Tailoring Your Blogs for Local Searches

The search engine optimization world is a very competitive one. Small, local businesses often have a difficult time competing with larger, more powerful organizations. Often, those corporations have impressive websites with a large number of links and other effective marketing tools. You must tailor your blog content for local searches.

Aspects of the competition–make sure to clearly determine who you want to search for you

When it comes to small businesses attempting to compete with large businesses, it can be an especially challenging situation because, in many cases, the large businesses have local franchises, several branches, or brick-and-mortar stores that compete with those small businesses for the ever-critical online search traffic. It can be really challenging with the widespread use of mobile devices and the technology that goes with it. If a mobile device user happens to conduct searches on his or her mobile device, it can potentially take away a great deal of business from the small business owners. Those device owners will probably be searching locally so that they can get what they need quickly and easily on a local level. However, if you think that it is impossible to compete with a large business just because your business is small, you should think again. Certainly, all hope is not lost. On a positive note for the small business owners, in many cases, the people who are doing the searching prefer a small, more personal, more down-home feel to the business with whom they do business. It is important for the small business owner to leverage the unique nature of his or her business and to make sure that the people who are searching understand the unique selling proposition (USP) clearly.

It is critical to connect  your brand and offerings with your geographic location

It is not uncommon for the blogs that local business owners post on their website to neglect a mention of the geographic location of the business. If that is the case, it will be very difficult for searchers to find those local businesses and pay them a visit. If you want other people to find you online, you must make sure to use keywords and key phrases that make it happen. You should be specific so that the people doing the searching find you before they find another business owner first.

Pay close attention to relevant local events

As a small business owner, you should take full advantage of  local events. They can really give you a great deal of mileage for your business. If you are able to attend local events that will benefit your business, there is absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t write about it afterward. It is a good way to offer your perspective as well as letting other people in on the benefits of that event even though they didn’t have the opportunity to attend for whatever reason. Another wonderfully positive result from attending events is that you can generate top-quality backlinks that will serve your business well. You may even wish to consider sponsoring an event of your own in which case you can certainly leverage backlinks to your website.

Make great use of subject matter experts in your geographic location

Let’s face it, everyone needs subject matter experts for their business and everyone aspires to being a subject matter expert (SME). There is talent all around you and it is for everyone’s benefit to tap into that talent. If you rely on SMEs to advise you and contribute content, you will be presenting a much more well-rounded presence than you would have otherwise. There are a great deal of benefits to using a SME, such as the following:

• Local businesses and business people (including you and yours) will be positively affected by presenting your SMEs to your other online connections. Doing that will also benefit the quality of the searches that are performed.

• All brand content will be brought to the next level for your business and the SME’s business.

• The two businesses will be giving valuable information (in all of its forms) to everyone.

• Both businesses will increase their client bases and they will gain a greater number of leads and clients eventually. Everyone wins in that situation.

Get involved with your local community

Not only is it important for you to get involved with your local community but it is also important for you to have a strongly mutually beneficial relationship. It will serve you and the people with whom you share a relationship extremely well.

Get the most out of your blog content and share it on social media channels

Social media channels are critical to your success. You would be surprised at how a simple thing like sharing social media content on your chosen channels can so often be overlooked. It is really important to be consistent and persistent when it comes to your social media sharing.  Remember that if you are sharing blog content, however, your job is to be informative and educational, not promotional. You should also make sure to share (syndicate) your content with all of the appropriate people on all of the appropriate social media channels.

Broaden your horizons

Of course, it is a well-established fact that SEO is very important. However, it is not the only important thing about which you should be paying attention. Your website will succeed because a variety of different elements are working together to create an effective unit that works well for your business.  Of course, it is extremely important to keep in mind that your content must keep your readers engaged and enticed. The more you are able to accomplish that, the more interested your readers will remain.

Conclusion

Your blog content can be extremely effective and you can get a great deal of mileage out of it. There are many important facets to your content and shareable links are certainly among them. You can also customize your content to bring in focused, specific searchers and search results. The stronger your professional reputation is, the more people will become loyal to you and will remain with you permanently. It is very important to keep in mind that you must tailor your blog not only to fit your target audience but also to make it easy for that target audience to be able to search on a more local, more personal level.