One of the first and most important steps is to find the right keywords that customers will use to find or search for you.

If you own a restaurant in Orange County, California, using “orange county restaurants” as a keyword phrase will be important to you.

Create an excel spreadsheet to keep track of your keyword ideas. It may be tricky to rank for your most important phrase depending on how much competition you have.

The main focus when coming up with your keyword phrases is to understand the language your customers will use to search for a business like yours.

(If you need some help researching the right keywords for your audience, our free marketing analysis will help point you in the right direction.)

Don’t take outdated advice to “stuff” your content with keywords. It’s not good for search engines or your customers. Instead create a reasonable amount of high quality content which is important for both your visitors and search engines.

Customize your meta title. Keep in mind that this is what most platforms use as the title when your content is shared on social sites so make it appealing and useful to your readers.

Update your meta description. Google will usually publish this on the search engine results page so make it attractive and inviting.

You should also include your city and state in your content where it’s natural. This will help let visitors and search engines know where you are located.

As a local business your Contact page can be the second most important page on your website…so get the most out of it.

      - The name of your company/business
      - The address where you are located
      - The primary phone number

I am sure you might have heard of Google Places or Google + Local pages. But if you haven’t you aren’t alone. Do you need one, both, or neither?

Google Places is the information search engines use when listing your business. The search engines might already have your business listed in results, but your Google Places page will give you control on what information Google has and displays to potential customers or people searching for your business. You can fill this page with information like a description, hours of operation, and contact information.

A Google+ Local page is more about connecting with your customers. It also allows you to get more exposure. They add social interaction to your listing and give you an opportunity to create a path of communication with your customers by responding to their reviews and creating post updates.

It’s vital for businesses to get involved in both for two major reasons:

      - It helps put you in control of your brand.
      - It helps you gain more visibility.

Both are easy to use and FREE to set up. With so many searches made each month, Visibility and control of your online presence are a must.

Do not use fake reviews. It will only create issues for you later on when search engines or customers catch on to what you are doing.

Try asking your customers kindly who have done business with you to leave a review on your Google+ Local page or yelp. Give them options. Let them choose their preferred service. More options = more results.

Check your social profiles and make sure they include your physical location. Include the city, state, business name, and URL back to your website. Keep these consistent across each of your platforms.

Mobile is the future! Your customers are constantly on the move looking for your business on their mobile devices. If you don’t have a mobile presence yet, you need to get up to speed. Think about getting your website mobile responsive so you’re your customers can have a better experience when they visit your site. Give consideration to how your most important sites look to your mobile viewers. 

Set up the tools that will help you track and analyze your results. Glance weekly over your impressions and click of your keywords in Google Webmaster tools. Check Google Analytic's to see if your organic traffic is improving.