One of the biggest issues for business owners is to stay relevant in today’s mobile-driven world and get noticed in your local area. If you don’t appear on someone’s map or don’t show up for “search in your area”, you can lose a lot of potential customers.
Being hyperlocal is
a great way for marketers to send out successful marketing messages to
potential clients in a specific local area and promote your products or
services effectively. Hyperlocal marketing looks like a microscope that can
help you focus on a particular city or neighborhood to improve your business
for a local search.
You know that hyperlocal search is pointing toward the growth in mobile search, and Google wants to increase “near me” and “ nearby” searches. According to this research, 94% of people search for local information by using their mobile phones. That’s why it’s important to optimize your business for mobile and local. Implementing these hyperlocal tips into your local strategy will make your brand more successful within the niche in your local area.
1. Build Local Reviews
You know that most of the mobile search results are
accompanied by reviews on Google, Yelp, Facebook, and other business review
sites. For small businesses, reviews play an important role in local search
ranking. Based on the Moz survey, reviews total to 10% of local search ranking,
so local SEO is very crucial for generating
in-store traffic.
If you get a lot of positive reviews about your
business, you can be ahead of your competitors and get more potential
customers. It is important to receive as many positive reviews as you can to
increase your brand authority. According to this survey, 88% of customers rely on local
reviews and in-person recommendations to make purchasing decisions.
You can encourage your consumers to leave reviews
about your product or service. You can also offer something (discount, free
item, or special offer) in exchange for reviews. Just be creative. Gather many
reviews as you can and create a special testimonial page where you can show all
of them. For example, Zavodnick, Zavodnick
& Lasky created a fantastic
client testimonial video about their services.
You know that it is easy to destroy your online
reputation, but it takes much time and effort to re-establish it.
2. Create Localized Content
If you want to succeed in local SEO, creating great
content for your target audience is a must. You can create localized content on your blog and publish
different local news, events, or local points of interest like landmarks,
buildings, or destinations that people might search in a particular area.
Moreover, you can create a local community or network of loyal readers that can
be a great starting point for sales and enhance your profits.
As I’ve mentioned earlier, mobile search results
continue to rise, and it is vital to optimizing your content for more mobile
search terms. Create content by including “near me” and neighborhood search
terms. For example, Hasner Law writes review-based articles by
using hyperlocal tips and buying intent. They specialize in personal injury and
create content titled “The Most Dangerous Intersections in Savannah” or “The Deadliest Workplace Injuries in Atlanta”.
From time to time, you can step out of the comfort
zone regarding the content and focus more on local communities (weather,
language, habits, events, etc,). With all content, be informative, useful and
conversational. Avoid being self-promotional and stick to your brand guidelines
with its own voice. Just try to deliver personalized local value via your
content for customers that have common interests and share a community.
3. Optimize Your Google My Business Page
Google My Business is a great way to have a steady
increase in hyperlocal search. When searching for a particular type of local business, you will always find the top GMB
search results, such as the overall rating, reviews, content, contact details,
and other information. If you want to get more hyperlocal, it’s essential to
manage and optimize your Google My Business Page.
Once you’ve created your GMB page, here are the
following things you should do:
- Fill out every single field
related to your local business and claim ownership of your business listing. - Choose an appropriate
category that helps to describe your business and connect to potential
customers. - Double-check the contact
information of your listing (address, open hours, local phone number). The
contact information should be consistent with the information on your website,
social media, and local directories. - Add a unique business
name, description, and link to your website. - Include high-resolution
photos and cover image. - Publish content within
your account to let people know about your special offers, discount, and events
directly from search results.
If your Google My Business page is optimized properly,
you can stand out from the crowd and attract new customers from the local
search and Google Maps. If you manage multiple business locations, you should
create and optimize pages for each location and link back to your Google My
Business pages.
4. Add Local Schema Markup
One of the key tasks to improve your local SEO is
using schema markup to help search engines easily understand your business as
local. Once you implement schema markup into your website, you can improve your
website in local search results and show more informative results for users.
There are many different types of schema markup you should choose to better
specify your local business.
For law firms and attorneys, you can use a
particular Schema to enhance their local results.
Here is a great example from Mirman, Markovits
& Landau PC,
using schema markup for their local small business:
You can mark up not only addresses, names, but also
things like videos, breadcrumbs, website navigation menus, etc. Just make sure
to validate the code before adding to your website, reveal any possible errors
and make the changes at once. Google’s Structured
Data Testing tool
is the best way to test and validate your code.
You can easily test your schema markup in Google’s Search
Console and get
instant results of your implementation with average results reporting. Ensure
to check out your Google Search Console for any new issues to quickly resolve
these errors.
5. Make Your Website Mobile-Friendly
As more and more people are searching for local options
on mobile devices, ensure that your website is optimized for mobile. Mobile
focuses a lot on hyperlocal marketing, and it goes hand in hand with the
search. Once you have a mobile-friendly website, you have a high chance of
showing up your local business in top search results.
When it comes to mobile optimization, find relevant
location-based keywords and optimize them for your mobile content. To check out
how well your webpage is optimized for a certain search query, you can use On-page SEO Checker. It will give you a detailed and
comprehensive analysis of each page with a list of required fixes and
recommendations.
Always add your business name, location, phone, and
address on your website. Make sure that your NAP information is consistent with
the information on your GMB listing, social media profiles, and local directories.
You know that customers want to instantly find all
necessary info through mobile search. Be creative and active. You can create
mobile apps for your small business and add there all daily deals, special
offers, mobile coupons, discounts, and flash sales. It is a great way to
connect with your target audience and control your business’s mobile promotions
and messaging.
6. Use Email Marketing
Email marketing is a good way to market your local
business and drive a lot of organic traffic. You can integrate maps to show
directions to your local business, add click-to-call buttons, share one clear
message, and give special offers.
It’s important to optimize your emails for viewing
on mobile devices and tablets as a lot of people are likely to open them
through these devices. You can also follow this ultimate email outreach guide to increase your website traffic.
Moreover, there are a lot of email marketing
services like Pinpointe, AWeber that come with integrated mobile support, high delivery, open rates,
and email analytics to better understand how effective your marketing campaign
performs at achieving your goals and increasing conversions.
Bottom Line
Having an effective hyperlocal marketing strategy is a good way to increase your local presence, drive more traffic, and take your business to the next level. Using these hyperlocal tips will help you find new customers, show your brand to the best advantage before, during and after the purchasing process. Keep experimenting and learning from each hyperlocal effort to figure out how effectively to scale target cities and regions.
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