In this week’s episode, the first in a mini series about signals that influence Local SEO, I talk about local content. Most sites have boring, generic content – learn how awesome, localized content will help you stand out and attract more customers.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

Welcome back to another episode of Local Search Tuesdays. This week, we’re continuing down the Local SEO signals road and talking about your website content.

In last week’s video, I talked about how Google uses different algorithms to return search results, and how in the following weeks, I’d walk you through the most important signals that influence your visibility in searches.

I’m starting with website content – because it’s literally the basis of everything else you do in digital marketing. It’s how you tell people what your business does. It’s how you show you’re relevant to Google, so Google will show you as a search result. And most importantly, it’s how you let people know that you’re awesome.

You need to have awesome content on your site that explains what you do. Don’t assume that Google will show you as a search result because it knows what kind of business you are. At a basic level, if you want to show up in search results for a certain search phrase, you need a page about that concept on your website.

Most websites have really boring, generic content – here’s an emoji that symbolizes that content… and for everyone out there who doesn’t know, that’s not chocolate yogurt.

You need awesome content to show up in search results – but you also need it to stand out from competitors. Customers are shopping around – so make sure you stand out!

Stop worrying so much just about being unique. There’s a big myth that there’s a penalty for duplicate content. There’s not – but duplicate content doesn’t help you either. But because most people think there’s a penalty, their number one goal is to be unique – but then the content ends up sounding really odd.

Remember – your content needs to be conversational – it should sound like something you’d say to a customer who just walked in your front door.

Make sure it’s actually ABOUT your business – and why you’re awesome. Make sure it’s actually localized too – don’t just shove your city name in a bunch of times, and don’t list a bunch of “cities you also serve” in a comma separated list – that’s not gonna help you show up in those cities, so don’t do it.

If there are 10 competitors in a market, and 9 have incredibly generic content and don’t really mention their city, but you have awesome, robust content that also clearly shows you’re a part of the local community, you’ll show up more often in searches. Or, just so I can use it again… If you’re talking about your business AND your city, you’ll be more relevant than your competitors with the not-chocolate-yogurt content and you’ll win.

There’s no magic number for word length – but typically, longer, well-written content will outrank shorter, generic content. Think about the question you’re answering with that particular page, and write the best possible answer. If that best answer is only 600 words, don’t add 400 words of fluff just to hit 1000 words.

You’ve got to rock a blog too. Don’t talk all about yourself, no one cares. Make your blog a local destination – share helpful information for the local community. If your blog content is only about your business and what you sell, then your content is only relevant for someone ready to buy your stuff right now – and that’s probably a pretty narrow focus on the potential local audience.

If you’re sharing helpful info about the general local area, you’re throwing out a wider net, and exposing your business to people who aren’t ready to buy – but when they are ready to buy, they’re more likely to buy from you since they’re already familiar with you. It’s almost like putting up a billboard on the highway.

Plus, as you add more localized content, you build more local relevancy, which helps your site outpace competitors and show up in more searches.

If you need help coming up with ideas for localized content, I’ll be doing a video in a few weeks that shares tons of ideas. And make sure you check back next week, when I’ll be talking about how to do local optimization on all your awesome content.

But, that’s all the time we’ve got for this week’s video, so you know what that means…

Put your hand on the screen right here:
We totally just high-fived ‘cause you learned something awesome. Thanks again for watching, and don’t forget to come back next week for another episode of Local Search Tuesdays.