Success in business is the meeting point of good products, great service, and excellent consumer awareness. Especially in the digital age where consumer behavior is increasingly smartphone-driven, missing on digital marketing channels is a mistake that modern business, no matter how big or small, can’t afford to make.
What is Local SEO?
Local SEO is a proven way to attract the attention of your local customers, who are more likely to make a purchase. Put simply, it increases the probability of selling products by promoting your business to nearby customers who are searching for products and services that your business offers.
What Do The Numbers Say?
Stats never lie and this is true in case of search intents too. Here’s a tweet from Nick Wilsdon, a digital marketing expert.
“At Secrets of Local Search conference at GoogleHQ. Now 46% of searches have local intent – quote from Google rep official presentation. That‘s increased since I last took note of that stat” — Nick Wilsdon (@nickwilsdon) October 10, 2018
This is a tweet from 2018, and it would not be a surprise if the local search intents command over 50% of Google queries in 2021.
An equally visible change in users’ Google search behavior has been the sharp increase in “Near me” searches (nearly 150%) over traditional searches. But most importantly, the true eye-opener for local businesses should be the fact that over 7 out of 10 people who do a local search, do visit the store on the same day.
What’s Driving Local Search?
You don’t have to be a Google search expert to know the answer. The answer is pretty much loud and clear:
Because it helps people find exactly the products and services that they are looking for. As our SEO Lead like to say it: “Local SEO is like the hyperloop of marketing. It instantly connects the right products and services to the right customers.”
Local Seo offers benefits to both business owners and customers alike:
- Local SEO makes the customer buying experience easy and convenient.
- Local SEO connects the right customers to the right sellers.
- Local SEO gives local businesses online visibility that drives business sales.
- Local SEO helps local business owners promote products and services at exactly the right time i.e the time when the customer is most likely to purchase or avail service.
- Last but not least, Local SEO saves customers from time and effort otherwise spent in hustling from one shop to another in a busy-packed market.
Top Google SEO Trends in 2021
Now that we know that Local SEO is now essential to local business growth, what are the top Google SEO trends for 2021? Here’s everything that you need to not just improve Local SEO rankings but also drive business sales in 2021.
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- Good Customer Reviews: Gold Standard For Local SEO
Customer reviews are one of the primary yardsticks used by Local SEO algorithms for ranking local businesses. If two businesses are selling the same product or service, then Google will rank the one with better ratings and reviews ahead of the other.
Hence, if you wish for a significant spike in Local SEO Ranks, ensure that you are loved and rated highly by customers who have visited you.
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- Is Your Business Popular on the Internet?
Business popularity on the internet is a by-product of engagements. A business that enjoys credible online reputation and is consistently promoted by happy-customers across internet forums and communities is bound to see a considerable jump in its Google SEO Rankings.
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- Voice SEO: A Seemingly Obvious Transition
Because voice bots are getting smarter with each passing day, it is natural that SEO rankings too will be driven by Voice Search. This means conversational search queries involve longer sentences instead of keyword phrases. Studies reveal that most of the smart users were opting for a voice search to find grocery shops and restaurants nearby. This trend is expected to pick up pace in 2021.
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- Business Listings: Being Accurate is The New Normal
Relevance, Distance, and Prominence (RDP) remain an essential ranking factor in Local Google SEO.Avoid making undesirable mistakes on Google My Business Listings. Ensure that your business name, address, product descriptions, etc are accurate and relevant. Also, share good quality product images and invite your existing customers for feedback and reviews. Google allows users to filter local search queries based on factors like customer reviews, price, and business hours.
By ensuring that your My Business Listings are relevant and up to date, you target your potential customers more effectively than ever before.
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- Don’t Forget Long-Tail Keywords
With increased voice-searches, 2021 could be the year when businesses specifically target long-tail keywords for improving both traditional and local SEO rankings. You must research for questions that your potential customers use for getting product information.
For example, a normal voice search for a brown leather bag may seem like: ‘Which are the best bag shops in Connaught Place, Delhi?’
Ideally, Quora is a good place to start looking for questions that customers near you are asking on the internet. Moreover, you can even create your profile to answer location-based user queries relevant to your business. This will not only help you create engagement but improve brand awareness too.
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- Customer Surveys: Powerful Medium To Identify Popular Customers Queries
Are your local customers looking for more brown leather bags or black leather bags? Are they more intent towards affordability or brand? These are questions that can best be answered only if you are willing to go the extra mile. Prepare a questionnaire that aims primarily to identify your customers search intents like
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- What products related to your business do they most search for?
- What location phrases are most commonly used by them like “Near Me”, “Near Connaught Place”, “Near Block C”, “Near Central Park”
Once you have collected a considerable amount of data, you can analyze it and accordingly improve your Google Business Listing feeds for targeting a larger section of the nearby audience.
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- Keep An Eye On Your CompetitorsWhile nothing serves better in digital marketing than a brand name that is unique and innovative, it’s always wise to observe and learn from competitors who are doing better than you. This is of particular value in case of Local SEO where your competitors are no more than a few blocks or streets away. And if they are successfully targeting online customers, you can pick up from what they are doing better and try to emulate them in your Local SEO efforts.
- Don’t Ignore Fake Reviews
While you might feel that a single fake review will have no impact on your online reputation, it surely does, and more often in ways, you can’t comprehend if you are not an internet buff. Simple research will give you a list of businesses that lost billions owing to bad app reviews, bad customer ratings.It’s now easier than ever before for a social media influencer to pick up a bad review, create a blog with an eye-catching title such as ‘10 Worst Customer Reviews on The Internet’.
And the next thing you know, his millions of followers have shared the information with millions of other internet users. That’s irreparable damage to your online reputation.
The solution to this is simple:
Immediately report a fake review as inappropriate. You can do this by visiting the ‘review’ option on Google Maps. However, use this feature after you have cross checked that the review is fake.
Search engine algorithms are getting smarter at ranking local businesses. Today it’s not just enough to feed GMB listings and expect all your potential customers to turn up at your store.
Today, even Friday-night party invitations do not see high footfalls without enticing sneak peeks into party-theme, performing artist, ambiance, etc.
Hence, expecting Local Business listings to attract potential customers by themselves is not a wise business strategy. Factors like social media engagements, digital consumer awareness, business mentions, and online credibility will play a key role in setting you apart from your competitors.
At Reinvent Digital, we help businesses create a credible digital footprint that not only improves local SEO rankings but contributes significantly towards long-term branding and business promotion. We are a leading digital marketing agency in India, helping businesses create unflinching credibility and loyalty among their existing and potential customers. Book your consultation and website audit with us today and launch your brand to the forefront in this new age.
