As the market becomes more competitive each year, home services contractors need to find new ways to stand out from the competition and get discovered by customers in the local area. Knowing the best ways to make your online presence optimized for local search results can help you find new audiences and strengthen your reputation in your local market.
Well-crafted content is a cornerstone of successful online marketing. As you work on creating digital strategies that connect with local audiences, it’s important to ensure that your written content is optimized to boost search visibility and foster better customer engagement. In this blog, we’ll give you some tips for local search-optimized content strategy for home services contractors to help you stand out in your area.
Understanding Local SEO
To begin, we first need to understand what is meant by local SEO and how that applies to the work you need to do online in your digital marketing strategy planning and implementation.
What is Local SEO?
Local SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of helping your home services contracting business become more visible in local search results, increasing traffic to your site and improving brand awareness in your community.
When your website or your blog pages rank high on Google or other search engines, it naturally attracts more customers to your business. People tend to click on the top answers in search engine results pages, so the higher you can rank, the more likely you are to increase traffic and build that all-important reputation online with local searchers and customers.
Key Ranking Factors
Having great rankings on search engine result pages is more than just optimizing one part of your website. You need to focus on multiple factors that all play a role in increasing your online visibility and search traffic. Those factors include key elements such as:
- On-page content
- Backlinks from other websites
- Your Google Business Profile
- Social media results and presence
- Online reviews
Local Search-Optimized Content Strategy for Home Services Contractors
Now that you know a little more about what local SEO is, let’s dive into some strategies that you can implement that will improve the content aspect of your home services contracting website, social media, blog, and other digital channels. Following these tips and best practices will help you boost your local SEO visibility and become a well-known and recognized name in your local area.
Web Content Optimization Tips
The first area to pay attention to is your website. Your website is one of, if not the most, important elements of your online presence. It gives you a centralized location to attract customers, explain your services, and direct audiences on the next course of action.
There are several ways that you can begin to optimize your web content. Here is a helpful guide to walk you through the most effective strategies for website content optimization.
- Localized Keywords: Pick keywords that are localized to your area, like “home contracting in [your city]”, or “home services near me” to effectively incorporate phrases and words your local audience will use.
- Content Structure: Contextualize your content for the local area, including adding local information or creating unique pages for the neighborhoods and towns you service.
- Meta Tags and Descriptions: Utilize location-based metadata in your meta descriptions and tags in order to improve your SEO on the backend of your website.
- Natural Language and Local Lingo: Make sure your web content is written in a way that resonates with local audiences, and try to incorporate local lingo when possible.
- Blogs with Local-Focused Content: Create blog posts around local topics and points of interest that are important to your audience.
- Local News, Events, and Trends: Integrate local events and trends into your blog content to keep it relevant to your specific community.
Directory Listings Optimization Tips
Directories are online guides that people use to find businesses in their local area and get information like their contact details and hours of operation. Finding the right directories is an important first step in improving your online visibility. Pick from options that are local to your area and have a good reputation among customers.
It’s also important to make sure that your information is consistent across all directories. You don’t want one listing to have a different address or business name than another, as it can make you look unprofessional or untrustworthy. A consistent NAP (name, address, phone number) on all your listings is key for SEO.
Online directories are also a great place to showcase customer reviews. Ask your customers to share their positive reviews on as many platforms as possible and make it easy for them to find the right place with links in your emails and reminders after you’ve completed services.
Google Business Profile Optimization Tips
Your Google Business Profile is the most important directory to have listed online. As Google is the most popular search engine, the Google Business Profile is the one that most of your potential customers will see. It’s important to make your profile as complete as possible and fill out all sections.
As with your other directories, it is important to keep your Google Business Profile up to date with accurate business information. For example, if you have different summer hours, change your business hours to reflect that. You can also update the holidays you take off or the details of the services you offer.
You can also be actively engaged in your Google Business Profile with photos, the Q&A section, and by responding to reviews. By keeping your profile active, it shows Google that you are engaged in helping and responding to customers online.
Social Media Localization Tips
Optimizing your social media for local content means that your posts should be tailored to your local audience, including mentioning things they like and events that they care about. You should also be involved in community engagement, interacting with your followers and local businesses.
You can also use your social media accounts to highlight local events and partnerships that boost the local credibility of your business and emphasize your connections in the local area. The more active you are on social media, the more the algorithms will boost your content and showcase your posts on customer feeds.
Online Advertising Localization Tips
Many home service contractors might forget that online advertising is a part of their digital content strategy. However, it’s important to remember that local ad copy can be optimized for local SEO. Write ads that appeal to your community and use helpful ad extensions to boost local credibility.
You should also be sure to include local contact information, like a phone number with the area code of your location rather than an 800 number. This further boosts your credibility and shows audiences that you are ingrained in the area and are a part of the community.
Measuring Success
It’s important to track the performance of your search-optimized content and ensure that it is working as intended. By monitoring local search results and rankings and checking in on your website analytics, you can see if you are improving with your local SEO content efforts.
You should also analyze that engagement and evaluate the customer interaction you have by checking the conversion rates across channels and seeing if there is improvement after you implement local SEO content optimization tactics. From there, you can adjust your strategy and tweak your approach based on performance data.
Using Surefire Local for Your Local Search-Optimized Content Strategy
A local search-optimized content strategy for home services contractors is an important part of your digital marketing efforts, and tackling it from various different channels helps you cover your bases more effectively. By following this guide, you can boost your visibility in local search results and improve your reputation in local markets.
At Surefire Local, we understand how important local marketing is to small businesses. That’s why we created the best all-in-one marketing solution for small businesses like home services contractors. Some of the features of Surefire Local include:
- Website & Local SEO Optimization: Geo-tagged content for your website, blog, and social media channels.
- Online Review Management: Request and respond to new reviews and analyze brand sentiment.
- Directories Management: Claim and update your online directory listings, including adding new content across multiple platforms.
- Content Marketing: Tools for creating locally targeted content across various channels like your website and blog.
- Social Media Management: Schedule your posts, track engagement with followers, and respond to your comments.
- Local Online Advertising: Create ads tailored to attract customers within your service areas and local communities.
- Analytics and Reporting: Performance insights and AI-driven recommendations for improvement across your marketing campaigns.
- Educational Resources: Webinars and helpful blog posts for local online marketing insights and education.
If you want to get started with Surefire Local today to help boost your online presence and increase rankings in search engine result pages, then click the link to attend a free demo of Surefire Local’s all-in-one marketing platform and get started today.