|
|
Local Search Engine Optimisation Tips
By: Scott Boyd 2007-03-02 It's not always easy to target local search terms when your business type doesn't warrant writing unique content for each local area you serve, so how do you go about targeting that local traffic through organic search engine optimisation? I've seen a few examples lately where people simply have tried to replicate the same content for countless local areas and all they have done is change the town name. This doesn't work The main reason this is the wrong approach is the obvious duplicate content issue that it creates - in fact, I'd call this a rookie mistake. You simply can't rank the same content on different pages for different keywords. This was the standard technique used by autogenerated spam sites back in 2002 - 2003 before Google really started clamping down on duplicate issues. So local SEO then - what's the best approach? Well, keeping the duplicate content issue in mind, consider that Google doesn't want people to find the same content (using different URLs) for different searches, but finding one page for different searches is OK (when the page is relevant). So that leaves your business with two clear options:
2. Optimise multiple pages for your terms, but keep the content different on each. 1. Optimising a single page for multiple local terms This is easier than it sounds. Remember most local search terms aren't that competitive (as there can be minimal traffic there), so you don't need to go the full hog in terms "on page optimisation". - Optimising your "about us" page A good page to optimise is your "about us" page. Naturally you have some copy on the page that tells your visitors about your business and through the process of writing this you have also included notable key terms (your business industry, your services). Ideally we want to target our "about us" page with our main key term + local areas. So this will most likely be our main service and the keyword that has been targeted on the homepage. Let's assume for this example that the keyword is "widget services". We want to target this in our Page Title, Meta Keywords and Meta Description, as well as including the phrase within our body copy and potentially even H# headings - but let's avoid being too "SEO" about it - no need to go overboard with keyword density - write good copy first! So your "about us" page has a couple of paragraphs about your business - next we add in a second section entitled "areas we cover". Very easy - all we need to do here is add a short sentence or two explaining these are the areas that our business can service. Then a simple bulleted list with local town names. In our example (small business servicing only a few areas) this will look clean and not too spammy as the list will be short. All we need to do next is add those town names to our Meta Keywords and that's us done. Very basic local search engine optimisation to cover our service areas. NOTE: Obviously certain business areas will be more competitive so this very mild version of SEO will be less effective, but it is a good starting point. - Optimising your testimonials page Very easy again - one or two pages with client testimonials - the testimonial copy naturally contains your target keywords (write it yourself and ask your clients to OK it) - simply sign each testimonial off with "A. Person, Business Name, Town, Region". If you have enough testimonials then split them down to separate pages and try to get clients from different regions and towns to sing your praises. One note here - while a testimonial page is a pretty good landing page for a searcher (they are instantly exposed to good vibes about your company), it's worth ending the page with a small paragraph or navigation area directing users to your service pages. The user process should be natural - search for a local service > find your page > read your testimonials > find out about your services. Don't make it hard for them to get to the last part. 2. Optimise multiple pages for your terms, but keep the content different on each. This is tougher, but there are a few simple things you can do to start off with: 1. Include your address details on every page. This is good to help increase user confidence in your business as well as adding local town and region keywords to your pages. 2. When writing copy for your service pages - add in some real life examples of your product or service use and try to include a local town name within the anecdote. 3. As long as you aren't targeting dozens of town names, it can be OK to add a small tagline to each page stating "We offer widget services in the following areas: one, two, three, etc". Anything more than a handful of terms will look rubbish though. The hard part is when you need to target a lot of town names and are really struggling when writing content for them. Here are some ideas:
2. Include directions to your business for each location - this is all unique content. 3. Do an "office overview" with some staff bios for each of your locations - this will give you plenty of content so you can target local areas on different pages. 4. As said before, include client testimonials on each local page. 5. Grab some news feeds for your local area and stick them on your locally targeted pages - TheBestOf offers RSS feeds for every local town in the UK (eg, Solihull - feed). This adds a little more content to each page and keeps them all relatively unique.
2. Do the same for staff, news, events, product use tips and so on. The bottom line Local search engine optimisation isn't that hard - you just need to have a good look at how your business and website approaches local marketing and decide which approach to SEO you want to take. From there, it's really just a case of coming up with the ideas. Comments Tag: Local Search, Search Engine Optimisation Add to  Del.icio.us |  Digg |  Reddit |  Furl Have a bookmark! -  About the Author: Scott Boyd (aka Marketing Guy) is an Edinburgh based online marketing consultant with over 6 years experience in the industry. He is the founder of SEO agency eFlaunt, where he mixes a blend of traditional marketing and SEO. Scott's musings relating to the marketing and SEO industries can be found on his blog - Fused Nation. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| SearchNewz
is an iEntry, Inc. ® publication
©
1998-2008
All Rights Reserved. Privacy Policy - Legal - Sitemap - Contact Us - RSS Feeds - Newsletter Signup |
