When developing a Townsville local SEO strategy for Townsville the main goal to keep in mind is that you want to be ranking within the top three spots in the local pack for the services that you offer.
Achieving a top three ranking is kind of like a badge of honor. It represents your businesses authority in the Townsville region for the key services that you offer.
For example below is the SEO local pack results for builders in the Townsville region. In order to see more results you have to click on the more businesses button.
It’s kind of greyed out and hard to see which highlights the value of locking down one of those top three spots.
When does the local pack appear?
I’m sure that you have noticed that some searches don’t show a local pack result at all. The local pack appears when Google decides that the term has local intent.
For example if someone is looking for a plumber in Condon, Townsville you will likely see a local pack result.
This local search terms typically include:
- Search terms that contain a location term like Townsville or a suburb like Kirwan.
- Search terms that include near me when locals are searching for a specific service.
- Services that are typical for a local community such as cafes, gyms and cinemas.
Appearing for these terms can be incredibly valuable for a business as the searcher is likely to be an ideal customer for their core services.
Local SEO is a essential piece to the SEO puzzle, as 30% of all mobile searches and related to location and 28% of searches for something nearby result in a purchase. (ahrefs Local SEO Strategies)
What are the key factors that impact my local pack ranking?
If you’re in business I’m sure you already know it’s all about location location location. Where your business is physically located will play a large role in where your appear in the search results.
For example if you are hoping to rank as the number one plumber in Townsville. It will definitely help being located in the middle of town.
If you’re on the outskirts of town don’t give up just yet as other ranking factors such as relevance and authority (aka street cred) will also begin to come into play. You might see on my site that I often mention a digital launch platform for your business. The aim of the digital launch platform is to start building your businesses authority online.
The key elements impacting local search rankings:
- Location location location the closer to the centre of the service area the better.
- Reviews go without saying but they are a amazing tool when building credibility. When getting customers to leave reviews it often helps if they are specific with the service they received. This helps Google tie the review to a particular service and also helps the reader. For example “Jim did a job for me on Friday 5 stars good work” isn’t going to cut it unfortunately.
- Build your digital launch platform, this simply means building out your online presence via website content, online directories and social media just to name a few. This allows Google to develop a better understanding of your business.
Where do I start with Townsville local SEO?
When getting started with local Townsville SEO it can be daunting at first so lets break down a few of the key jobs to get you started on your local SEO journey.
Local SEO in four easy steps
- Claim your google my business listing: Simply do a quick Google search for your business, if it comes up you may be able to claim the listing through a simple verification process. If nothing appears you are able to add your business to Google. The verification process is usually a few simple tasks to prove that your business is legitimate. If you run a business from your own home than you are able top add in a service area that you cover while also hiding your home address from the search results. It is also worth heading over to bing.com and going through the same process to claim your listing on Bing.
- Earn your street cred via online Google Reviews: Reviews are a way for Google to understand how customers interact with your business and most importantly what they think of your services. When getting customers to leave a review ask them to mention the service in particular and provide a bit of a summary on the specific service they received.
- List your business in local directories: Directories like True Local and the Yellow Pages are often great first starts although there can be some value in diving a little deeper. What I mean is check out your local business chambers or even the local fish wrappers classified pages. This helps Google identify your business as being local to the Townsville area. The Townsville Business Chamber or Bulletin could be great opportunities for some additional exposure.
- Social proof via social media: Social media is one of those things we can’t escape especially as more and more customers are preferring mobile engagement. A way to help build out your digital launch platform is to pick two social media channels to make a start. This allows you to focus in on building a reputation on a few platforms while building your local authority.