When optimising their websites for search rankings, most companies tend to focus on conventional SEO. But when it comes to competing with large national brands who have been investing in search engine optimisation for many years, it can be hard for local businesses to keep up. This is why it’s important for smaller businesses to focus on Local SEO, as these results follow a different set of rules and ranking criteria.
Google wants to serve up the most relevant results to their users at the top of the rankings, here are 5 main reasons why you should start investing in local SEO right now!
1. Changing Consumer Behaviour
Consumer’s behaviour to finding local products and services has changed dramatically in the last few years with more and more consumers hopping online to perform their research. According to GE’s 2013 major purchase study, 81% of consumers now research products online before heading in-store. After all, when was the last time you picked up a copy of the Yellow Pages to find something?
2. Lower Competition
Local SEO is relatively non-competitive; the uptake from local businesses is virtually non-existent, giving a wide opportunity for companies with the right strategy to jump in now.
3. Budget Friendly
Local SEO is budget friendly, as it’s possible to achieve high rankings without a large amount of investment. Study after study has illustrated that SEO traffic is more convertible than most other online channels which ensures a good return on investment.
4. Google Wants You To Go Local
The changing landscape of search behaviour has forced Google to re-think how it presents users with search results for local searches. Local businesses have a huge advantage over large national brands by means of its local address and contact number.
5. Everything Is Going Mobile
There’s a mobile app for almost everything now, and most pull data from local business listings such as Google Maps. Studies done by Flurry Analytics indicate that user’s are now increasingly spending their mobile internet browsing time using mobile apps, rather than mobile web browsers.
Not being optimised for these channels could be a missed opportunity, so what are you waiting for: it’s time to go mobile!
Local SEO is here to stay – so if you’re one of the many local business not investing in local SEO, you’re one of the local businesses missing out on a lot of web traffic!
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