Figure Out Your Target Audience
In the past, SEO efforts focused on doing things to your site that would automatically target the people who were interested in what you were offering. However, local SEO is a little different. You have to know who you are marketing to before you implement a marketing strategy.
Take a few minutes to think about who your potential customers are, where they live, what are the things they are searching for online. Are they looking to buy or do they need convincing? Are they looking for a cheap solution or are they more interested in a lifestyle? This will form the basis of your keyword research. Choose terms that reflect what you are selling and in such a way that it will appeal to your customer base. Use the Google Adwords Keyword Tool to find relevant keywords. You'll also want to choose keywords that have high search traffic but little competition. Once you've created your short list, move to step 2.
Update Your Page Titles
On your website, the area where you put your page's title is known as the title tag. Your title tag is searchable by search engine crawlers and is perhaps the most important area of your website for ranking and indexing purposed. You will want to have your carefully selected search terms listed in your title tags. You will also want the city and state of the locale you are trying to promote in there as well. Make sure that your title is still readable in plain English and that it makes sense to readers. And ensure that all title tags throughout your website are unique.
Add a Few Internal Links
Having internal links in your website pointing to important pages is also important. Your homepage is important, so there should be links on other pages back to your homepage. Other pages in your website that are linked to from the homepage are also important, so don't forget those. Make sure that your links include relevant keywords from your list from above and try to make sure that your links are using different keywords from each other and from the ones you used in your title tags wherever possible. Try to use natural phrasing for better readability.
Add Your Address to Every Page
In the footer of each page, you need to add the name, address, and phone number of your company. This helps reinforce location to search engines as well as making it easy to find for customers.
Claim Your Profile on Relevant Directories
While there are tons of business directories out there that you can use to promote your business, you need to make sure that you have claimed and completed your profiles on these high profile directories: Google Local Business Center, Yahoo Local, and Merchant Circle.
Make a Video
Multimedia is a huge hit with customers and adding a short video about your company to YouTube, your directory listings and more will make your company shine. You can do it cheaply and easily by just explaining who you are and what your company does. Be charming. Be likeable and keep it simple. Use high profile keywords in your title on YouTube and then link to it from your website.
Add a Blog To Your Site
Blogs are a great way to engage readers and reduce your bounce rate. It's also a great marketing tool because you can expand your keyword list to include things that are relevant, but in a more peripheral way. When adding content, focus on interesting topics. Use a method of writing that engages the reader and keeps them interested. Make sure that your content is 100% unique and use keywords naturally throughout the content.
Local SEO is vital to your marketing strategy. But it doesn't have to be complicated or difficult. It is also important to note that local SEO isn't a once and done effort. You'll need to tweak it from time to time. And while these techniques barely scratch the surface of things you can do to boost visibility, it's a great start.
