Local Search Marketing can be an effective way to grow your business and attract more customers. It involves optimizing your website, Google Business Profile and garnering quality ratings and reviews about your products and services.
By ranking higher in local searches, more visitors may come into your office or storefront location.
Google Business Profile
GBPs (Google Business Profiles), also known as GBPs, are an invaluable asset and foundation of local search marketing. A comprehensive local SEO campaign includes GBP management and optimization as a key part of any comprehensive campaign, listing management on other location data platforms like Yelp or Trip Advisor reviews platforms as well as social media publishing, image and video production/distribution and strong focus on optimizing a company website.
Verified managers can make changes to the listing, such as services offered, operating hours and other aspects. You can also utilize Google Business Profile Insights for valuable insight into how customers are finding and engaging with your listing.
An effective Google Business Profile can drive tangible results for local businesses. Understanding how these listings function is key to providing optimal results for clients; this guide is intended to assist with this management and give a strong foundation upon which to build as you expand your local search knowledge and skillset.
Google My Business Listing
In order to optimize your local search marketing strategies, it’s crucial that your Google Business Profile (GMB) remains up-to-date. This involves filling out all relevant fields, encouraging customers to leave positive online reviews and updating any pertinent business info as it changes.
Google’s algorithm prioritizes customer reviews more than any other ranking factor. Customer reviews help searchers identify businesses most likely to meet their needs and deliver the best experience, as well as helping your site rank higher in search results.
Once your Google My Business (GMB) listing has been optimized, you should start seeing an increase in website traffic. But your work doesn’t end here! It is essential to monitor and update listings as necessary – adding products/services/special hours during holidays/events etc; using GMB features such as Messages to communicate directly with customers while keeping an eye on performance using tactics such as UTM tagging.
Google Maps
Google Maps provides businesses with a handy solution that enables them to embed maps directly on their websites while offering features like zooming and control settings, link text boxes, and customizable business information boxes.
Google gathers data to improve Maps through various techniques: adapting Street View cars specifically for this task; gathering GPS signals from mobile phones and crowdsourcing through Google Map Maker – which allows people to help correct errors and add places of interest – and crowdsourcing through crowdsourcing platforms like IFTTT (Independent Financial Trading Company of Taiwan).
The company tracks real-time traffic patterns to help avoid sending people down one-way streets or in directions which might cause frustration. Their service offers a button which people can use to report any problems with roads or sidewalks that is then reviewed and corrected accordingly.
Users can submit photos to add areas not yet covered by Google Street View, and request Google to blur images deemed sensitive, such as those depicting cyclists in urban environments or those depicting individuals with dementia.
Local SEO
Local SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is an offshoot of traditional SEO that encompasses all the ways a business can be discovered online by people searching for its services, from reviews, articles, interviews and video to image and video assets. For successful Local Search Marketing to take place, each piece of content must serve the customer by answering their queries while simultaneously optimizing for search engines.
One of the key components of local SEO is an effectively optimized Google Business Profile. It should be updated frequently in order to keep its data accurate and up-to-date, and create dedicated web pages for each location to optimize for more keywords and provide more helpful answers for searchers.
Be wary of agencies making unsubstantiated promises or promises about getting you to the top of Google search results; such agencies tend to be scams. Instead, seek an agency with real people working on client marketing efforts.