Local SEO is very essential and plays a huge role to smaller businesses that operate on a regional or selected service areas, as opposed to a national level. While national SEO focuses more on ranking in SERP across the country, local SEO prioritizes appearing on searches in a specific location. This local SEO approach relies on marketing your brand, products, and services to potential customers and eventually convert to leads

Optimizing your local SEO means you want more website traffic, leads, and conversions since the strategy is more focus to your base of local customers. Think of this focused strategy as a way to help you compete more effectively against larger national brands that are willing to invest from their unlimited resources. Understanding local SEO, you can neutralize the advantage of dominating bigger brands that routinely optimize for broader keywords and rely on brand recognition, instead of value propositions in order to drive traffic in their website.

WHAT’S HOT IN 2020?

Thinking about what’s hot in 2020 local SEO tactics? Check out this graph below:

Removal of Spam listing through Spam fighting is the hottest local SEO tactics today. The least would be the GMB listing/category.

The Rise Of Google My Business Listing

Take a look on how Google My Business became popular over the years. We can see how relevant this type of listing for local businesses. 

The Top 15 Local Pack Factors

Primary GMB Category: the only way to rank quick and easy is to be on the right category in Google My Business. Placing your business in too many categories will confuse Google as to what your website is all about.

Keywords In GMB Business Title: Consider placing keywords in your Google My Business title but don’t overdo it nor stuff it with keywords. A natural way would mean success for your GMB listing.

Proximity Of Address To The Point Of Search: The only way to be on the top 3 is to provide the right address and service areas your are focusing. This way Google will not have a hard time finding your business.

Physical Address In City Of Search: Google doesn’t accept PO Box address, find your business a physical location so Google can find it easily.

Additional GMB Categories: This could be tricky but adding 2-3 additional categories wouldn’t harm your listing. But can add flavor to it.

Quality/Authority Of Inbound Links To Domain: Adding some spices to your listing from high quality backlinks will support rank your GMB.

Keywords In Native Google Review: At some point, Google also now crawls reviews that includes keywords the same as your business.

High Numerical Google Rating: Obviously, we all want positive reviews. However, don’t just gather this reviews – make sure to engage with it.

Removal Of Spam Listing Through Spam Fighting: Have you tried reporting a GMB listing due to keywords stuffing or GMB Spamming? If not, then try looking for those listing.

Completeness Of GMB Listing: Your GMB Listing represents how complete your business is. Make sure to complete all details as much as possible. In this way, Google finds your business more appropriate than others.

Verified GMB Listing: No one runs a business without a business permit, so same as with your GMB Listing – it won’t be available to the public if you haven’t verified it.

Quantity Of Native Google Reviews: The more reviews, the more it shows that many people are using the service. A bad review could affect it, but it is also the best room for your business improvement.

Keywords In GMB Landing Page Title: A natural way of providing your GMB Title with keywords will never harm your listing. Take advantage with the right number of characters placed in GMB Page Title.

Quality/Authority of Inbound Links To GMB Landing Page Title: It means giving a push or support not just going to your website but also to your GMB Listing if possible.

Topical Keyword Relevance Across Entire Website: A product/service needs an informational keywords not just within your GMB Listing but also to all pages in your website.

Rank your Local Business in Google Local Listing today. Dominate and get leads through GMB advanced features. Local SEO never fails local businesses in getting sales/leads they need. This is the only answer to small scale business that needs their phone ring and get the sales they need from their local listing while optimizing their website so to keep up with Google’s latest algorithm.