Local SEO Checklist: Maximise your Local Ranking Today!

Did you know that 46% of searches have a local intent every day? This shows that local SEO plays a very important role in supporting business development in a specific area, so the practice needs to be properly considered and maximised.

A well-executed local SEO strategy ensures that your business is visible to potential customers when they look for products or services in your area.

If you’re unfamiliar with local SEO, you might be unsure where to begin. This article explains local SEO and provides a checklist guide to achieving success in local search, so make sure you read until the end!

What Is a Local SEO Checklist?

The local SEO checklist is a step-by-step guide that can help make local SEO practice easier. By focusing on these checklists, you can maximise local SEO practices, increase website traffic, gain local leads, and increase search rankings.

Checklists for local SEO are created to ensure that every aspect of local search engine optimisation is handled properly, easily analysed, and easily tracked if something goes wrong.

Benefit Local SEO Checklist

A checklist for local SEO is used as a tool to keep your optimisation process well-organised and efficient. 

By offering a clear, step-by-step guide, it breaks down the complexities of local SEO into manageable tasks. Creating a local SEO checklist can bring several benefits to your business, including:

• Help organise local SEO practices.
• Ensures consistency of SEO practices.
• Prevent the occurrence of missed practices.
• Makes local SEO easy to monitor.
• Makes local SEO easy to track when problems occur.
• Optimise local SEO practices.

15 Local SEO Checklist

There are 15 main steps in the local SEO checklist that you should consider to optimising you local business, such as:

1. Analyze Keywords for Local Search

The first top on your SEO checklist should be keyword analysis for local search. When analyzing keywords, there are many things to consider, like relevance, local intent, search volume, business-specific keywords, and competition. 

You can use SEO tools to analyse a keyword by its search volume and see how many people in your area search for it every month. 

Tip: You can consider using long-tail keywords that are more specific and less competitive. Also, try to use local terms and language for target areas that have specific behaviours.

2. Create Landing Pages

Next, your website, especially your home page, should target the main keyword that is relevant to your business and area. 

For example, if your business has a main keyword such as wedding decoration, wedding decoration Indonesia, or wedding florist, each of these keywords could have a separate landing page. 

If your business offers wedding decoration services in Malaysian, then you may try keywords like: 

• “Wedding Decoration Malaysia”
• “Wedding Florist Kuala Lumpur”
• “Bridal Decorations Penang”
• “Wedding Decorators Johor Bahru”, etc.

3. Optimize Landing Pages

Once you have created a landing page, the next thing you should do is optimise it, also known as on-page SEO. 

This practice includes optimising internal links, URLs, title tags, and search intent to help search engines understand your content. If you're struggling to do this, you can use SEO tools or hire SEO Services to help you maximise it.

4. Check Technical Issues

Another local SEO checklist is monitoring technical issues. This element involves user experience factors. 

Your website would be technically healthy if it was fast and easy to use. However, sometimes, issues like duplicate title tags or meta descriptions can occur. So, it's important to run regular site audit checks to ensure the issues are fixed.

5. Ensure Mobile Friendliness

Due to mobile-first indexing, which prioritises the mobile version of a website over the desktop version, a mobile-friendly website is essential for Google rankings. 

There are three main ways of configuring your site for mobile: 

• Responsive design. Google recommends responsive design, which automatically adapts to different screen sizes for ease of maintenance.
• Dynamic serving, where the same URL displays different HTML depending on the device, though it can occasionally show the wrong page
• Different URLs for mobile and desktop. This can be challenging to manage and might cause duplicate content problems. So, make sure you do it right.

6. Implement Local Schema Markup

Another item on the local business SEO checklist is schema markup. Schema markup, also known as structured data, is a piece of code that helps Google understand your content and display it in a more effective way.

Implementing structured data increases your chances of appearing in Google's advanced search results, such as rich snippets and knowledge panels.

You can include your business name, contact information, address, opening hours, and other key information on schema markup.

7. Improve Internal Linking

After implementing local schema markup, you can improve internal linking on your website. Internal links connect the pages within your website and play a crucial role in transferring authority and helping search engines like Google understand your site structure.

Internal linking can improve the user experience by directing visitors to relevant content, making it easier for them to navigate and find the information they need.

8. Set Up Google Business Profile

Next on the important list for local SEO is setting up the Google Business Profile. Google My Business is a free tool that enables business owners to manage how their business information appears on Google's platforms, such as Search, Maps, and Shopping. 

By setting up your Google My Business profile it’s easier for local customers to find and engage with your business.

9. Get More Reviews

Another point on the local business SEO checklist is to get reviews. Positive reviews on your website can improve the credibility of your business.

You can do this by asking your customers to leave a review on your website after making a purchase. You can also send emails, receipts, or live interactions to make them engaged.

Also, remember to always answer reviews and show your appreciation to customers who leave positive comments.

10. Create Local Backlinks

Backlinks are crucial for Google in determining website rankings, as they act as "votes of confidence." With more high-quality backlinks, you have a higher opportunity to get in the top rankings in the SERPs.

To maximise your local SEO, you can build backlinks by issuing press releases about business updates to local media, collaborating with local bloggers to cover your events, and creating a local guide that you promote to local websites and media outlets.

11. Create Local Citations

Creating local citations involves listing your business name, address, and phone number (NAP) on pertinent online directories and local websites. You can add more details like business hours, your website URL, and a short description of your services.

Consistency is key, so make sure your information is consistent with what appears on your Google Business Profile and other platforms. 

12. Be Active on Social Media

Being proactive on social media is an important component of a local SEO checklist. Consistently sharing engaging, locally relevant content increases your business's visibility and strengthens community ties.

By posting location-specific updates and using local hashtags, you can also improve your website visibility performance for your local area.

13. Create Content Calendar

A well-structured calendar for content can help you organise and plan your content strategy, ensuring that you consistently publish relevant and optimised content.

Plan topics around important dates, industry trends, and keyword research to align with your SEO goals.

This approach will help maintain a steady flow of fresh content. So, don't forget to include this step in your local business SEO checklist.

14. Track Your Keyword

One of the steps you can add to your SEO checklist is keyword tracking. You should monitor the performance of your targeted local keywords on a regular basis to assess their effectiveness and adjust your strategy as necessary. 

Track the rankings, search volume, and traffic associated with each keyword using tools like Sequence Stat, Google Search Console, Google Analytics, or other specialised SEO tools.

15. Participate in Local Events

Lastly, adding local events to your SEO checklist is important to improve your online local presence and community engagement. 

Look for relevant events such as festivals, fairs, or community meetings and create content or participate in them to attract local traffic. 

By participating in or sponsoring these events, you can increase your business's visibility and earn backlinks from local media and event websites. 

Conclusion

Understanding and following this local SEO checklist will help you attract more local customers, improve your local search visibility, and help your business grow. Remember, local SEO is an ongoing process, and sustained effort will yield the most effective results.

If you want to maximize your local visibility and draw in more customers, then our talented SEO experts are ready to help! 

With SEO Services by cmlabs, we’ll elevate your search rankings and fuel impressive growth for your business. 

Contact our marketing teams today for a free consultation and find out how we can craft a personalized SEO plan just for you!