Local SEO for service area business

What is Local SEO?

Local SEO for services area business refers to all site optimization activities that make your website visible to local customers. Local SEO is most focused on the customers of a specific neighborhood, city, or country. To do local SEO, many steps must be taken.

Why is Local SEO Important for Service Businesses?

Before entering your business into the web world, you have to compete with other businesses in your area and want all the local people to be your customers. This competition and attracting customers online is much more complicated than these words and is not limited to 1 or 2 competitors.

Your potential customer searches Google for a term and comes up with tons of pages with flashy titles. With this situation, it is better to invest in local SEO for your site and local SEO for businesses.

Rank higher in local search results

When someone searches for a business or place around their location, they’ll find local results across Google in places like Maps and Search. Use the Google Business Profile to improve your local business rankings.
Generate more qualified leads and customers

By using Local SEO, you can make more links introduce yourself to more locals give them the thread of your presence, and as a result, find more customers.
Increase brand awareness in the local community

Brand awareness is an important achievement of branding. Through brand awareness, we can convert sales leads into customers and thus increase our business conversion rate.

Brand awareness occurs when people connect with a product and company, especially emotionally. This can be achieved through the advertising provided through your social media and website, the connections your company has with the community, and the quality of the products and services you offer.
Compete effectively with other service businesses in the area

When you start your own business, competition will be quite inevitable, and often this competition is very important and necessary for the success of companies. This importance is because competition in business allows organizations and businesses to gain market share and position or to stabilize and improve it. This can be done much faster by using local SEO and bring significant progress.

Other importance of local SEO:

Local search is very targeted and fast.
A large percentage of local searches convert into customers.
Smartphones that use the Internet are constantly being added.
The return on investment in local SEO is much faster compared to other methods of local advertising.
Many local business opportunities are free.
A large number of customers trust local businesses.

Challenges of Local SEO for Service Area Businesses:

After we found what is local SEO for service area businesses, we faced challenges in this area, such as: managing customer expectations, managing multiple locations, staying up-to-date for competing with larger businesses, challenges to choose the right tools for this work, etc.

Optimizing Your Google Business Profile (GBP)

What is a Google Business Profile?

GBP is a free service that helps businesses appear on Google Search, Maps, and other Google products. It’s a tool that helps businesses manage their online presence and make it easier for customers to find them.

Businesses can claim their Google Profile and add information about their business, including contact information, hours of operation, photos of the business location, and more. They can also link their social media accounts to their Google account so they can share their content on Facebook or Twitter directly from their list.

The Importance of a Well-Optimized GBP

There are many reasons, including:

Increasing visibility

GBP statistics from Google show that if your profile is complete, users are 70% more likely to visit your business and 50% more likely to make a purchase.
So, if you don’t have an optimized GBP, you are almost certainly losing out on views, clicks, traffic and ultimately paying customers.
Trust and Credibility

When people see your business as trustworthy, they feel more confident in making a purchase decision. This is why building trust and credibility with potential customers is important for any business. Creating and optimizing a GBP is a great way to do this.
Brands with GBP are more likely to be trusted by online users. This is partly because users trust Google to verify businesses. Simply put, if a business isn’t legitimate, Google won’t verify it.
Your GBP also provides your business with a level of transparency that can help build trust. If a user can see your physical location, contact information, and products or services, they are more likely to perceive your business as legitimate.
On the other hand, if the information in your profile is incorrect, it can reduce the trust and credibility of your brand.
Customer Engagement
An optimized Google Business Profile also allows customers to leave comments about your business, ask you questions, and send you direct messages. This is critical to attracting potential customers as a significant number of them rely on reviews when making a purchase decision.
It adds credibility to your business when they can see real feedback from other customers. Plus, Google takes reviews into account when ranking businesses in local search results. Responding to comments also shows Google that your profile is active.
Positive customer reviews also serve as free advertising for your products or services. Since they are not encouraged by your business, customers tend to trust them as much as personal recommendations.
Increase the number of phone calls
When users see your brand name in the Google Map Pack list, even if they don’t intend to visit you in person, they will at least contact you and may turn into a lead.
Increase customer conversion rate
Usually, users who use local searches to fulfill their needs convert to customers faster. Also, most of the leads that come from local SEO are genuine and have a high conversion rate.
Creating a competitive advantage
By focusing on local SEO strategy and getting a high ranking in Google Pack, you have created a competitive advantage for your business and can attract targeted customers to your site.
Increase in mobile traffic
Since Google Map Pack takes up more space in the SERP in mobile display, placing your site in the Google Pack list increases the probability of users clicking and choosing your brand.

Completing Your GBP Profile:

Setting up a Google Business Profile is relatively simple, here are the steps to do it:

Login to Google account:
First, make sure you’re signed in to your Google account, or create one if you don’t have one yet.
Then go to the Google Business Profile Manager section and click on the “Manage Now” button.
Add your business
Next, you need to enter your business name. Since people can submit new locations to Google Maps, your business may already be listed on Google Maps. If your business name appears in the drop-down list, you can click on it. If it’s managed by someone else, you’ll need to claim it (Claim keyword) (we’ll walk you through this later). If your business is not listed, now is the time to add it.
Start creating your business profile by selecting the main category your business falls under (eg, restaurant, shoe store, law office) and click “Next”
Enter your location
If you do not serve customers at your business address, you do not need to enter a business address, so you can select “No” on the next page.
For example, if you have a plumbing business that is based in Seattle and you perform your services on customers’ premises, you do not need to add a business address. Instead, you must add a service area (Service Area keyword). This can be done after you set up your profile, so we’ll get to that later.
However, if you have a hybrid business (Hybrid Business keyword), you must add a location for your business. Hybrid businesses provide services to customers at their business address but also visit or deliver goods to customers.
In this case, select “Yes” and click “Next”.
On the next page, select your country and enter your street address, city, province, and zip code. Click on “Next”.
Enter your contact information
Type in your business’s phone number and website (the website section is optional) and click Next.
High-quality photos showcasing your business and team
To have the best profile, you need to use the right high-quality profile photo.
Verify your Google Business Profile
After entering all the details, you will be redirected to the confirmation page. Click on “Continue”.

After this step, a few different things can happen. Most users will be asked to verify their business through one of the following methods:

Phone
Short message
Email
Live video call
Video recording
A postcard sent by post

Depending on the verification method that Google offers you, the verification time will be different.
Positive customer reviews (encourage users to leave reviews)
Getting opinions and suggestions from customers is very important and it is suggested that you ask them to share their opinions with you.
After entering the verification code, you should be approved immediately. But in some cases, Google may need to manually review the listing. In these cases, approval may take up to seven business days.
While waiting for approval, you can make changes to your profile. However, they will not be visible to users until you are verified.

In some cases, Google automatically verifies profiles. If you verify your business website through Google Search Console (GSC), your GBP can be verified immediately after creation.

Managing Multiple Locations

Multi-location management refers to the management of businesses that operate out of multiple locations. In the real world, the applications of multisite management are very context-dependent and should be considered in local SEO.

Additional Local SEO Strategies for Service Businesses

Keyword Research with a Local Focus
One of the ways to enter local results is to focus on local keywords (Geo-targeted keywords) related to your business. It is better to use the phrases “near me”, “neighborhood name”, “city name” and any phrase that can show the locality of your business, along with the keywords of your field of activity.
Website Optimization for Local SEO:
For your articles and pages to appear in local results, they must have optimized meta titles and descriptions with local SEO in mind. For Local citations and directory listings, It is enough to add the name of your city or activity area to the words of these two sections of the pages. Also, ensure your website is mobile-friendly for optimal user experience on local searches.
Content Marketing for Local SEO:
One of your most important actions in local SEO is to create valuable content to describe and introduce local businesses, for example: write suitable blog posts, local events, etc. If you have branches in several cities or several neighborhoods of the same city, it is better to produce specific content for each of them and not consider the same content for all locations. Also, be sure to use the name of your region, city, and province in addition to the keywords of the content, both in the text and in the titles.
Encouraging Customer Reviews
According to the MOZ study, the Review signal plays an important role in the local ranking of businesses. User comments and reviews show the quantity and quality of a business’s profile. It is also very likely that Google will use reviews from other sites such as Yelp.
According to a member of MOZ’s research project, “surveys with brand response show how much a user or customer trusts that brand and trust is a key factor in ranking results.” This means that responding to comments, even negative comments and complaints can help your local SEO.
Building Local Backlinks
In local SEO, various links make your site’s link rank in Google’s local results. The effective types of link building in local SEO are:
- Links received from other local sites
- Links received from local sites related to your industry.
- Links received from local partner sites.
- Links received from local news sites.

Build links for your site from the links your competitors have.

Measuring Local SEO Success

Key Metrics to Track:
To measure the success of local SEO, you should monitor several criteria, such as website traffic: the more traffic your website has, the more successful your local SEO is. Seeing positive organic comments from customers indicates that you are on your way to success.

Conclusion

Local SEO for services area business is a search engine optimization (SEO) strategy that helps your business be more visible in local search results on Google. Any business that has a physical location or serves a geographic area can benefit from local SEO. If used correctly and continuously, it can help increase brand awareness, traffic, and sales for your business.

In this article, we tried to introduce all aspects of local SEO and its techniques in detail. We hope you have used this article and we would be happy if you share your thoughts and experiences with us in Hellodigi

Frequently Asked Questions

What is local SEO and why is it important for service businesses?

Local SEO is one concept that, if used correctly, can help increase brand awareness, traffic, and sales for your business. In this article, we tried to introduce all aspects of local SEO and its techniques in detail. We hope you have used this article and we would be happy if you share your thoughts and experiences with us.

What are the benefits of local SEO for service area businesses and the benefits of local SEO for service businesses?

Some of the most important aspects of local SEO are as follows:
Increase organic site traffic
Easy access for customers to business information
Increasing the number of customers (local traffic)
Increase customer conversion rate
Creating a competitive advantage

What are the challenges of local SEO for service businesses and SEO for mobile service businesses?

On the way to local SEO, there are specific challenges that you will encounter, often these challenges can be solved together. Here are some examples of these challenges:
Project management, a.k.a., balancing client work and tasks
Providing a multi-service approach
stay up to date
Choosing the right tool

What information should I include in my Google Business Profile?

By creating a business profile on Google, you can provide Google with information such as business hours, website address, phone number, and the exact location of your business. This information is displayed when customers search for your company name or the type of service they need on Google and Google Maps.

How do I claim and verify my Google Business Profile?

To update your business information and claim that this business is yours, you must search for your business name on the Google search page or the Google Map site. Then the option “You Own this Business” or “Do you own this business?” Find and click on

How do I encourage customers to leave reviews on my Google Business Profile?

You can create and share a link to customer reviews. To encourage customers to use the link: Include it in thank you emails.

What keywords should I target for local SEO??

To find local SEO keywords, you can use the following methods:
Competitor Analysis:
Using SEO keyword research tools:
Use local searches:

What type of content should I create for local SEO?

This content should include relevant keywords, local services, and information about the business’s products and services. By providing useful and engaging content tailored to local customers, businesses can attract more visitors and improve their local search rankings.

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