The presentation kicked off answering the question: What is local search? “Local search” is what consumers do, and consumers have been searching locally from day one.
The industry uses local search as a catchall that includes:
- Serving locally targeted ads by IP addresses
- Serving locally targeted ads by keyword indicators
- Internet Yellow Pages (IYP) listings
- Any local directory
- Map results
- Pay-per-call
- Mobile search
- Service firms, including SEMs
- Geographic-specific search engine queries
- Searches conducted on smartphones
Jason covered the fact that there are a variety of players in this space, including Google Maps, plus other elements of Google, ReachLocal, Bing, Yahoo! Local, Yelp, Ingenio, VoiceStar and more.
The ten tips were:
- Understand where your location is within the city and do not try to overreach
- Understand how far your location is from the midpoint of the city
- Claim your listings to ensure accuracy
- Target the right keywords and make sure they are in your title, URL & metadata
- Select the relevant categories for your business so you display for the right searches
- Monitor reviews: sentiment, impacts, rankings and display
- Have citations for your listings: web pages, addresses listed, phone numbers, etc.
- Optimize your website for search engines
- Have a good inbound link structure: quality and quantity matter
- Put your address on your website so people looking for you locally can find you
These 10 tips are things every company could and should do to optimize their business listings.
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