A Complete Guide to Local SEO Checklist

If you’re a digital marketer, it’s no surprise that some activities fade away when it comes to search engine optimization (SEO). It’s on your to-do list, but you keep putting it on the back burner.

Is there a short-term strategy you can adopt to get the ball rolling and improve your local search ranking?

After we go over the essentials, you can get a complete guide to local SEO checklist to keep track of your progress.

Importance of a Local SEO Strategy

Local SEO is the practice of enhancing a company’s online presence in order to target a specific geographic area. Marketing and webmasters pay more attention to local keywords, ranking criteria, and client testimonials than they do to general SEO principles.

You may be missing out on a significant opportunity if you automatically tune out when you hear the term “SEO.” Organizations of all sizes can reap the benefits of SEO. Using a well-executed local SEO plan can help you connect with a wider audience than ever before. Even though we say so, don’t take our word for it.

Google Page 1 receives 92% of all clicks. If you want potential customers to see your business, it’s right here. SEO Checklist for Local Search Engine Optimization.

Positions 1 through 10 are those that are included in the standard organic SERP listings.

SEO rating won’t signify what it used to in 2022 because of the increasing prominence of SERP features like image carousels, maps, lists, knowledge panels, dropdowns for “People also inquire,” and other sorts of local business cards. These featured snippets must also be won by your company.

You’ll need local SEO to accomplish this.

Where do you begin? How can you get your brand in front of internet users looking for information? We’re delighted you inquired about this.

The most attractive fact of this checklist is that each one of the topics discussed here is working fantastically.

Without further due, let’s hop into the discussion.

• Local SEO Basics Checklist
• Local Keyword Research Checklist
• Local On-Page SEO Checklist
• Local Technical SEO Checklist
• Local Content Checklist
• Local Link Building Checklist

Well, before we move into the real part of it, let’s understand how to use this mind-blowing checklist to grow your local organic search rankings.

Local SEO Basics Checklist

Before you go further, you need to set up SEO fundamentals for your local business. There are a few things you can do to track the performance of your business website. Here are the processes,

• Connect your website with Google Search Console by just registering on it.
• Add your business website on Google Analytics and observe your performances.
• Integrate Search Console with Analytics to better understand your visitors.
• Add your site on Bing Webmasters and See how your business doing on Bing search
• If you can then find other webmaster platforms and check how your business doing on those SERP
• You must use any of the SEO plugins to optimize your pages, product pages, and blog posts correctly

You need to be updated with all of those webmaster tools. You can see which queries people are getting your business. According to them, you can go for further optimization, or you can apply other strategies that match your industry.

In terms of local SEO, you need to keep in mind that local SEO is totally different from traditional SEO strategies.

Get Listed On Business Listing Platforms

First thing in the local SEO checklist is to add a business on local directories. You may find it new, but trust us, it is one of the most effective ways to reach local customers. Building listings on any local and international directories will bring new customers daily. There are certain places you must list your business on those platforms. Here is the list of some leading global business listing platforms.

• Google My Business
• Yelp
• Foursquare
• Zagat
• Bing Places

They are the most popular ones in the world, and you must list your business on them. There are other listing platforms that match your industry or products or services as well as you may find some of them are localized with your business location.

Make sure that your business is listed every potential listing platform. Include your business name, address, email, phone number, and, if possible, embedded a map with directions to your business location.

Example of Yelp Business Listing

Example of Google My Business Listing

Local Keyword Research Checklist

Next item of our local SEO checklist is researching keywords to find the best keywords related to your products or services. Local keyword research is similar to the usual keyword research but the filtration process of finding keywords that match your products or service as well as the location you are serving. Here are a few tips you can use while doing keyword research for local SEO.

Find Long Tail Keywords Including your business location because location-based keywords play a significant job to reach location-wise businesses or products or services.

For instance, let’s take a query about a steak restaurant located in “Downtown Chicago” certainly not relevant to people who are living in Miami, right?

So if you choose a keyword like this, “best steak restaurant in Downtown Chicago” then that is better than the best steak restaurant only. So you see that if you choose the keyword, including your location, then the search engine will get a direct signal about the location of your restaurant.

You must select low competition high search volume keywords according to your business category. The best thing you can do it, hire an SEO agency, and your problem will be solved.

Local On-Page SEO Checklist

On-page SEO is another essential tips in our local SEO checklist. Proper On-page SEO is the single one strategy that can break the wall and present you in front of the location you are doing business or selling your products or services. Follow best practices to apply correct On-page SEO on your business website.

URL optimization: Keep your keyword in URL

Short URL: Keep your URL short and Simply Understandable

Title Optimization: Try to Put the keyword at the beginning of your Title

Keyword Placement: Place your Keyword in the first 120 words of your content. Do not overdo it; keep it natural. Try to use Your Keyword in H1, H2, or H3 Tags.

Image Optimization: Optimize your images before uploading them on your website.

Use LSI Keywords: Search engine loves relevancy; try to use relevant phrases and keywords in your content as much as you can, but keep it natural.

External Links: Give references to the high authority relevant resources so that people can get further information on the topic.

Internal Links: Try to link up with other relevant pages within your website.

Local Technical SEO Checklist

Technical SEO for local businesses is quite the same as general SEO. You need to apprehend the basics of SEO to at least mark up the errors on your website. Use the search console to find out if there are any errors on your website. Try to solve them by yourself, or if you need any assistance, then you may contact SEOViser . We have a great team of SEO specialists who can solve your problems.

Google now uses mobile firs indexing because more than 70% of the searches are now happening on Mobile devices. People are now using mobile devices to find anything or to order anything online more often than before. So, whenever you are designing your content or website, keep the mobile usability in mind.

Local SEO Checklist for Content Optimization

Always publish fantastic content, whether it is a product description or a blog post or a service page of your business or products or services. Because quality content is king in the whole digital presence and performance.

Most of the time, people ignore when it comes to writing the product description. Try to convince the visitor in the product description so that they feel eager to buy your products or services.

Create a blog page within your business website and publish informative content related to your industry regularly. Remember, blog posts are the most actionable way to draw visitors from search engines organically.

Let your visitors feel that you want to help them to get the best thing for them. Approach them in a way that they find your products and services reliable.

Local Link Building Checklist

Link building for a local business is different than usual because your business is based on a specific location. There are certain methods you can apply to build backlinks for your local business. We are giving the two most effective strategies you can follow.

• Reach out your customers and ask them to review your products and services on their social media profiles. You can always reach out to popular influencers, bloggers, and reviewers who are writing about your locality and ask them to write about your products and services on their websites.
• Sponsor events happening in your service areas and promote your business, products, or services through those events physically. It will endorse your business very effectively, and people will get to know better about your products and services.

Final Words: Local SEO Checklist

We at the end of our discussion on Local SEO Checklist and hope that you now understand how the local SEO works for your local business. Now it’s your turn to apply all of the above strategies on your business website and enjoy the organic growth of your business.

If you have any queries regarding local SEO, then you can always reach us by contacting us through our contact form. You can also comment below how you feel about this article and how we can improve it further. SEO is a matter of experiment, trial, and error. The more you practice, the more you learn new things. Just keep it that way and move on to your success. However, follow our local SEO Checklist as we’ve instructed in the above discussion for the desired ranking on search engines.