounce rate will soar. High bounce rates signal a poor user experience, and search engines won’t rank your site highly if it provides a less-than-desirable UX.

Here are a few quick fixes for improving your site’s UX:

• Streamline your navigation and internal linking to make it easy for visitors to find the information they need.
• Speed up your site with page speed optimization services.
• Include visual and interactive elements to engage users.

7. Implement mobile responsive design

The final local SEO technique you’ll want to invest in is making your site mobile responsive.

More than half of online searches — nearly 60 percent — occur from mobile devices. Oftentimes, searchers need information while on-the-go, especially when it comes to finding local businesses.

The on-the-go-nature of mobile usage makes it crucial for local businesses to adopt mobile responsive site designs. When your site is responsive, it will look great and perform well, no matter the device someone uses to access it — a desktop computer, mobile device, or tablet.

Not sure if your site is mobile-friendly? Check out Google’s Mobile-Friendly test tool, and take it for a spin.

If you’re not happy with the results, don’t worry. ODS offers mobile responsive design services to help you improve UX and rank higher in local search results.

You need more than an SEO for local SEO — you need an entire team. That’s why our local SEO plans provide you with a complete digital marketing team, giving you the skillsets you need to develop, implement, manage, and scale your SEO strategy.

Your dedicated account manager will have an in-house team that includes the following:

• Local SEO experts
• Content specialists
• Copywriters
• Web developers
• Web designers
• Business consultants

When you have all the resources for local SEO, it’s easy to:

• Publish localized content
• Manage local listings
• Improve on-page SEO
• Refine strategy
• Pass competitors
• Accelerate local SEO’s return on investment
• And more

You can see the power of our in-house team by looking at our clients’ results:

• Northside Towing increased its year-over-year organic traffic by more than 90%
• Merrimack Vslley Psychology Associaltes doubled its revenue in six months
• Hurst Pediatric Dentistr increased its leads from organic search by 540%

Traffic is great, but is your business driving revenue from those visits?

At ODS, our local search engine optimization services focus on targeting keywords that convert — or contribute to your organization’s goals. With our client-exclusive technology, MarketingCloud, your business can also see which local SEO interactions resulted in a sale, store visit, or lead.

For practices like Merrimack Valley Psychology Associates, focusing on the bottom line led to:

• Doubling revenue in six months
• Hiring six new team members

If that’s the bottom-line impact you want to create with local SEO, then ODS is your perfect partner.

With first-party data, we’ve helped our clients increase their marketing ROI by 20% (or more). That’s why our local SEO optimization services help your business collect and activate its first-party data across channels like paid, social, and email.

For example, with access to MarketingCloud’s first-party data toolkit, you can:

• Launch hyper-targeted remarketing campaigns
• Create lead-nurturing email workflows
• Provide sales teams with a full-funnel view of a lead’s journey
• And more

The best part? You won’t find MarketingCloud’s tech anywhere else. We’ve developed it in-house, which means you have a competitive advantage that your competitors can’t get with another agency. So, wave goodbye to the competition and say hello to the revenue.

If you’re like most businesses, your brand invests in multiple digital marketing strategies to drive revenue, like local SEO, content marketing, and digital advertising. When you have an agency like ODS that can align your local SEO strategy with your overall strategy, you maximize your ROI.

As your partner, we’ll align your local SEO plan with your overarching campaigns by providing:

• Dedicated team of specialized experts in digital marketing, business, and more
• Full-funnel reporting for measuring all your strategies’ bottom-line impact
• Supporting services, if needed, for scaling your digital marketing strategy
• And more

Browse our case studies to see what our clients say about how we support their overall marketing plan.

Local SEO services are digital marketing services that help businesses appear in search results for location-related searches, such as for users in close proximity to the business. For example, local SEO can help a pizza shop rank for the search query “pizza near me” in searches by nearby users.

Prices for local SEO services depend on several factors, including your number of locations and your local SEO agency. Typically, businesses investing in local SEO will pay $300 to $2000 per month. For the more accurate local SEO pricing, though, request a custom quote.

If your business operates locally, regionally, nationally, or globally, you should use local SEO services. Why? Because local search helps users find a reputable business in their area, whether they’re looking for a bakery in their city, a vacation spot in their state, or an accounting firm in their country.

If you’re looking to invest in local SEO optimization services, here are some tips for finding a provider:

• Read reviews: Reviews provide social proof and preview what it’s like working with that local SEO company. So, see what past and present clients say. No company is perfect, but if you notice a trend, re-consider contacting the agency about their local SEO services.
• Get transparent pricing: Local SEO agencies vary, with some offering pre-built local SEO packages and others custom solutions. Either way, these agencies should provide transparent prices for their services before signing with them. If they don’t, continue your search.
• Investigate rankings: Many companies test new strategies and refine tactics using their own website. So, see how these agencies rank in localized searches and check if their Google Business Profile follows best practices.

For more tips, check out our guide on how to hire an SEO expert!

A local SEO company like WebFX works to improve your business’s online presence in relevant, localized search results. WebFX, for example, uses on-page local SEO and citation management, plus our industry-leading team and revenue marketing tech to improve your presence and revenue from search.