Why is Local SEO Important for Your Business?

Tuesday, October 15, 2019

When one is seeking local services like plumbing, roofing, restoration, carpet cleaning, grooming, or even a good place to have a meal, they take out their phone and type/speak to Google for recommendations. This is how most customer journeys begin.

As a business owner, you shall know the ways to become ‘findable’ in the local search results. Your business information should be right there in front of customers each time they try to find services/products offered by you in your region.

To go big in your local space and attract major footfall in your store, your business simply needs to catch up with the “phone friendly” customer behavior - it will make it easier for you to be discovered locally and from mobile phones. That’s where local SEO comes into the picture.

Local SEO - What’s There to Know?

Local SEO, often known as local search engine marketing, is an effective practice to increase the visibility of your physical store in unpaid search results. It’s like a segment of your overall SEO strategy that serves to promote your business’ visibility on location-based searches.

The aim of local SEO is to market your products/services before your local, ready-to-buy customers at the exact time when they are making an online search.

All in all, if you care to be found by the local audience and dominate the market competition, local SEO is your go-to strategy.

Top Benefits of Local SEO

According to Google, more than 80% of users who do a local search on their phones visit or call a store within a day. In fact, nearly 45% of all Google searches are seeking local information. This is a big enough reason to have a strong local SEO strategy in place.

Optimizing your local SEO is one of the most effective ways to get found your potential local customers in the right stage of their buying journey. Here are a few major reasons to start with Local SEO -

Attracts Tech-savvy and Informed Buyers

A few years ago, everyone used to refer to Yellow pages, a giant clunky directory to find information about local businesses.

However, modern customers don’t need it anymore; they just have their phone in their pocket.

These days customers use their favorite search engine to look for anything and everything. Google can help you pinpoint locations that relate to your interest and deliver search results tailored to the area indicated by your GPS. Not only the exact address but Google helps you with the direction from your location to that address as well as shows your star ratings and feedback from other visitors making it more convenient for you to choose the right business for your needs.

Helps You to Rank on the First Page of Google

Local businesses have the most chances of getting ranked on the first page of Google. The search algorithm is designed to get the most relevant nearby business to the top of the search results page.

If your digital presence is not optimized locally you won’t be visible to your potential customers, that would be like keeping mum while customers keep knocking on your door so they could buy your products. Direct them to your physical as well as virtual storefront by implementing the right Local SEO strategy. Listings that are done on TripAdvisor, Yelp, Foursquare, and other platforms can majorly contribute to your ranking.

Drives Highly Targeted Traffic

When your local SEO game is strong, you can expect a surge of highly targeted customers who are looking for services/products offered by your business. This will help you promote your business and enjoy a competitive edge. However, to reap maximum benefits, never forget to have a consistent NAP.

Name
Address
Phone Number

Be consistent with your NAP on every platform you register your business on. If there is a mismatch in your information between different platforms, Google bots will consider them as different businesses and your local search results might suffer.

Wrapping Up

Local SEO is here to stay.

People will always be looking for local places to get what they need, and Google will continue to improve their algorithms to ensure only the most relevant and optimized businesses get noticed. Make sure that when someone searches for you, your listing is fine-tuned and spread among enough platforms to show up in the first few results.

Walibu can help you set up and maintain a strong SEO foundation and campaign that can keep your business readable and reachable online.

Click Here to complete a quick SEO questionnaire for your business website. You can also email us at team@walibu.com, and we will get back to you right away!

Feel free to reach out to us if you are interested in improving the online presence of your business. Our passionate and qualified team will be very happy to help you grow your business. If you have any questions, let us know!

See you here next week!