Local SEO Mistakes That Damage Local Search Engine Rankings
Local SEO is one of the most used ways to rank your business locally – it’s one of the search engine optimization strategies that can help your business target local customers and improve online visibility so you can attract more visitors.
More than 45% of all searches consist of location in some or the other way.
The above fact only highlights how essential it is to focus your marketing efforts on the local searches to ensure higher chances of success. But though local SEO has been around for a while, people are still not exactly sure about what it entails.
Local SEO – what is it really about?
You might already know that search engine optimization enables you to improve visibility on search engines results. Local SEO is basically just taking it a step further and making sure that you are visible on local search results.
Before you market your business globally, it’s always a smarter choice to start from the potential customers that are near you. It’s possible that they will trust your business more as you are local to them and give your products or services a try. Thus local SEO becomes one of the most popular services used, especially by small businesses around the world.
Local SEO mistakes that you need to avoid :-
Local SEO is nowhere near being a simple task – there are many things involved and that means there are several mistakes you can make along the way. And those mistakes often become the reason why you fail to target the local audience for your business. And especially as a small business, you cannot afford to lose the local market at all.
In this article, we are going to talk about some of the most common local SEO mistakes that you might be falling prey to as well. That way you can also understand what is keeping you away from getting customers in the local online market.
1. Targeting keywords that are not localised
Keyword research is one of the most used ways to ensure that your content is visible to your target niche. But not targeting local keywords can be one of the local SEO mistakes that keeps you away from attracting local audiences.
Before you target keywords that are popular around the entire world, you should think about keywords that your local audience is using frequently while searching online. That way, you have better chances to rank higher for your local target niche and gain more customers for your business locally. It’s also much easier to rank locally than it is to rank in the global market where the competition is even more excessive.
2. Customer reviews aren’t displayed over the business website
Customer reviews are often pushed back saying that they are not necessarily needed, but are nice to have in case customers might read them. But that is not really an accurate thought – customers reviews matter a lot more when you are targeting local clients.
95% of customers will read reviews before they buy anything online.
Customer reviews matter and now it’s time for you to also start taking them seriously. Local customers are going to consider you trustworthy and helpful when they see reviews from your past clients. So make it a priority to generate positive reviews and display them proudly on your website.
3. Not having a Google my business listing
Google my business is Google’s tool that you need to utilise to ensure that your business is ranking well on Google maps. It’s something that enables your local audience to find your business and services quicker.
It’s important to fill out all the details when you are listing your business on Google my business. The more detailed you are in the application, the more chances there are for your local clients to find you when they are searching online. Google is one of the most used search engines in the world, and it is a great loss if you don’t list your business on Google my business for local visibility.
4. Not taking mobile users into consideration while designing the website
Small businesses often want to reduce the expenditure as much as possible when it comes to the website design phase. But that doesn’t mean that you completely ignore the vast majority of potential clients that use mobiles to access search engines.
It’s extremely important to ensure that your website is compatible for both the web and the mobile version. That way, you can give excellent website experience to mobile users and also attract them towards your business. Ignoring the present dire need to optimise websites for mobile can truly get in your way to implement local SEO correctly.
5. Incomplete contact information on your business website
It always should be your first priority to make sure that the potential and existing customers have an easy way to get in touch with queries or anything else. Being an online business, this becomes much more important as clients need to know ways in which they can talk to you.
If your business website is not yet updated with your latest contact information, you might already be missing out on clients who wanted to talk to you but didn’t know how to do it. Whether it’s your phone number, email address, physical address, or anything else, you have to put proper communication portals that your clients can use.
Conclusion :-
Local SEO has been a buzzword that is now getting more and more popular in the business community. Business owners are now understanding the importance of targeting the local audience and ensuring that you are locally visible as well.
In this article, we talked about what local SEO is and some common mistakes related to it that you need to avoid to ensure your business doesn’t lose potential local customers.
