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Local SEO Tips From a Grand Rapids SEO Company

What is Local SEO?

Local SEO is simply the search engine results that show up when you search for a term in a specific city. This means that somebody in Dallas who searches for a term like “roof repair” in Dallas will get different results than somebody who does so in San Diego. These results will return websites that are relevant to the main search term in the same city as the searcher. Obviously, you can see the value in ranking your roofing companies website so that when people search for related roofing terms in your city, they will come across your website.

The difficult of search engine optimization is that it is an ever changing field. What worked last year to rank a local service business may cause your website to get penalized today. When it comes to SEO, the truth is that you really can not watch a video or take a class to learn how to properly rank your website. For this reason, it is recommend that you do not try any advanced SEO techniques, otherwise you risk penalizing your website. We have reached out to a Grand Rapids SEO consultant to offer some basic advice for setting your website up for some success in the local SERPS.

Name, Address, and Phone Number

When it comes to local SEO, one of the most important things a business can do is let Google know where they are located. Obviously if Google understands that your business is located in Houston, you will stand a better chance of ranking for local searches in the Houston area. The easiest way to do this is to simply tell Google the physical location of your business. You will want to list the name of your business, the address, and the phone number for customers to call on your website, as well as on all the social properties, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest that you have set up for your company.

Now the key is to add your business to as many local citation sites as you can. Local citations would be websites like Yelp or Foursquare. These websites will list the name of your business, as well as the contact information you provide. When you submit your website to these local directories it is important that you use the same business name, address, and phone number for each one. For example, if your business is located at 123 main street, suite 2, you will want to put that exact address format on all the citation cites. Consistency in your NAP across all the web properties that link to your website is a key ranking factor in local SEO.

Optimizing Images for Local Search

One thing that you can do to help improve your local search results is to optimize all the images that you use on your website and other social properties. The best way you can do that is by adding Geo-tagging your images. This means that you update the meta data of your images in order to tell Google the location data of the image itself. There are many tools available that help you geo-tag your images, or you can do it yourself. Adding location data to your images is an effective way to tell Google where your business is located, and this helps boost your local search relevance.

On-Page Optimization For Local Grand Rapids SEO

One of the best things you can do for ranking in your local area is to mention that local area in your on page content. If you are a plumber in Chicago, make references to Chicago, Illinois, and other local neighborhoods or areas that you serve in your one page content. Utilize your websites title and and H1, H2, and H3 tags to tell Google not only what services your company provides, but what local areas they provide those services in. So if you own an SEO company for example, your might put Grand Rapids SEO – Internet Marking Company in the title or H1 tags on your website. It is important to avoid over optimizing though. So be sure to vary the phrases and terms you use in your title and heading tags. Don’t just put Chicago Plumber over and over, mix in stuff like Plumbing Repaid in Chicago, as well as more general terms like Plumbing Repair Services.