Most small businesses serve a specific geographic market. If you’re a roofer, contractor, plumber, HVAC company, landscaper or electrician, you want to be found quickly when someone needs your local services. If you want to get more leads, local SEO is an important marketing activity.
Local SEO incorporates the following:
- A properly optimized website
- A fully optimized Google Business Profile
- Strong local signals (citations, reviews, consistency)
When someone searches “roof repair near me”, “kitchen remodel” or “plumber in Middlesex County,” you want to be given an opportunity to get that home service customer.
Why Aren’t I Getting Enough Local Leads?
Most home service companies struggle with local visibility for a few common reasons:
- Your website is either slow, not mobile-friendly or not optimized properly (or all of the above)
- You haven’t claimed or fully built out your Google Business Profile
- Your business information is inconsistent across the web
- You have no process to actively generate reviews
The job of search and AI engines is to show the most trustworthy, relevant local businesses. If your competitors are sending stronger signals, they get picked, not you.
What is Local SEO?
Local SEO takes organic SEO and combines it with online strategies to make your business more visible to those searching locally for products and services. These local SEO strategies include:
- Localized content on your website
- Google Business Profile listing
- Bing Places for Business
- Apple Business Connect
- Citations in business directories
- Online reviews
In a world where we are always on the go, we rely on our smartphones to find the information we need. Millions of us use local search daily to find the best local businesses in our area. You can help increase your chances of getting found by implementing local search strategies.
What is a Properly Optimized Website for Local Search?
Before we get into these specific local SEO strategies, let’s talk about your website. It is the central focal point of your online presence and does the heavy lifting when it comes to lead generation.
That means:
- Service pages built around what you actually do (roof replacement, emergency plumbing, AC repair)
- Clear mention of the towns you serve where it makes sense
- Consistent Name, Address, Phone Number (NAP) across every page
- Proper title tags, meta descriptions, and URL structure
- Optimized images (yes, image file names matter)
What doesn’t work:
- Duplicate town pages with only the city name changed
- Stuffing city names everywhere
- Sloppy tracking phone numbers that confuse search engines
Also, most local searches happen on mobile. Therefore, your website has to be mobile-friendly or “responsive,” so your potential customers can get information about your business quickly and easily. And, Google uses mobile-first indexing, meaning it judges your site based on how it performs on a phone. If your site is slow or hard to use:
- Rankings drop
- Visitors bounce
- Leads disappear
Ensuring your website is designed properly for the mobile device provides a better user experience and plays a huge role in local SEO. Make yours clean and simple with easy to find local information.
Local Search Tips to Outrank Your Competitors
Create Localized Content for Your Website
On-page SEO never loses importance. It just becomes more localized.
Starting with your website, make sure you optimize for local search results. Be consistent with your name, address and phone number on your website so that it matches the local citations that you will need to claim and manage.
Add towns and cities you service where appropriate. Always remember to write for the human first. By doing so, you will be providing a good user experience and content the search engines will love.
Pay attention to on-page SEO techniques, localizing them where it makes sense:
- Include service pages that are unique for each area.
- Optimize images using locations in the file names. You paint houses and have images of your work in specific towns. Create the file names using the towns (e.g. residential-painting-boston.jpg). Also include the locations in the alt tags.
- Include your location in your title tags, meta descriptions, URL structure for the pages
Now let me re-emphasize the “where it makes sense” part. This leads me to the things you should not do when optimizing your website for local search results:
- Add service area links at the bottom of every page of your website that link to duplicate pages with only the town and zip code changed
- Put the name of a town at the end of every post title (e.g. 10 Plumbing Tips for Homeowners Boston, MA)
- Stuffing city and town names into the content everywhere
- Using different phone numbers for different locations for tracking purposes
Optimizing your website for local search results can be a winner if done right. Keep it human and let the search and AI engines index the content for best results.
Claim and Optimize Your Google Business Profile Listing
If you’re a local business, having a robust, optimized Google Business Profile is often more important than your website for local leads.
If you want to be found in local search, claim and verify your Google Business Profile. According to Google itself, you can improve your local ranking by using Google Business Profiles and creating a robust profile. Whenever someone searches for a local business, Google displays results using information it has in its database of local businesses. By providing accurate and up-to-date information about your business, such as your name, address, phone number, and hours of operation, you make it easier for potential customers to find you.
A strong profile includes:
- Accurate business info
- Proper categories
- A keyword-rich but natural business description
- Regular photo uploads
- Ongoing review management
- Consistent updates and posts (similar to posting on your Facebook business page)
Keep in mind that there is a lot of mis-information floating around as well. Don’t listen to those who tell you to use a PO box or stuff keywords in place of your business name. Create your account using real information. If your business has only one physical location and a service area, make sure that is how you create your listing.
Verifying your business location is a crucial step in this process. This can be done through a postcard, phone call, email or most likely, a video verification. Once verified, your business will appear in local search results, making it easier for potential customers to discover you when they search for your services.
Claim and Optimize Your Bing Places for Business
Similar to Google Business Profile, Microsoft offers their local business directory that can help you rank higher on Bing’s local search engine results. Make sure you claim and optimize your Bing Places for Business listing.
Bing may not have the same market share as Google, but it still powers search for millions of users, especially through Windows devices, Microsoft Edge, and voice assistants like Cortana. Setting up a profile is free and can help your business show up in local search results, maps, and even in Bing’s AI-powered search experiences. By adding your listing to Bing, you better your chances of being found over your competition.
To get started, go to bingplaces.com and click on “Get Started.” If your business is already listed, you can claim it; if not, you’ll be guided through adding a new listing. You’ll enter key information such as:
- Business name
- Address
- Phone number
- Website
- Hours of operation
- Categories that describe your services.
Make sure your information is accurate and matches your listings on other platforms like Google Business Profile or Yelp. Consistency is key for local SEO. You’ll also have the opportunity to upload photos, which helps your listing stand out and appear more trustworthy.
Once your listing is complete, Bing will require you to verify your business. This usually involves receiving a PIN by mail, phone, or email depending on your business type. After verification, your business will be live on Bing, giving you one more opportunity to connect with local customers who are searching for the services you provide.
Claim and Optimize Your Apple Business Connect Listing
Creating an Apple Business Connect listing is an important step for local businesses that want to show up accurately in Apple Maps and across Apple’s ecosystem, including Siri, Spotlight, and Wallet. If you’ve ever asked Siri to find a nearby service or looked up directions on your iPhone, the data comes directly from Apple Business Connect. This free tool allows business owners to claim and manage their location details. This makes sure customers find up-to-date information when they search on any Apple device.
To get started, visit businessconnect.apple.com and sign in using an Apple ID associated with your business. You’ll then:
- Set up your organization profile
- Claim your location(s)
- Provide key details like your business name, address, phone number, website, hours, and service categories
- Upload high-quality photos, logos
- Showcase promotions or seasonal updates through what they call “Showcases”
Once your profile is complete, Apple requires a verification step to confirm that you’re the rightful owner or authorized representative of the business. After your location is verified, your business information will be live on Apple Maps and discoverable across millions of iPhones, iPads, and Macs. Keeping this listing up to date ensures you don’t miss out on traffic from Apple users, a significant slice of the mobile market.
Claim and Manage Local Listings and Citations
A local citation is any reference to your business that can be found online. Search and AI engines look for confirmation that you’re a legitimate, established business. In addition to Google Business Profile, Bing Places and Apple Business Connect, that confirmation comes from:
- Yelp
- BBB
- Industry directories
- or other authoritative websites that may provide an online directory to businesses in your industry.
One of the major factors in determining how you rank locally is the quantity and quality of citations and the consistency of your name, address and phone number (NAP). Inconsistent listings with out-of-date information or different spellings of your business name can lower your visibility.
So, before you begin updating your citations, create a document that specifies exactly:
- The spelling of your business name
- Your address
- The main phone number to use
These must match exactly everywhere and should match the registered name with the state, the information at the post office, the information on your website and one main phone number. Even small inconsistencies can weaken your local authority.
Audit and clean up citations so your digital footprint is tight and trustworthy. Plus claiming and actively managing your free profiles on citation sites are a great way to get reputable back links to your website. Since many of these citation sites have credibility with Google, your listing on these sites can often show in top search results.
Obtain Online Reviews From Your Customers
Do whatever it takes to get online reviews from your best customers. According to BrightLocal’s Local Consumer Review Survey, 97% of US consumers read reviews online. And it’s no surprise that the use of ChatGPT and other generative AI tools for local recommendations has grown rapidly. According to the report, use is up from 6% last year to 45% and becoming the third most popular source of business recommendations.
Also from the report, consumers look beyond the star ratings when deciding which business to use. Trust in the business increases with:
- Number of reviews
- Recency of its reviews
- Speed of the business owner’s response
If you aren’t implementing a way for people to easily review your business on Google, Facebook, Yelp, Better Business Bureau or other review sites, you need to figure out a way to do so. Not only do they influence the consumer, they also affect your rankings in local search engines.
Add LocalBusiness Schema to Your Website
Adding LocalBusiness Schema to your site is a great way to boost your local SEO and give search engines a better idea of who you are, what you do and where you’re based. This type of structured data helps search engines understand the context of your business and can lead to more visibility in local search results.
By adding LocalBusiness schema, you’re giving search engines important business details like name, address, phone number (NAP), hours of operation and services. This can help search engines create rich search results that might show up as “Knowledge Panels”, with all the information right on the search results page.
This means potential customers can find the basics about your business without having to dig through multiple pages. And for local businesses being online means more foot traffic, more calls and ultimately more conversions.
You can create the proper schema JSON-LD by visiting this Schema Markup Generator. You can select your local business type. The schema.org library has several types of local businesses like “Restaurant”, “FinancialService” and “HomeAndConstructionBusiness”.
Add the key business information including business name, address, phone number and hours of operation. Make sure to keep this information consistent across all online listings to avoid confusing search engines or potential customers.
Add your code to the header of your web pages and then validate the code using Schema.org’s validation tool. It will let you see if your schema code is working. Running this test is important because even small errors can prevent your structured data from showing up in search results.
LocalBusiness schema can be a visibility booster. A properly implemented schema means you’ll show up in local searches, display knowledge panels and give a better experience to customers who are looking for your services.
Make Local SEO Part of Your Marketing Strategy
If you’re a home service company and you want more local, qualified leads, local SEO can’t be an afterthought. It needs to be a core part of your marketing strategy.
When homeowners need help, they want it fast and easy. If their furnace stops working, their roof starts leaking, or they need a plumber, they pull out their phone and search Google. In seconds, they’re looking at the businesses that show up in local results and deciding who to call. And, if your company isn’t visible in those moments, you’re losing leads to competitors who are.
Local SEO makes it easier for the right customers to find you when they’re actively looking for the services you provide. When your website, Google Business Profile, and local listings are optimized correctly, potential customers can quickly see who you are, where you serve, what services you offer, and why they should trust you. And that’s what turns online searches into phone calls, form fills, and new customers.
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