How To Create A Local SEO Content Strategy

by | Feb 26, 2023 | Online Marketing Articles, SEO Related Articles

Lady waiting for customers outside store.

Summary

Suppose your business is locally focused. In that case, you need a local content strategy to do well in local search results and attract more customers. A local content strategy is a plan for creating and sharing content that is useful, interesting, and relevant to your local audience. Local content can help you improve your online presence, build trust and authority, and get more visitors and sales and should be part of any local SEO strategy.

So how can you establish a successful local content strategy? This post will discuss developing a successful regional content strategy for your organization.

First, localize your website’s content.

As part of your local content strategy, you must ensure your website pages are optimized for the local search terms used by your target clients. To find the correct keywords, research the best words for your local market.

You may use tools such as Google Keyword Planner or Bing Keyword Research Tool to discover what keywords people in your region use when searching for similar items or services. You may also use tools such as Moz Local, BrightLocal, or Semrush.com to determine the keywords for which your rivals rank.

After you have a list of keywords, you need to add them to your web pages in strategic areas, such as:

  • Title tags Meta descriptions
  • Headings
  • Image alt and title tags
  • URLs

Be sure to apply the above using Google’s guidelines.

Add location-specific elements to the page such as:

  • Your company’s name, address, and telephone number (NAP)
  • A map or instructions leading to your location
  • Local customer testimonials or reviews
  • Local honors or badges
  • local events or news

These components help you create relevance and reputation in your local community and make it simpler for search engines and people to locate your website.

Create Local Focused Content

The next phase in your local content strategy is to develop relevant and helpful blog entries, videos, podcasts, infographics, etc., for your local audience. These types of content should help you show how knowledgeable you are, provide value, and solve problems for potential customers.

How can you generate ideas for local content?

  • Identify your target audience’s questions, concerns, or obstacles concerning your business or specialty.
  • Use resources such as AnswerThePublic or BuzzSumo to determine the hot or trending local subjects.
  • Examine the topics covered by other local companies or websites and see whether you can provide a unique viewpoint or value proposition.
  • Ask your current customers or followers what they would want to learn more about or what they find difficult.
  • Use social media tools such as Facebook Groups and Twitter Spaces to discuss with locals and learn about their interests.

Possible local content writing themes

The following articles are examples of content you could create. Still, the options are unlimited and would depend on your type of business. The examples below are from different industries. Your blog should only be about your niche, but it doesn’t have to be directly related to your business.  

  • How To Choose The Finest Dentist In [Your Town]
  • The Comprehensive Guide To [Your City] 
  • Top 10 Reasons to Visit [Your City] 
  • How to Save Money on Heating and Air Conditioning in [Your City]
  • The Top Vegan Restaurants in [Your City].

While creating local content, be sure to:

  • Use clear and easy-to-follow language that directly addresses your audience.
  • Incorporate keywords and phrases that correspond to their search purpose.
  • Include photos, movies, and audio samples that improve the user’s experience.
  • Add internal links to further information or value-added pages on your website, such as a resource page or another page highly relevant to the user’s current page.
  • Add external links to other credible sites that support claims made in your article or provide additional resources.

Send Guest Articles to Local Publications

One way to develop a regional content strategy is to send guest articles to other local businesses or websites that only attract locals. Guest blogging is a great way to reach new audiences, grow your website’s network, and build relevant backlinks.

How can you identify possibilities for guest posting?
  • Locate possible websites that allow guest posts in the geographical area of your business. You may use Google Search Operators (such as “write for us [Your City] + blog”) or Moz Link Explorer to locate websites that have linked to the guest articles of your competitors.
  • Contact the website’s administrators or editors through email or social media and propose your idea for a guest article. Ensure that your message is personalized and that you explain why you are a good match for their website and how your material will help their audience.
  • Adhere to their guest posting requirements and produce high-quality, original content that matches their tone, style, and expectations. Add a short author bio with a link to your website.
  • Submit your article for evaluation and follow up until it is published.
  • Thank the blog owners for letting you write and promote a guest post on their website.

Expand Your Local Social Media Audience

A crucial part of any local content marketing plan is to grow your local audience on social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Social media may help with the following:

  • Boost brand recognition and reach.
  • Develop rapport and trust with the local community.
  • Generate more traffic and leads to the website.
  • Customers are a valuable source of feedback and knowledge.

So how can you expand your local social media audience?

  • Include NAP, website URL, logo, etc., in a company profile on each platform. The NAP must be consistent on all platforms.
  • Optimize your profile for local keywords and hashtags that reflect the company and location of your business.
  • Share compelling information highlighting your goods or services that provide value or entertainment or tell a story about your company or customers.
  • Use photos, videos, live broadcasts, etc., to improve interaction and catch attention.
  • Publish regularly during reasonable times when the local audience of your business is most engaged online.
  • Engage with other local companies, influencers, groups, or people by liking, commenting on, or sharing their posts or messages.
  • Conduct competitions, giveaways, polls, and surveys to build buzz and interest in your business.
  • Use paid advertisements or sponsored posts to target specific regions, demographics, interests, etc., with tailored messaging.

Avoid common errors with your local SEO content strategy.

The last part of your local content strategy is avoiding common mistakes that could hurt your rankings, performance, reputation, etc. 

Examples of these errors include:

  • Creating boring, duplicate, short, useless content is worse than no content at all.
  • Overusing keywords or keyword stuffing renders content awkward or spammy.
  • Not matching the user’s intent and not focusing on your local community or their interests.
  • Having a website that is unprofessional and or not mobile-friendly.

To prevent these errors, you must:

  • Generate unique, creative, helpful, and exciting content that stands out.
  • Use keywords in your text without affecting readability, user experience, or naturalness.
  • Assess user intent through studying, analyzing, segmenting, customizing, etc., your target audience’s needs, desires, objectives, challenges, and queries.
  • Enhance mobile-friendliness by adopting responsive design Evaluate, monitor, measure, analyze, optimize, enhance, test, experiment, learn, adapt, refine, iterate, develop, expand, scale, repeat, etc., your website’s content often.

Conclusion

Developing a local content strategy for your organization takes a lot of work. Still, if done well, it can be very profitable.

A local content strategy may help you rank better in local search engine results, attract more consumers, give value, and solve issues. Build trust, authority, credibility, loyalty, brand recognition, traffic, leads, conversions, sales, and revenue growth. So if you are considering starting a local content strategy, the sooner the better.

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Robert Long is the owner of Seller's Bay and has been creating websites and promoting them via SEO and SEM for over 26 years.
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