A Beginner’s Guide to Local Search Engine Optimization
A Letter to Small Business Owners
Dear Small Business Owner (you),
If you have your company phone number anywhere on the Internet you’ve probably gotten spam calls from ‘internet marketing companies’ claiming to be Google, or asking you to update your Google listing. Shortly thereafter, they pitch you a service that guarantees first page placement on Google for a certain amount of key words, in your area and surrounding areas.
First off, if you don’t have a physical location like a restaurant or an office, this definitely will not work. P.O. boxes are not accepted with this system either.
I wanted to take a few minutes and clear up a few of their claims while offering a few resources to do this for yourself, for free.
Don’t fall for the guarantees.
1. No one can guarantee first-page placement on Google within 60 days unless they are using Google Adwords.
2. No one can guarantee that they will get you to the first page of Google in multiple cities for multiple keywords, again without using Google Adwords.
3. If they claim they have a proprietary process to do this, they do not — it’s actually common knowledge.
4. If you dig into their terms of service, you’ll notice that the companies will ‘suspend billing’ if they do not achieve this within a certain time frame. By this time, it’s too late and you’ve paid anywhere from $600-$1,500 with no chance of a refund. More importantly, they will not suspend billing unless you ask them to.
Here’s what they actually do.
1. The company claim and verify YOUR Google Listing. This is what’s used on Google Maps. This is YOURS, never let anyone claim it.
2. They’ll submit your business information to local directories to match your Google listing.
3. They may create social media pages with your name to help populate on Google as well.
4. In many instances, duplicate listings are created on your behalf which may actually have a negative effect on your current rankings on Google.
5. They may make you a templated website, but it is typically not a customizable website and in most cases, you won’t’ have access to make any changes yourself.
Heres what you can do.
With all that said, you can do this all yourself and it doesn’t take very long. I’ve included some resources that can help you optimize your search engine presence yourself. Keep in mind, this is a very basic way to develop a presence in your local area and does not substitute for a full marketing campaign.
1. Claim Your Google Listing — That link will show you step by step how to do it. When you do claim it, be sure to add pictures, complete all your business information and make sure you verify the listing. Google has made this really easy. Additionally, when it’s published on Google have some of your customers leave reviews on the page to increase its relevancy.
2. Submit Your Business Information to Local Listings — That link shows the top 50 FREE listings to submit your business information to. Be sure that information such as the phone number, business description, address and business name matches exactly on each and exactly to your Google listing for best optimization results.
Side note, Hub Spot is a very well known and reliable source for search engine optimization best practices.
3. Create a Business Facebook Page — This differs from your personal page and allows customers to leave reviews, for you to add your address and business description. Facebook has made this really easy. Again, make sure that all your information matches to your listings and Google pages. This is important though, as Facebook pages do come up in Google Search.
4. Claim Your Business Yelp Page — Yelp in many cases is the first directory that comes up after Google Listings on Google. It’s important to have this optimized and claimed. As far as Yelp Advertising is concerned, that’s dependent on your budget and goals. In some cases we recommend it, but be sure to ask questions like “where will my listing come up when someone searches (your service) in (your area)?” and be sure you’re happy with that answer.
5. Build Your Own Website — If you don’t have one already. Squarespace is one of our favorites for small businesses, and even though it might be tedious, you can customize it exactly as you’d like it. Be sure to add your business information and — — you guessed it, make sure it matches your listings and Facebook page.
Hack: Create a document with all your business information in it so you can cut and paste it into each directory to help save time.
If you already have a website, on-site SEO (SEO done directly to your site) is a completely different process and I recommend finding an experienced professional that you trust to help you with that. We don’t do SEO ourselves, but we work with OS Ignite on many projects and at the very least he’ll educate you on how it can be done and set realistic expectations for your business.
I hope you found this helpful. If you have any other questions, feel free to reach out to me anytime and I’d be glad to help you out.
Your friend,
Mikhail Alfon
