Are you involved in Local SEO? As part of the tourism industry you almost certainly are. This is a bit counter-intuitive: you’re in London and you want to be found by a customer in Paris; how can that possibly be local search? This is local search because they are looking for a business in a specific, local, area. You don’t need to rank all around the world, you only need to rank in your town and the search engines will show those results anywhere in the world. This is good news!
The next question should be “How do we rank in local search?” There are several components to this answer, let’s look at them:
The Citation… Don’t get too caught up in a lot of what you may see in the Internet here. This is not some big, complex theory: simply make sure that your name, address, and phone number are always written the exact same way.
There is an excellent example of why this is so important is in the video lecture. We ask Google to locate some generic named T-shirt shop. Google has no idea of the location we are looking for and returns all kinds of listings from all around the world.
How do you write your phone number? (123) 456-7890 — 123.456.7890 — 123-456-7890 This may well be something you have never given much thought to before. In this example, you are just hoping that the search engines understand that these are all the same phone number.
This idea extends to all parts of you NAP (name, address, phone). Don’t write your address with St, ST., and Street in different locations and expect computers to magically understand that these are all the same place. And for the love of all things good: do not end you business name with Inc., Inc, and without incorporated at all.
This is so simple to do and so easy to repair you should really check into it right away. How? Just get on all the search engines and type variations on your citation. Google your phone number in different ways and repeat the process on Bing, and so fourth.
After that, go to all your Social Media platforms, review sites, and website to be sure everything matches.
It’s important to visit all the business listing pages the search engines offer and list your business (ex: Google My Business). The search engines use this as a serious local ranking signal.
Repeat the same process with all the search engine map offerings. Don’t forget Apple Maps! (mapsconnect.apple.com) Several of these places now allow you to buy an upgraded listing (ad) so you may want to look into pricing. That will get you higher profile than your competitors.
We do value your privacy and want to be compliant with all laws. To learn more visit our Cookies Page