Let's get started!
Table of contents
Local SEO Optimization: What is it for and why?
How local searches appear in SERPs
How to satisfy the user's search intent
Monitor your positions in the "local package"
Prepare your company's listing for local SEO: What is NAP?
How to review and update NAP data
Action plan for local SEO optimization
Conclusions
Local SEO Optimization: What is it for and why?
Imagine that you have finished a long and tiring day but with a happy ending in which you have achieved the goals you had set for yourself, whether personal, academic or professional.
And what better way to celebrate and regain energy than to treat yourself to a good dinner?
As you are passionate about beef (here each one would put their favorite dish), you do a voice search: “where to eat the best beef steak”.
You wait for the results to come out and... let's suppose the following information comes out:
Local SEO Action Plan - Local Search Setup
As you look through the links on this list, you can't help but think: "It's 9pm and I'm in Seville. What do I care if León, Ávila or Castilla have the best beef steaks in the world? I want to eat it here and now!"
The above scenario is a bit unrealistic.
If you actually do this search, you will find that, in addition to links to restaurants in other cities, there are also several links to where you are or nearby:
Local SEO Action Plan - Real Local philippine area code Search
As you might have guessed by now, the first image, with only results from other locations, is a small montage.
I did this because I wanted to highlight some important factors that will affect our Local SEO strategies :
When using a mobile phone, the user searches wherever he or she is, which may be his or her place of residence or any other location.
You are searching by voice, so your expression and the words you use will differ from how you would type your query (for example, the use of articles and prepositions, or colloquial expressions).
The search does not include any words about where the user is located or where they want to eat.
There is no explicit reference to the user's search intent; that is, that they want to eat the best beef steak near their location.
In addition to “global” results, Google shows results for places located in the user’s vicinity (“local” results).
Ultimately, Google is trying to provide a good user experience by providing users with information that is as useful as possible based on their geographic location, without being limited to the words they used to perform the search.
How does this dynamic affect business owners or professionals?
They will have to do everything in their power to ensure that Google has the relevant information necessary to link them to a specific search intent within a geographic area and that they can be included in these search results.