How to Create an SEO Strategy for Your Local Business

How to Create an SEO Strategy for Your Local Business Few businesses today can thrive without building a robust online presence. This means creating a website, curating plenty of written content, and promoting your products or services on social media. But the work of drawing traffic to your local business doesn’t end there. To keep attracting new customers to your business and have an edge against your competitors, you’ll need to understand the basics of search engine optimization. SEO involves many moving parts. Keyword research, meta descriptions, and analytics all play a role in how well your business stands out online. With that said, it isn't likely that focusing on just one or two aspects of SEO is enough to thrive in today’s digital environment. Instead, businesses need to create a complete SEO strategy that brings all these elements together. Read on to learn more about how to build an effective local SEO strategy, including common pitfalls to avoid along the way. Get Help With Your SEO Strategy Why Is It Essential for a Business to Create an SEO Strategy? Search engine optimization is all about making your business easier to discover online. Following SEO best practices will help your website achieve a higher ranking on search engine result pages, or SERPs. In short, the more you invest in SEO for your business, the more likely that it will show up on the first page of search results.

SEO is especially vital for local businesses seeking to attract nearby customers. For example, if someone searches on Google for “lawn care” in Dallas, Texas, a list of websites will pop up that contains some reference to the keyword. Google will find the most relevant and trustworthy sites that contain this search phrase. To compete with other lawn care companies in the area, you’ll need to publish plenty of relevant content on your website and social media platforms. Producing quality content is only one part of a comprehensive SEO strategy. You'll also need to consider things like website design, mobile optimization, and including links to reliable sources. 5 Tips for Creating a Solid SEO Strategy Developing an SEO strategy doesn’t need to be a struggle. Almost anyone can get started with it by grasping just a few of the basics. Here are five key tips for building a successful SEO strategy for your local business. 1. Spend Time on Keyword Research In many ways, the success of your SEO strategy will depend on the keywords you deploy in your content. An easy way to find popular search phrases is to open a Google tab and begin typing a relevant keyword. For example, typing “Dallas lawn care” into Google will show several search suggestions like “Dallas lawn care companies” or “Dallas lawn care tips.” You can also use Google Analytics to determine which keywords people are using to find your website. Google’s Keyword Planner is another useful tool that can recommend keywords based on the types of products or services you provide. Once you’ve built a list of popular search terms, you can begin working them into all your content. 2. Get More Backlinks to Your Site

Google grants more authority to websites that earn backlinks from other websites. To get more backlinks, you’ll need to provide plenty of well-researched, informative content on your web pages. This may include professional case studies, or research papers associated with your industry. The idea is that other related websites will cite your website to support their content, ultimately granting higher authority to your brand. Just make sure you’re building backlinks from trustworthy sources. Earning backlinks from lower quality websites can harm your SEO ranking in the long term. If you discover backlinks from suspicious sources, you can easily disavow the links by notifying Google. 3. Always Use Meta Titles and Meta Descriptions Writing relevant meta descriptions and meta titles for blogs or articles is vital for any SEO content strategy. Ideally, these meta tags should include popular search phrases you discovered earlier in step one. This metadata will help ensure that people know exactly what your business is about before they click on your website. Metadata isn’t something solely reserved for written content. Remember to attach meta descriptions to your photos and videos as well. Doing this will improve the chances of Google correlating your website to search terms. 4. Optimize Your Website for Mobile Devices Many people use their mobile devices to search for a local business online. To attract these customers, you’ll need to ensure your website looks the same on any device. If you haven’t already, ensure your website supports responsive web design, or RWD, to improve accessibility. While most modern websites use RWD by default, some older websites may not display properly on a mobile device.

You can check this yourself by visiting your website on a cell phone or tablet. Look for any formatting issues like stretched out text or illegible navigation menus. Websites that aren't optimized for mobile may also take a long time to load. Problems like these can cause many customers to look elsewhere for help and could even harm your rankings on search engine result pages. 5. Leverage Data Analytics Take advantage of analytics software to gauge the performance of your SEO strategy. Using Google Analytics or third-party software, dig into the details of your traffic sources, lead generation, and conversion rates. Studying this information will help you improve your content for greater engagement. If you notice your most recent blog post isn't performing as expected, analytics software will help you find out why. You Can Depend on Scorpion for Your SEO Scorpion has the tools and resources to help you with building your SEO strategy. Our technology will assist you with everything from keyword research to generating insightful reports on major performance metrics. Meanwhile, you can rely on our experts for support with content marketing, website design, and social media engagement. No matter what you need to reach your SEO goals, our team of marketing specialists will get you there. Visit Scorpion today to learn more about how we can help your business grow.