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The Importance of Local SEO and How It Benefits Your Online Store

8 min read
Andrew Macaluso May 23, 2019

You've likely heard a lot about local SEO being a standout among the most significant aspects of the digital marketing world.

When you have a physical store location, whether that’s a restaurant in Chicago, Illinois, an auto shop in Tacoma, Washington or a clothing store in Long Beach, California, local SEO plays a vital role in generation new customers and bringing in conversions.

As a local business owner, you may feel there’s little point in putting time and money in your online presence on Google when a quick search shows you contending with major stores like Target and Amazon.

That might matter when it comes to organic listings, but for ranking locally, it’s a different issue altogether.

To determine whether or not your local business is relevant geographically to those performing a ‘nearby’ search, Google has created local rankings factors.

What that means is that you won’t have to worry about competing with large corporations like Target and Amazon to get customers to visit your business locally.

This article breaks down that information for you, so you can have a clear idea of the importance of local SEO and how it promotes your online store, and how it can help grow your business.

 

What is Local SEO?

local seo

Local SEO’s main purpose is to advance the visibility of your business on location-based searches.

It is only a different variation of your ordinary SEO, and is meant to ensure your business gets found online by individuals searching for it at that exact location.

Certain Geo qualifies are included in these searches, for example, city, state, zip code, and so on., and ‘nearby’ searches, where Google picks up the Geo-area of the individual and gives query items from that area.

 

Why is Local SEO Important to Your Online Store?


If you have a physical store location or one in a certain locality that provides a service to the public, local SEO is crucial for your business.

A study performed by Forbes shows that 95% of users with a smartphone have used their device to perform a local search, and according to SearchEngineWatch, 70% of mobile phone users call a business directly while doing a local search on Google.


What Does Local SEO Consist of?


As the name recommends, local SEO centers around pulling in clients from smaller areas, for example, in a specific town or city.

Those that aim to reach this audience to drive more in-store traffic to their brick-and-mortar location, or develop a business in a certain area, is typically performed by local businesses.

Doing so requires improved visibility on Google Maps and in Google’s 3-pack of SERPs, which provides local consumers with special results to their area or within a certain distance from their physical location.

Proximity, relevance and prominence are all key elements to ranking in the local pack.

 

What Kind of Benefits Can You Expect to See With Local SEO?

 

An Increase in Traffic to Your Site

Increase webtraffic

With the amount of competition on the internet, increasing traffic to your website is no easy task.

While many web design companies and SEO service providers claim to be the best in the business, that’s not always true. In order to drive more traffic to your website, you need the right SEO tools and white hat tactics to do so.

By utilizing both of these key tools, you will see traffic increase on your website at a stable rate, as well as conversions.

Improved Brand Awareness and Credibility

Improve brand awareness

Search results that appear on the main page of Google and also shows up inside the initial 5-6 results, are increasingly trusted by visitors online.

At the point when your company’s website is shown at the top, it portrays that you sell products or offer services that clients need and improve their way of life.

The content and information on your website should not just be relevant, but also useful for those in need of problem solving. Improved rankings help establish credibility and brand awareness.

More Consistent Results

Consistent results

When it comes to organic search optimization, you may not see overnight results but your websites ranking will gradually improve, which is something that does not happen when you stop paying for paid advertising on Google.

In short, generating traffic organically will result in more consistent and permanent traffic.

And if you put fresh, relevant content on your site on a regular basis, your rankings will continue to improve.


Your Web Pages Will Be User-Friendly

User-friendly webpages

If you want your website to SEO friendly, your web pages have to be user-friendly first.

What makes your website user-friendly?

Smooth navigation, easy browsing, enhanced performance and smooth transactions make for an extremely effective optimization strategy.

Your Business Will Be Able to Be Found in Organic Search and on Google Maps

Organic search on google map results

Another incredible advantage of Local SEO for your online store is that Google puts you in two of its business listings.

The first spot is on Google's organic search results.

Google utilizes an exceptionally complex algorithm to rank the most relative content at the top so searchers get exact results.

The second spot Google will list your business is in Google Maps.

It is very important for a business to be positioned in Google Maps so searchers with purpose discover your business, especially while using a mobile device. If there is one thing searchers want, it’s fast results.

Google is fully aware of this, too, which is why they normally place the local listings in the form of map listings above search results on search engines.

A typical map listing allows those performing a search to click on the business’ site, call the business, read reviews of the business, and get directions to the business’ brick-and-mortar location.


Find Out How Your Competitors’ Customers Are Finding Their Site

competitor analysis

Another great benefit of Local SEO for your online store is that you can find out which keywords drive the most traffic to the websites of your competitors.

This kind of information can be extremely beneficial to your business and can provide you with information on what services your competitors are providing their customers, that you should also consider adding.


You Can Have Reviews Left For Your Business

Review for business

With Local SEO, your local online reputation will be able to improve.

In order to do so, you will need to acquire positive reviews for your business from customers on Google and other places like Yelp.

The more positive reviews you have, the most trustworthy your business will appear to be.

If you’re sitting at the top of Google’s organic search and Google Maps with great reviews, you are destined to acquire more in-store and online traffic to your store.

In conclusion, there are many positive benefits of implementing local SEO for your business.

The higher your business ranks on Google’s search engine and map listing and the more keywords you rank highly for, the more business your business will be seen by potential customers.

Every local business with an online store can reap the benefits of adding local SEO to their web marketing strategy with time, effort, and consistency.

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