SEO for local businesses has changed dramatically over the last few years, and it’s likely to keep changing even more in the coming years. Local business owners who can stay up-to-date with these changes will likely be the ones who succeed and even thrive as they gain an edge on their competition in the local SEO Gold Coast. If you want to be at the top of your game by 2022, here’s how to make your local SEO a priority this year.
What is Local SEO?
Local search engine optimization is an increasingly important part of digital marketing. While many local businesses don’t give it much thought, it can be surprisingly effective if done right. With that said, there are dozens of ways you can optimize your website for local SEO—and some of them are more effective than others. In order to improve your ranking in local search engines like Google and Bing, you need to figure out what techniques will help you meet specific goals.
Who should do local SEO? Checklist to Improve Your Rank!
At some point you’ll likely want to rank high for local keywords, like restaurants nearby or hair salons near me. While these phrases can be tough to target organically, that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth trying. This checklist will help you make local SEO a priority in 2022 so you can improve your ranking for relevant keywords that bring new customers your way.
-Create a solid foundation
It’s always good practice to set up your site with good SEO. When setting up your website, use keyword-rich URLs for all of your pages and include relevant keywords within those URLs. If you’re creating new content, think about how that page will rank organically and what kind of keywords you can include within it. This doesn’t mean you have to stuff your content with keywords—just write naturally and add words where they make sense.
-Local keywords in content
In order to be found by local keywords on Google, you need two things: local content that includes your target keywords and Google My Business (GMB) information for your business that has those same keywords. You can’t rely on just one or even both of these; you have to have both. The great thing about local-based websites is that they typically come with both of these preinstalled because they’re designed specifically for businesses like yours. If you aren’t getting natural traffic from searches related to your business, it’s probably because you’re lacking either keyword-rich content or GMB data/information.
-Optimized tile tags
When it comes to local SEO, having your business appear on Google Maps is critical. Optimized tile tags, which help you stand out from other businesses that serve your area, will help you get noticed by potential customers when they search for certain keywords related to your services. To ensure local customers are finding you online, optimize your tile tags with pertinent keywords. You can also add contact information and a link to your website so visitors can learn more about your company and easily click through for more information or book an appointment with you.
-Fast site speed
Users love fast websites, so it’s important that you prioritize speed. Google has started taking page speed into account with its ranking algorithm. The good news is that there are many ways you can improve your site speed by focusing on page size, server response time, and caching issues. Here are some resources on local SEO Gold Coast businesses can use to improve their rankings over time.
-Good Internal links and Back links
Linking within your site or linking other sites back to your website helps search engines determine its relative importance. This is called link authority. Inbound links and anchor text give Google (and other search engines) two signals that they need to assess how important your content is compared with that of another site – length of time it has been around, and number of inbound links. Internal links help tell Google which pages are more important than others on your site – and can also help users navigate their way around.
