How do people determine where to go, what to buy, and what to do next?
Even during the height of the pandemic, customer-centric digital experiences reigned supreme.
Customers owe most of these pleasant and high-impact digital experiences to effective location pages and local SEO. Location pages help deliver timely, relevant, and geographically specific results through search engines like Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc. While Google remains the biggest search engine in terms of market share, let’s not forget that when a business engages in the best practices for location pages and local SEO, it also optimizes for multiple search engines, not just Google.
The benefits of well-devised location pages are endless.
 What are Location Pages?
At its core, location pages are all about attracting traffic, converting visitors into customers, and keeping them coming back for more. As a result of these three factors interacting, user involvement, visibility, and rankings, combined with the overall user experience, are all ultimately enriched. Location pages also serve as the central point that makes all these things possible.
Whatever services or products you offer, location pages are a great way to get your name out there. These specialized pages work hard to keep users engaged. Location pages also provide updated and relevant information based on their local search. People will reach out to your business, and you’ll also be able to keep up with potential customers, boosting the potential of more sales.
 Are Location Pages Needed for Good SEO?
Yes, location pages are essential for good local SEO.
Specifically, local SEO benefits from location pages that provide good content. We’ll get back to what ‘good content’ means in this context in just a bit. Your business needs to be as bright as a star on people’s mobile phones to appear continuously in local recommendations.
Many years ago, the battle for market dominance had shifted to the mobile world. If your website still looks like a ledger on mobile because it lacks responsive design and other essentials of a good website in 2022, you’re probably not getting that many clicks or conversions. Either way, you will lose because your site is not ready to serve the massive influx of customers who do almost everything on their mobile phones nowadays.
 What Are the Benefits of Location Pages?
- Location pages can boost the visibility of your entire site, as long as those pages are not orphaned and are appropriately integrated with the rest of the site. Orphaned pages won’t deliver the same results, so be sure to think of a good strategy for adding these pages to the site’s current schema. Location pages are crucial for local SEO success, but they must be appropriately positioned, too.
- A location page is unique because it represents just one real-world location and emphasizes all the good things about your business in that location.
- These pages are naturally authoritative, so from a logical standpoint; customers will be more interested in checking out your business’ local page first than the main website since they will get information that is pertinent to where they live or where they intend to go physically since the location is closest to their home.
- Properly optimized location pages are Google index-friendly, are responsive on mobile, and have the proper information and links to enrich the customer experience. Make customer-centric experiences central to your local SEO strategy, and you will reap big rewards in the end.
- Location pages can help you manage your reputation online. Think of all the local pages auto-generated by companies like Google, Yelp, and Facebook. These local pages are generated by keyword queries and demand for a digital pin on these locations. The best way forward is to claim these pages and link them to the appropriate location pages. Or, if the business page is not specifically local to a city or town, you can probably highlight or link to different location pages to keep customers updated.
- You can boost site authority on search engines like Bing and Google by creating location pages (landing pages for different cities/towns/states) on your website. Location pages signal to search engines that these pages are essential to those performing queries for local businesses, ranking it higher in SERPs. Therefore, on-page signals on location pages are considered top-tier ranking variables for local SEO efforts.
Search engines can gauge the value of any page on the web by the number and quality of links pointing to it. Therefore, it’s just as essential to make sure that your location data is accurate and consistent to ensure that all your social pages are in sync with your location pages.
Search engines like Bing and Google love authoritative links from aligned social pages. Location pages are a great place to build these high-value links—the more links originating from different locations, the better the results.
- Location pages are also practical. No two business locations are ever the same. Location pages provide relevant information to customers like business hours, staff profiles, contact numbers for the staff (whenever available), etc. If you own a franchise, you can promote branch-specific specials and discounts and even provide a channel to give customers coupons and other offers. Differentiating content is essential. Consider enriching your location pages with local links to other sites that you think will be useful for those coming to that location.
How Do You Create the Best Location Pages?
Luckily, getting impressive results from your landing pages doesn’t require super complex local SEO. However, the small details count – so we’re going to explore those ‘small details’ that make location pages for SMBs and organizations explode in local searches.
 Make Sure You Have the Minimum in Place
We understand that it takes time to create the best location pages. In the beginning, it might be a good idea to focus first on the core elements that make them work well – even if it may take some time before you can build up your location pages to their ‘maximum’ form. Below are these essentials:
-   Branding basics – Apart from the logo, it’s essential that you immediately work into the location page what your branding is about. Don’t skimp on detail and worry about ‘overdelivering’ your past merits.
-  Complete business details – Apart from your business name, make sure that you already have a store locator widget in place, plus your business address and phone number. Emails – all active – should all be part of your location page.
-  Images – Local images are essential as people are typically skeptical of new business pages. By showing customers that you and your staff are alive and kicking, you’re well on your way to impressing them and triggering engagement and conversions.
 It’s All in the Language and Keywords
Google loves unique content. While the search engine knows that there will be similarities between what businesses provide their customers, the algorithm is always looking for fresh page content and metadata helpful to customers. One way to make your location pages more attractive to both search engines and users is by incorporation relevant keywords into the copy.
For example, if you have a new wedding photography business in Orlando, don’t just repeat “photography” and “Orlando” throughout the copy. Just adding keywords won’t be effective. Instead, you must place additional context and content that distinguishes this business location from the others. Content uniqueness is equivalent to possible real-world insights and demonstrations of how the business works or operates.
Essential keywords about the business and location must be present in the headline, the first part of the content, and the content’s H1/H2/H3 tags. You have to sustain the narrative about how great the business is in that location.
Don’t forget to add important details like your business address and contact information (email and phone number) on every location page as well – don’t neglect the header and footer areas!
Google has an immense database of related keywords and phrases, so the machine learning component of the search engine will create links between what is on the location page and what it ‘knows’ of the area. This learning process for the search engine is continuous, and let us tell you, language matters the most when creating that content for location pages.
 Install a Store Locator Widget
Every business serving multiple locations should have a store locator widget on its site. These are easy to install using WordPress.
To provide the best experience to customers (which consequently increases the value of your site in the eyes of Google), be sure to add the coordinates of your locations to each Google My Business profile before linking the same to your social media channels.
Every relevant connection adds value and weight to your location pages, primary site, local pages on social networks, and so on. Create a network of pages that point customers in the right direction, and you’re sure to get good results.
Just make sure that those latitude and longitude coordinates are correct, so people can use their smartphones to drive to those locations. We wouldn’t want people using your store locator and ending up in the wrong street or avenue.
 Connect Your Social Media Accounts
Many widgets or plugins allow you to share what’s going on in your day-to-day operations with old and new customers. Let’s face it – we like businesses that appear active and well.
Compare a business with a ton of Instagram posts with one that has one post from six months ago, and you know what I mean. Activity is a sign that the business is open and is doing well. We prefer companies that are doing well in the pandemic. Customers are also looking for signs that you are a good fit for their needs. For example, a New Jersey carpet cleaning company that shares TikTok videos of how they clean carpets and solve tough stains is more likely to pique the interest of new customers than generic copy, which brings us to the following technique – bringing out the best of your business.
 Bring Out the Best in Your Brand
When you’re done optimizing all the technical details of a location page, it’s time to focus on the actual content. Creating content for a location page requires marketing know-how and branding smarts. Businesses should think about what makes their business unique and produce great content based on those vital points.
The value-add is also an essential aspect of the branding process. The location page is there to inform and entice – how are you going to do that even if there’s lots of competition around you? Don’t forget to incorporate winnable keywords related to your product or service as you create that unique content.
 Integrate Social Proof
Proof that other people have purchased and have also found value in a brand is called social proof. Social proof can boost sales and build brand awareness while telling people – hey, this business is something to look forward to. Social proof also increases brand popularity and can even help your business become more visible on social media. Individuals are more likely to buy if others are already doing so.
Product reviews, testimonials, and even plain comments on product pages are all types of social proof. Social proof can provide measurable data (“Over 30,000 downloads and 1,000 5-star reviews!”)
These metrics help develop trust, communicate value, and ultimately increase conversions and sales.
Social psychology’s bandwagon concept asserts that individuals are more inclined to act if other people are already doing it immediately. The essentials of all motivational elements can be found in social proof, even if the evidence is found online.
Social proof triggers the belief in the wisdom of the crowd. If two million customers are seemingly happy with a service, you are likely to appreciate the benefits and features.
