There is a lot about search engine optimization (SEO) for you to learn. Many people read articles online about SEO and they feel like they have become professionals in the field. Well, this is a feeling someone gets when they have understood something extensively. You feel like you can educate others about it. This is good but then, there is always something more for you to learn. As a matter of fact, this cannot be any more real for SEO. There is a lot of information online about SEO that makes people feel like that they have learnt everything about the topic. Sadly, a majority of the articles online about SEO are usually about organic SEO.
Local SEO has not received tons of content like organic SEO. This is probably because local SEO is still growing. It is only in 2011 that it was discovered that a majority of people search using mobile devices, and the queries that they make are based on a particular locality. People are looking for the nearest restaurant, steakhouse, hospital, grocery store and a lot more in the area that they are to be found. In 2013, Google reported that more than 80% of search queries that are made on the search engine have a specific location attached to them.
The local SEO misconception
And with that, the birth of local SEO occurred. People have been stumbling all over each other in an urge to understand how this optimization happens. It is still growing as a type of SEO, but there is no way that business owners can continue ignoring it. It works excellently for both online and offline businesses. Local SEO is continually becoming complicated with each passing day. People are doing this and the other on their websites in the hopes that it will improve their visibility in local searches.
The thing that you have to understand about local SEO before you even embark on a journey to find out how it works is that, it is not based on one tactic alone. Business owners nowadays seem to be watching a lot of videos and reading content about local SEO. When they realize that they are not using the tactic that is mentioned, they drop everything else and concentrate on the new tactic they have learnt. You can never do this and expect that your business is going to be successful. Local SEO is more than citations on Google Places. It is more than inserting a city or town in a title tag.
Doing this is like using a microscope and expecting that you will be able to see a bigger picture of the whole. The microscope simply concentrates on a particular part of the whole thing. When you focus too much on one activity, you are blind to a multitude of other factors that are equally important for the success of your local SEO campaign.
Get expert help
A good place to start is to get professional assistance from the leaders in this field. Contracting local SEO services should not be such a challenge. There are several companies that are providing SEO services nowadays and a majority of them offer both local and organic SEO. This is a really good route to follow because you can relax and concentrate on other things that are of equal importance to your business as local SEO.
Google seems to be making work for local businesses so much easier. This year the search engine unveiled Pigeon. This Google update has dramatically altered the way local results are calculated and it caused even professionals in the SEO business to be concerned. This basically means that you will have a lot to focus on, when you decide to do the work on your own.
One problem that many people have to grapple with when it comes to local SEO, is trying to remember to do everything right. Setting up a Google Places for Business page is not hard work at all. It is a very straightforward process. However, the same cannot be said about hooking your page to a Google+ local page. The connecting part is also simple, but then there are some simple mistakes that people make that make a whole world of difference.
For instance, the format of the address citation can affect your business’ SEO ranking. The name, address, phone number (NAP citations) format is the most common. However, some people tend to forget and put them in some other order that is different from the way it was cited in another location on the internet. When you hire a local SEO professional, you will avoid such nasty occurrences.
There are a whole lot of other benefits that you stand to gain when you hire these professionals. Typically, the SEO expert will:
- Ensure that your location pages are not only unique but also well-written
- Create local content that will be posted on your blog. Always remember that people are consuming content like food nowadays.
- Optimize Google My Business listing on Google+
- Get citations that you are lacking and clean up the existing ones
- Bring in social media to interact with your business’ customers.
These are just a few of the many things that are involved in local SEO. When you contract these services for your business, you can turn your attention to other activities like providing your customers with premium quality service. There is no point of marketing a brand so much and then when your prospects procure your products or services, they are just not impressed at all.
Conclusion
Local SEO is of great importance to any business whether online or offline. The problem with local SEO is that it is not as straightforward as many people think it is. It is a strategy that involves a good number of other strategies. If at all you want to be successful in your local SEO campaigns, then you should get an expert in SEO matters onboard to help you out.
Digital & Social Articles on Business 2 Community(18)
